Anthropology 4400E Chapter online reading: Anthro 4400 Reading Notes on “Beyond the Suffering Subject: Toward an Anthropology of the Good” by Robbins

• School: Western University
• Department: Anthropology
• Course: Anthropology 4400E
• Professor: Dan Jorgensen

Document Summary

Anthro 4400 reading notes on beyond the suffering. In 1980s anthropologists stopped studying societies that were the other". Robbins argues that the replacement has been the suffering subject". He says and now there"s a shift towards an anthropology of the good". He stresses on how anthropologists have lost sight of the cultural point - that cultural differences are very deep and that they touch on fundamental aspects of human existence. Our own values as social scientists determines what we choose to work or focus on. The suffering subject came to replace the study of the other. This focused on the subject living in pain, poverty or violence, oppression etc. Makes reference to trouillot who famously wrote about how anthropologists study the savage, primitive and radically other and needs to break out of this con ning lot quickly if it is to survive in the future.