Anthropology 2222F/G Lecture Notes - Identity Politics

• School: Western University
• Department: Anthropology
• Course: Anthropology 2222F/G
• Professor: Andrew Walsh

Document Summary

Who we are is ultimately determined to the affiliations we had, the labels we can give ourselves and the people around us. There is a feeling of belonging to certain groups or a single group leve 2011: 513. A relatively new keyword in the field. Studies of ethnic or ethnicity: how do groups of people organize and/ or imagine themselves as members of distinct ethnic groups. Studies of identity politics: how do identity claims figure in political action. Opportunities to align our work with the interests of marginalized groups in need of support: longstanding history of anthropologists supporting the identity based claims of indigenous peoples. But also attention to how our perspective on ideintity as an analytical concept differs from that of those with whom we work: concerns over identity much like concerns over culture. As you might expect, anthropological studies of identity tend to suggest the complexity of what many of us experience as very simple, even fundamental.