In one such case, I contacted the individual directly around a seed that he had misrepresented; he responded with a (perhaps feigned?) expression of confusion over the fault and promised to send along another source substantiating his claim.Sure enough, he never followed up.
I`d appreciate any thoughts from you or other Savage Mind readers.
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Nice one, Adam.I, too, have encountered published texts about indigenous peoples andtheir communities that if showed to the localsornativeswho are the subjects ofthesaid studies,theauthors` irresponsible exaggerations and baselessinterpretationsthatare far from the truth willbecome evident.I suspect suchanomalies in ethnographicresearch happen due to the goals andexpectations ofsomeanthropologists to follow up with studies that are strange,different, complex,and difficult.Who would need to pass a lot of metre and resources to go to a jungle to consider how power or labor, forexample,is conceptualized andpracticedbyanomadic group but to get out that it is no different to thatof homeless itinerants in San Francisco?
Why dothe mala you listed happen in anthropological research?Is it due to lack ofcheck andbalance inthe discipline?Is theira problem inacademictransparency and sharing data?Whocanverify theveracity of an ethonographic research if its authoris the sole one who does such study?
I seethreecollaborative solutions:
1)Comparative sociocultural case studies should be the research norm in anthropology.
2)Scholars in the Westshould makethetranslationoflocal studies done by non-Western scholars a project.
3)Local professors who are experts of the areas foreign anthropologists study should be employed by universitiesandpublishers as research readers orconsultants.
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And now a semi-comical question to ponder: Why would we want dead wrong scholars to be our future collaborators? ;o)
To seriousness now, we can simply fit to the corporate "team-spirit" slogan here. Yes, it`s irrefutably senseless to approach others as a individual for the ideas they hold. So many forget that politics must be wholly kept out of actual academic debate. Of grade one should not get a one-sided career out of denouncing others but should balance any necessary critiques with one`s own unique contribution to the argument so that one may be in turn critiqued.
Yet if one argues that one should concern confronting others` errors head on for fear that our position in the delicate social order might be confused and that collaboration will be denied us, isn`t this merely an empty appeal to popularity? What form of scholar do we wish to be truly? The extreme socially-loved kind with nothing material to convey? Doesn`t the "right choice" fundamentally involve scholastic principles above the idle sentiments of people about us? Or is this nihilistic societal obsession with "likability" now irreversible? I marvel what dear Galileo would get to say most all that.
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*there
Ifonewantsto get a tenure or work inthe academe, exposing or attackinga senior scholar`s blunders and mistakes is nota good idea.Ass-kissing is even the average in academic departments.Maybe giving undergraduate students and foreign scholars publicationopportunities in academic journals will help, sincethey are not start of the local professional hierarchy.
Nobody questioned Erdos` absurdities because ofself-interest.He couldeasily dismiss a mathematician`s workasnotelegantby saying"it`snotinthe book,"and nobody really knewor questioned what thebook was.It was all inthe mind ofErdos.How coulda mathematician question him since hewanted to write with Erdos orhisprotegeesand colleagues and havean Erdos number?Ass-kissing explained!
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I`m glad you broached this very ticklish topic.
I am in a somewhat
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