Critical Reflection, Academic Freedom, and Anthropological Pluralism
Public scholarship must balance an impulse to contribute to socially responsible policy and action with a critical awareness of the possible dangers and myopias of advocacy and social engagement. The Public Anthropology Initiative sponsors talks and workshops in order to address the following questions: How does social engagement affect the ways in which anthropologists think about their methods and theories? What methods are useful for different purposes and audiences? What is the value of integrating public anthropology into regular anthropology courses? How can anthropologists effectively help undergraduates and others recognize the value of anthropological thinking outside of the academy? How do anthropologists ethically deal with the possibilities that their public engagement may be both empowering and paternalistic?
Discussions about public anthropology should also consider the dangers that accompany different ways of politicizing knowledge and linking scholarship to issues of public concern. Duke PhD candidate Yektan Turkyilmaz’s imprisonment in Armenia while conducting dissertation research highlights the importance of principles of scholarly freedom, and perhaps even academic distance. http://www.dukemagazine.duke.edu/dukemag/issues/111205/yektan1.html
Public engagement can also inform, and sometimes transform, the ways in which anthropologists approach their work. By providing opportunities for collectively reflecting on public engagement, the initiative also aims to foster the reconsideration theory and method. The variety of publics with which anthropologists might engage have, or require, very different standards of evidence and argumentation. By discussing the intentional use of different research and representation strategies for different purposes, we also hope to reinvigorate an appreciation of anthropological pluralism – seeing the variety of anthropological approaches as a strength for both scholars and the multiple publics that might find anthropology to offer something of value.