Philosophical Anthropology

The Encyclopaedia of Anthropology deals with the nature and position of Anthropology as a subject among various fields like culture, social, political, cognitive, genetic, philosophy and peace etc. It explains its development, theoretical orientation and methods, its social and cultural background, fundamental concepts, civilization, kinship system, etc. Anthropology is both science and history. Therefore, the strict history-or-science dichotomy is inapplicable to anthropology. Scientific-nomothetic explanations cannot be reduced to historical explanations as the latter, cannot be reduced to the former. Any conclusion regarding the impossibility of scientific-nomothetic anthropology is simply a non sequitur because such a kind of anthropology is possible, at least in principle, if not in practice. The old bias in anthropology towards the study of the rural and powerless is now being corrected, and work is undertaken on elites and politicians as well as those whom they lead. Leadership and power in the Third World rest with social groups that are at once indigenous and in a number of cases alienated firom those over whom they preside. The science of anthropology grows as members of previously non-participating cultures come to share in the gathering and interpretation of data, the building theory. We learn objectivity by studying other peoples,gain insight by the studies that others make of us and achieve responsibility by applying the results of our rapidly changing, evolving world. Each volumes in this encyclopaedia brings together significant contributions with some aspect of a science that is increasingly complex, vital and related to the future.