Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism

Classical logic, Hegel observed, is premised on atomistic categories, forcing its think-ers to apply either–or judgements – contingency or necessity, universal or particular, discrete or continuous, and so forth. Dialectical reason, by contrast, recognises such seeming antitheses as mutually constit...

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Main Author: Campbell, Stephen
Other Authors: School of Social Sciences
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: 2020
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Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/145466
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Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
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spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-1454662023-03-05T15:34:16Z Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism Campbell, Stephen School of Social Sciences Social sciences::Sociology Anthropology Capitalism Classical logic, Hegel observed, is premised on atomistic categories, forcing its think-ers to apply either–or judgements – contingency or necessity, universal or particular, discrete or continuous, and so forth. Dialectical reason, by contrast, recognises such seeming antitheses as mutually constitutive sides of conceptual wholes – empty, that is, in and of themselves (Hegel 2010 [1812]).This insight gains relevance for the anthropology of capitalism due to our discip-line’s penchant for polemical reasoning, and one notable instance thereof. While its roots lie in earlier debates, the birth of Anthropology’s culture wars can be most read-ily set in the mid- 1970s. For it was then that Marvin Harris (1974) published his Cows, pigs, wars, and witches, followed by Marshall Sahlins’ (1976) Culture and practical reason. For Harris, human cultural diversity could best be understood, not through ‘spiritualized’ explanations, but by tracing particular cultural phenomena back to their ‘down- to- earth’ material causes (1974: 4). For Sahlins (1976), by contrast, cultures were to be understood as symbolic orders operating according to meaningful internal logics rather than to cross- culturally recognisable material conditions. Accepted version 2020-12-22T07:57:23Z 2020-12-22T07:57:23Z 2019 Journal Article Campbell, S. (2019). Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism. Social Anthropology, 27(3), 547-553. doi:10.1111/1469-8676.12597 0964-0282 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/145466 10.1111/1469-8676.12597 3 27 547 553 en Social Anthropology © 2018 European Association of Social Anthropologists. All rights reserved. This paper was published by Wiley in Social Anthropology and is made available with permission of European Association of Social Anthropologists. application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider NTU Library
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic Social sciences::Sociology
Anthropology
Capitalism
spellingShingle Social sciences::Sociology
Anthropology
Capitalism
Campbell, Stephen
Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
description Classical logic, Hegel observed, is premised on atomistic categories, forcing its think-ers to apply either–or judgements – contingency or necessity, universal or particular, discrete or continuous, and so forth. Dialectical reason, by contrast, recognises such seeming antitheses as mutually constitutive sides of conceptual wholes – empty, that is, in and of themselves (Hegel 2010 [1812]).This insight gains relevance for the anthropology of capitalism due to our discip-line’s penchant for polemical reasoning, and one notable instance thereof. While its roots lie in earlier debates, the birth of Anthropology’s culture wars can be most read-ily set in the mid- 1970s. For it was then that Marvin Harris (1974) published his Cows, pigs, wars, and witches, followed by Marshall Sahlins’ (1976) Culture and practical reason. For Harris, human cultural diversity could best be understood, not through ‘spiritualized’ explanations, but by tracing particular cultural phenomena back to their ‘down- to- earth’ material causes (1974: 4). For Sahlins (1976), by contrast, cultures were to be understood as symbolic orders operating according to meaningful internal logics rather than to cross- culturally recognisable material conditions.
author2 School of Social Sciences
author_facet School of Social Sciences
Campbell, Stephen
format Article
author Campbell, Stephen
author_sort Campbell, Stephen
title Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
title_short Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
title_full Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
title_fullStr Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
title_full_unstemmed Towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
title_sort towards a dialectical anthropology of capitalism
publishDate 2020
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/145466
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