After Group 1’s presentation this week, I was left questioning the position of the anthropologist in their diagram in two ways.

First, Grace acknowledged that they intentionally placed the anthropologists within the production of culture, noting the anthropologist’s role is to not merely be an outsider viewing the inside. In other words, the fact that the anthropologist is observing a culture means that they are embedded in their culture and their presence has an impact (like that funny cartoon shown at the beginning of class). If the anthropologists’ presence impacts the interactions of the people they’re observing, I am left wondering how it can be that the anthropologist could be able to systematically deduce some version of “truth” if their very presence alters the interactions and observations they make? I think back to Mitchell and how this is the very question that he asks and the solution he poses is that there is no “truth” but merely versions of “truth” in certain time periods and histories. Then, I am left wondering if it is possible for anthropologists to measure or systematically describe their own limited location and knowledge in relation to the people they are observing – would they need another person to observe how they are observing? But perhaps that isn’t the point as long as one is able to accomplish ethnography and thickly describe, then perhaps not being able to completely describe your positionality as an anthropologist is ok.

Second, I’ve been thinking more about the position and role of the anthropologists. Ginsburg notes that there is a responsibility for anthropologists to support unarticulated voices and to critically analyze the way in which those with power use media. Looking back on Group 1’s diagram, they placed the anthropologists between knowledge and power, and I would also think about adding another arrow from the anthropologists to the “outputted culture.” Ginsburg notes the unique position that anthropologists have: “But our stance as intellectuals is what enables us to articulate and make public our critical analyses  (22).” By adding this arrow from anthropologists to outputted culture,  anthropologists have a stake in the production of knowledge where they can use the same knowledge that is going to those in power but select, represent, and articulate that knowledge in a different way. It’s like what Geertz has said, the role of anthropologists is to open human discourse, and I suppose what I am concluding from Ginsburg is that opening human discourse means offering different forms of media other than those shaped by positions of power.