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Anthropology of art is a sub-field in social anthropology dedicated to the study of art in different cultural contexts. The anthropology of art focuses on historical, economic and aesthetic dimensions in non-Western art forms, including what is known as 'tribal art'.
Franz Boas, one of the pioneers of modern anthropology, conducted many field studies of the arts, helping create a foundation to the field. His book, Primitive Art (1927), summarizes his main insights into so-called 'primitive' art forms, with a detailed case study on the arts of the Northwest Pacific Coast. [1] The famous anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss took Boas' analyses further in his book The Way of the Masks, where he traced changes in the plastic form of Northwest Pacific masks to patterns of intercultural interaction among the indigenous peoples of the coast. [2]
Essential contributions made to the field of art anthropology by M.N. Haidle showcase the biological changes necessary for humans to evolve creative capacities. [3] These changes include precise hand-eye coordination, improvements in information processing systems, improved aesthetic awareness and prioritization, process-oriented teaching, advancements in communication, and the application of abstract concepts. [4] Individuals that have developed such structural and cognitive advancements are enabled to produce art and will be evolutionarily selected for. Ellen Dissanayake has published work which contributes to this concept and suggests that creativity was practiced by only the most fit individuals within a population. Since artistic involvement is not an essential duty, it could only be produced once survival tasks were completed, and therefore, individuals with the highest fitness could partake. This exemplifies the selection of artistic individuals, since fitness is concomitant with participation in leisure activity. [5] Gillian Morriss-Kay addressed preliminary artistic patters like zig-zag, criss-cross, and parallel lines. [6] Use of patterns indicate advancements in cognition and signify an evolutionary step towards increasing complexity in imaginative capability. [7] Early interpretations of the human form, as seen in the Venus Figurines and the Lion-Man reflect this evolutionary step by indicating awareness of anatomy and the function of symbolism. [8]
One of the central problems in the anthropology of art concerns the universality of 'art' as a cultural phenomenon. Several anthropologists have noted that the Western categories of 'painting', 'sculpture', or 'literature', conceived as independent artistic activities, do not exist, or exist in a significantly different form, in most non-Western contexts. [9] Thus, there is no consensus on a single, cross-cultural definition of 'art' in anthropology. [10] [11] To surmount this difficulty, anthropologists of art have focused on formal features in objects which, without exclusively being 'artistic', have certain evident 'aesthetic' qualities. Boas' Primitive Art, Claude Lévi-Strauss' The Way of the Masks (1982) or Geertz's 'Art as Cultural System' (1983) are some examples in this trend to transform the anthropology of 'art' into an anthropology of culturally-specific 'aesthetics'. More recently, in his book Art and Agency (1998), Alfred Gell proposed a new definition of 'art' as a complex system of intentionality, where artists produce art objects to effect changes in the world, including (but not restricted to) changes in the aesthetic perceptions of art audiences. [12] Gell's ideas stirred a controversy in the anthropology of art in the following decade. [13] [14] [15]
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavior, while cultural anthropology studies cultural meaning, including norms and values. The term sociocultural anthropology is commonly used today. Linguistic anthropology studies how language influences social life. Biological or physical anthropology studies the biological development of humans.
Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans. It is in contrast to social anthropology, which perceives cultural variation as a subset of a posited anthropological constant. The term sociocultural anthropology includes both cultural and social anthropology traditions.
Ethnology is an academic field and discipline that compares and analyzes the characteristics of different peoples and the relationships between them.
Franz Uri Boas was a German-American anthropologist and a pioneer of modern anthropology who has been called the "Father of American Anthropology". His work is associated with the movements known as historical particularism and cultural relativism.
In the arts, bricolage is the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things that happen to be available, or a work constructed using mixed media.
Material culture is the aspect of culture manifested by the physical objects and architecture of a society. The term is primarily used in archaeology and anthropology, but is also of interest to sociology, geography and history. The field considers artifacts in relation to their specific cultural and historic contexts, communities and belief systems. It includes the usage, consumption, creation and trade of objects as well as the behaviors, norms and rituals that the objects create or take part in.
Robert Harry Lowie was an Austrian-born American anthropologist. An expert on Indigenous peoples of the Americas, he was instrumental in the development of modern anthropology and has been described as "one of the key figures in the history of anthropology".
Boasian anthropology was a school within American anthropology founded by Franz Boas in the late 19th century.
The avunculate, sometimes called avunculism or avuncularism, is any social institution where a special relationship exists between an uncle and his sisters' children. This relationship can be formal or informal, depending on the society. Early anthropological research focused on the association between the avunculate and matrilineal descent, while later research has expanded to consider the avunculate in general society.
Ellen Dissanayake, an American anthropologist and writer focusing on art and culture. She lives in Seattle, Washington, and is affiliated with the University of Washington.
Alfred Antony Francis Gell, was a British social anthropologist whose most influential work concerned art, language, symbolism and ritual. He was trained by Edmund Leach and Raymond Firth and did his fieldwork in Melanesia and tribal India. Gell taught at the London School of Economics, among other places. He was also a Fellow of the British Academy. He died of cancer in 1997, at the age of 51.
Dan Sperber is a French social and cognitive scientist, anthropologist and philosopher. His most influential work has been in the fields of cognitive anthropology, linguistic pragmatics, psychology of reasoning, and philosophy of the social sciences. He has developed: an approach to cultural evolution known as the epidemiology of representations or cultural attraction theory as part of a naturalistic reconceptualization of the social; relevance theory; the argumentative theory of reasoning. Sperber formerly Directeur de Recherche at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique is Professor in the Departments of Cognitive Science and of Philosophy at the Central European University in Budapest.
Michael Eugene Harkin is one of the leading anthropologists in the United States specializing in the ethnohistory of indigenous people of the western U.S. and Canada. He is currently professor and former chair of anthropology at the University of Wyoming, having previously taught at Emory University and Montana State University. In 2011 he was Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Cultural Studies at the Karl-Franzens University in Graz, Austria, and in 2007 he was a visiting professor at Shanghai University.
Claude Lévi-Strauss was a French anthropologist and ethnologist whose work was key in the development of the theories of structuralism and structural anthropology. He held the chair of Social Anthropology at the Collège de France between 1959 and 1982, was elected a member of the Académie française in 1973 and was a member of the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris. He received numerous honours from universities and institutions throughout the world.
Systems theory in anthropology is an interdisciplinary, non-representative, non-referential, and non-Cartesian approach that brings together natural and social sciences to understand society in its complexity. The basic idea of a system theory in social science is to solve the classical problem of duality; mind-body, subject-object, form-content, signifier-signified, and structure-agency. Systems theory suggests that instead of creating closed categories into binaries (subject-object), the system should stay open so as to allow free flow of process and interactions. In this way the binaries are dissolved.
Tribal art is the visual arts and material culture of indigenous peoples. Also known as non-Western art or ethnographic art, or, controversially, primitive art, tribal arts have historically been collected by Western anthropologists, private collectors, and museums, particularly ethnographic and natural history museums. The term "primitive" is criticized as being Eurocentric and pejorative.
Robert H. Layton is a British anthropologist and Fellow of the British Academy. He is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Durham University. He has carried out fieldwork in rural France and in a number of Aboriginal communities in Australia, and recently on traditional craft in rural China. Robert Layton studied anthropology at University College London under the famous Australian anthropologist Phyllis Kaberry. He completed his DPhil under the supervision of F.G. Bailey at the University of Sussex. He is known for his eclectic approach to anthropology and diverse range of interests. He has written extensively about art, archaeology, the evolution of hunter-gatherer society and culture, the co-evolution of genes and culture, social change and anthropological theory. He was the recipient of the Royal Anthropological Institute's Rivers Memorial Medal for a substantive contribution to anthropology in 2003
The Journal of Anatomy is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Wiley on behalf of the Anatomical Society. It covers all aspects of anatomy and morphology. The journal was first published in 1867 and was originally known as the Journal of Anatomy and Physiology, obtaining its current title in October 1916. The editors-in-chief are Phil Cox, Stefan Milz, James N. Sleigh and Neil Vargesson.
This bibliography of anthropology lists some notable publications in the field of anthropology, including its various subfields. It is not comprehensive and continues to be developed. It also includes a number of works that are not by anthropologists but are relevant to the field, such as literary theory, sociology, psychology, and philosophical anthropology.
Ruth Leah Bunzel was an American anthropologist, known for studying creativity and art among the Zuni people (A:Shiwi), researching the Mayas in Guatemala, and conducting a comparative study of alcoholism in Guatemala and Mexico. Bunzel was the first American anthropologist to conduct substantial research in Guatemala. Her doctoral dissertation, The Pueblo Potter (1929) was a study of the creative process of art in anthropology and Bunzel was one of the first anthropologists to study the creative process.
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