For a History of Anthropology in the Plural

Abstract

What are the reasons behind the “scientific” positioning that anthropology had adopted since its origins up to a few decades ago? They were certainly cognitive reasons, but they were intertwined with political concerns, ideological frameworks and cultural references. The urge to gain academic legitimacy, reliance on “Western-centric” perspectives and the aspiration to build broad, universal knowledge all played a role. Another significant role was played by its involvement in the project and the projection of colonial supremacy. These are all implicit factors that started to take on an increasingly deliberate problematic form, and finally culminated in the “crisis of representation”, falling into the wide-open sea of post-modernism, in an effort to “give a voice” to those who, despite everything, still did not have one. The structure of anthropology, which was a Western projection and, inside the West, a projection of modernity on the domestic “pockets” of backwardness, was forced to change because it was challenged by the increasingly strong quests for pluralism and the consequent requirement to rethink its very organisation. In our essay, we present and sustain the many reasons at the basis of the actual quest for pluralism in anthropology.