2 - Anthropological resistance

Summary

Our insistence that anthropologists need to study internalization is not new: The point has been made by cognitive anthropologists (e.g., D'Andrade 1984 and Sperber 1985a) and other psychological anthropologists (e.g., Obeyesekere 1981,1990; Shore 1991,1996; and Spiro 1987a) for many years. Others who have made some of the same points include Bloch (1985), Barth (1975, 1987), and Wikan (1990). Still, our concern with psychology and our use of the term, “internalization,” is likely to meet with resistance from many anthropologists. Before we go any further we need to consider why, and try to disarm these objections.

We expect dissent to come from several quarters, especially from Geertzian and neo-Geertzian interpretivists, Foucauldian poststructuralists and other postmodernists, some contemporary historical materialists, and those cognitive and linguistic anthropologists who study cognition in practice (or discourse pragmatics). Each of these schools is associated with a characteristic stance on psychology, meanings, and culture. Geertzian interpretivists have stressed the publicness of meaning, cognition, and culture. Foucauldian postmodernists have argued for the constructedness of culture and of the self. Some contemporary historical materialists highlight the importance of resistance to cultural meanings. Finally, many of our colleagues in cognitive and linguistic anthropology focus on the way thought and meaning are situated. We will present and counter these four possible critiques of our approach, showing that there is no incompatibility between a reasonable version of those claims and ours.