Lively, forceful, and impassioned, Unwrapping the Sacred Bundle is a major intervention in debates about the configuration of the discipline of anthropology. In the essays brought together in this provocative collection, prominent anthropologists consider the effects of and alternatives to the discipline's standard four-field structure based on the integration of archaeology and biological, socio-cultural, and linguistic anthropology. While the contributors are not in full agreement with one another, their critiques all diverge from "official" definitions of anthropology as having a fixed, four-field core. They argue for the historical contingency of the discipline's present configuration and question its efficacy. The essayists consider the fragmented state of anthropology, its relation to other disciplines and the public sphere beyond academia, the significance of the convergence of linguistic and cultural anthropology, and whether or not anthropology is the best home for archaeology. Daniel A. Segal and Sylvia J. Yanagisako provide a powerful introduction to the volume.Unabashed in their criticism of the four-field structure, they trace its origins to nineteenth-century social evolutionary thought.
Urging active engagement with other disciplines, they address the fears that anthropology will cede its claim to empirical integrity if it embraces the humanities. The editors are keenly aware that anthropology is too protean and complex to be remade along the lines of any master plan, and this volume does not offer one. It does open discussions of anthropology's institutional structure to all possible outcomes, including the refashioning of the discipline as it now exists. Contributors James Clifford Ian Hodder Rena Lederman Daniel A. Segal Michael Silverstein Sylvia J. Yanagisako
Industry Reviews
"A provocative and problematizing look at the history and present state of anthropology in the United States, a century after the 'sacred bundle' was first questioned by its patron saint and uniquely preeminent practitioner, Franz Boas. Revolutionary in editorial intent, diversely dialogical in the essays themselves, this volume should be read and pondered by all those interested in the future of anthropology and its role in general intellectual discourse."--George W. Stocking Jr., Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus, University of Chicago "Anthropology is perhaps the last of the great nineteenth-century conglomerate disciplines still for the most part organizationally intact. Long after natural history, moral philosophy, philology, and political economy have dissolved into their specialized successors, it has remained a diffuse assemblage of ethnology, human biology, comparative linguistics, and prehistory, held together mainly by the vested interests, sunk costs, and administrative habits of academia, and by a romantic image of comprehensive scholarship. In this intense, precise, and sharply written book, six leading anthropologists from a variety of subfields question both the logic and the effectiveness of such sentimental 'holism' and produce a powerful critique of their profession's mythology."--Clifford Geertz, Institute for Advanced Study "This book provides a challenging and creative set of 'reflections.' ... This volume will be appreciated by any serious student of anthropological history or the anthropology of intellectual life. It will be welcomed by anyone looking to define contemporary anthropology and chart its future course."--Daniel Reichman, Journal of Latin American Anthropology
