Critics against Culture: Anthropological Observers of Mass Society - Hardcover

Handler, Richard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0299213706 ISBN 13: 9780299213701

Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press, 2005

Synopsis

Critics against Culture: Anthropological Observers of Mass Society—a collection of essays on the history of anthropology focused on Benedict, Boas, Sapir, and modernist thought by one of American anthropology’s leading scholars—explores the roots of anthropology’s early involvement with the study of American society. The essays making up this volume, focused on the critique of mass society and the history of the culture concept, examine Boasian anthropologists as critics of mass society. The book also includes two new, unpublished essays: one on Alexis de Tocqueville and Margaret Mead, the other on Jules Henry and Richard Hoggart. Handler offers a striking analysis of Boasian cultural criticism and the intersection between anthropology, American studies, and cultural studies.

About this title

About the Author:

Richard Handler is professor of anthropology at University of Virginia. His several books include Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec, published by the University of Wisconsin Press, and a book-length interview with David Schneider, Schneider on Schneider. Handler is also coauthor of Jane Austen and the Fiction of Culture and, with Eric Gable, of The New History in an Old Museum.

Review:

“In terms of recent theoretical developments and alliances in anthropology, Critics against Culture demonstrates the potentials and limits of American anthropology as a practice of social and cultural criticism, and it provides among the clearest and most intelligent discussions of anthropology’s relationship to the influential interdisciplinary movement known as cultural studies.”—George Marcus, Rice University

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0299213706
• ISBN 13: 9780299213701
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 248