Anthropology for Development: Understanding Contemporary Social Change

De Sardan, Jean-Pierre Olivier/ Olivier De Sardan, Jean-Pierre

ISBN 10: 1842774174 / ISBN 13: 9781842774175

Published by Zed Books, 2005

About this Item

243 pages. 9.00x6.00x0.75 inches. In Stock.

Seller Inventory # x-1842774174

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Anthropology for Development: Understanding Contemporary Social Change
• Publisher: Zed Books
• Publication Date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1842774174
• ISBN 13: 9781842774175
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: Brand New
• Weight: 0.45 kilograms

About this title

Synopsis

This book re-establishes the relevance of mainstream anthropological (and sociological) approaches to development processes and simultaneously recognizes that contemporary development ought to be anthropology's principal area of study. Professor de Sardan argues for a socio-anthropology of change and development that is a deeply empirical, multidimensional, diachronic study of social groups and their interactions.

The Introduction provides a thought-provoking examination of the principal new approaches that have emerged in the discipline during the 1990s. Part I then makes clear the complexity of social change and development, and the ways in which socio-anthropology can measure up to the challenge of this complexity. Part II looks more closely at some of the leading variables involved in the development process, including relations of production; the logics of social action; the nature of knowledge; forms of mediation; and 'political' strategies.

About the Author

Jean-Pierre Olivier de Sardan is Professor of Anthropology at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Marseilles and Director of Research at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris