Great piece Eric, as always. I actually feel like this came at a perfect time for me - I’ve been struggling with proximity on a fiction series Im working on and I think Grants philosophy is something I never could find the words for but felt so this was eye-opening
Dude, that's awesome -- thanks for sharing!! This is a really helpful bit of advice when I approach writing; I'm glad to hear it's working for you when it comes to fiction!
Wonderfully written! As someone who grew up Southern Baptist, I was raised to be a missionary. It’s very hard to unlearn the “entitlement to good deeds” that I believe we learn.
My only note (not really for you, but in general) is that anthropology suffers from the same colonialist/western mindset that missionary work does. Thankfully, the field is acknowledging that and moving forward in a big way. I hope that one day I can say “I try to look at things as an anthropologist” and not feel the intense need to clarify about 15 points!
I really enjoy the framing that the quote you used proposes here, that one side, being a missionary, is about imposition, and the other is about observation. I think one of the things that I often think about is that, if set up to its fullest extent, that dichotomy would be (and was, for a long time) imposition vs. extraction.
We benefit from our time as “anthropologists” whenever we put on that hat and go somewhere. We have to do the work to make sure we are not taking without giving something truly helpful in return. (A lesson I think I’ll keep learning my whole life.)
Merrilee, thank you for the super thoughtful response -- I appreciate your note about anthropology here, and you are totally right! I think Grant (and I know I) am looking at "anthropology" more as the Platonic ideal of the practice of observation, as opposed to how anthropology has been culturally/academically deployed -- but I definitely am glad to have an opportunity to be precise in my framing of these thoughts!
Great piece Eric, as always. I actually feel like this came at a perfect time for me - I’ve been struggling with proximity on a fiction series Im working on and I think Grants philosophy is something I never could find the words for but felt so this was eye-opening
Dude, that's awesome -- thanks for sharing!! This is a really helpful bit of advice when I approach writing; I'm glad to hear it's working for you when it comes to fiction!
Wonderfully written! As someone who grew up Southern Baptist, I was raised to be a missionary. It’s very hard to unlearn the “entitlement to good deeds” that I believe we learn.
My only note (not really for you, but in general) is that anthropology suffers from the same colonialist/western mindset that missionary work does. Thankfully, the field is acknowledging that and moving forward in a big way. I hope that one day I can say “I try to look at things as an anthropologist” and not feel the intense need to clarify about 15 points!
I really enjoy the framing that the quote you used proposes here, that one side, being a missionary, is about imposition, and the other is about observation. I think one of the things that I often think about is that, if set up to its fullest extent, that dichotomy would be (and was, for a long time) imposition vs. extraction.
We benefit from our time as “anthropologists” whenever we put on that hat and go somewhere. We have to do the work to make sure we are not taking without giving something truly helpful in return. (A lesson I think I’ll keep learning my whole life.)
Merrilee, thank you for the super thoughtful response -- I appreciate your note about anthropology here, and you are totally right! I think Grant (and I know I) am looking at "anthropology" more as the Platonic ideal of the practice of observation, as opposed to how anthropology has been culturally/academically deployed -- but I definitely am glad to have an opportunity to be precise in my framing of these thoughts!
As a former religious studies major I long for the days of the platonic ideal of anthropology 😭