Post-Colonial Critiques of Anthropology and Discipline's Growth

This essay provides a comprehensive overview of post-colonial critiques within the field of anthropology and their influence on the discipline's trajectory into the 21st century. It begins by defining anthropology and its various subfields, including archaeology, linguistic anthropology, biological anthropology, and cultural anthropology, emphasizing the discipline's role in understanding human evolution, behavior, and culture. The essay then delves into the core of its argument by examining post-colonial critiques, which challenge the historical biases and power dynamics inherent in anthropological research conducted during the colonial era. It explores how these critiques have reshaped the discipline, prompting a reevaluation of ethnographic methods, a focus on the voices of marginalized communities, and a critical analysis of Western-centric perspectives. The essay further discusses the impact of post-colonial critiques on the development of anthropology, highlighting the emergence of new theoretical frameworks and the discipline's increased engagement with issues of social justice, globalization, and cultural relativism. The conclusion summarizes the key arguments, emphasizing the importance of understanding the historical context of anthropological research and the ongoing efforts to decolonize the discipline.

ANTHROPOLOGY ESSAY

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Overview of anthropology...........................................................................................................1
Overview of post colonial critiques of anthropology..................................................................2
Impact of the post-colonial
critiques on the development in 21st century.............................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

ESSAY: Explore the post-colonial
critiques of anthropology and what have these meant for the development of
the discipline into the 21st century
INTRODUCTION
Anthropological studies is the study about the homo sapiens, which are considered as the
most advanced and developed primates on the earth. This is the combination of several human
aspects including the humanities, languages, biologies and socio-cultural modifications. It is
primarily divided into soft and hard science that has a huge contribution on the qualitative
standards of living. This essay is based on learning the conceptual framework of specialised
variations in the anthropological field. Moreover, it also highlights the benefits in terms of
development and growth in the recent times regarding the anthropology sector.
MAIN BODY
Overview of anthropology
Anthropology is defined as the science of humanity that is in relation to understanding
the evolutionary development of humans ranging from the behavioural aspects, linguistic
abilities, social communication, adaptability component and many such elements. It has been
refereed as the study of humans in all its forms such as hominids and primates. Moreover, this
also examines about the cultural aspects that is required to survive in the society and involves
wide range of elements like understanding biological factors, learning about language and
cultural aspects, behavioural approaches and more. It shed light on the systematic exploration of
variety of aspects to know about the similarities and differences among various space and time
zones. Herein, there are four types of anthropology and is divided into archaeology, linguistic
anthropology, biological anthropology and cultural anthropology. These are highlighting the
need to demonstrate the interests, objectives and goals ad are used through the implementation of
techniques for conducting of research properly.
In addition to this, it also emphasis on gaining insights about knowledge and learning
about multi disciplinary elements of anthropology regarding culture, biology, language and
archaeology to know the changes that took place over the time. This purpose is to establish a
critical analysis to learn about the developmental phases of human life in accordance to the roles,
responsibilities and complexities for survival (Mac Ginty and Williams, 2016). Franz Boas, the
Father of Anthropology laid the foundation of modern anthropology to develop scientific
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temperament about the natural sciences and its effects on the concept of 'culture'. He termed the
'culture' as learned behaviours of an individual. For instance, cultural anthropology reflects upon
different communities and their existing way of communication and dressing while performing
religious or any other events. Christianity has several traditions such as protestantism, orthodoxy,
catholic church etc. that brought different ways and approaches to perform the religious affairs,
however, the ideologies are same and uniform in all over the world.
Moreover, the application of post colonialism is determined by the adoption of two forces
which made the realisation of the changes that are essential for gaining knowledge about
essentialism. This notion 'essentialism' is the tool to define the subjects of imperialism and
colonialism to perform the tasks for proper configurations and confrontations in context to the
existing colour, race, religion, cultural values and production modes. The two forces are useful in
underpinning the epistemological frameworks. Here firstly, the ethnographic reports have a
contributing hand which contains reviews, comments, viewpoints and perspectives of natives to
gain the analysis part of the post colonialism changes (Katz, 2018). It has found out about the
cultural voices to know the details and beliefs where the origination of such subjects occurred.
Secondly, the disturbances that led to fall of the European imperialism and colonialism has been
analysed to learn about the studies. It also focused on the oppression practices and led to
exploitation of cultural aspects while solving the socio-political and cultural factors.
This post-colonial critiques is in relation to the convergence of two streams which
demonstrated the need of intellectual perspectives and consists of Leninism and Marxism. These
have the essence of using the knowledge concept to maintain the inspirational levels to overcome
the challenges of imperial and colonial fields. Here the focus is on gaining knowledge about
stressing powers in the field of orthodox Marxism and not on the economics. It has also
supported in positioning of the demographical and geographical components to study about the
evolutionary progress. In addition to the above, another stream is postmodernism that acts as
helpful in rendering opinions and differentiate between subjective perspective and relative
perspective. This took the specific perspective to know the epistemological practices and do not
relate to the objective knowledge. Therefore, this is applicable to the third world societies which
are flourishing and are contributing to the overall growth in the world.
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Overview of post colonial critiques of anthropology
Postcolonial critiques is defined as the study of cultural aspects in context to colonialism
and imperialism and is based on understanding the implications that happened with the people
suffering from these aspects. There was exploitation and control on the basis of colour
differentiation also called as racism that led to study about it under the anthropological studies.
For example, late 19th century saw the independence of almost all the colonies of African
continent under the European empires (Spickard, 2019). This led to a new era of formation of
third world nations where bothy the Africans natives and the non-African people lived together
in a multi dimensional world including different classes, genders, languages, families, religions
and many more socio-cultural elements that shape the postcolonialism and a discontinuous
cultural platforms. The major assumptions made here are based on religious and cultural logic
where the emphasis was on utilising the resources under the legislative framework.
Moreover, this post-colonial critiques is socio-political oriented and is mostly led to
changes on the sentiments of the people and their attitude towards adaptation of new changes as
see after the end of colonialism and imperialism. The colonial heritage is an eye opener on the
minds of the anthropologists and led to the inquires regarding the global connection between the
west and the east. The postmodernism has interpreted in such a way that it reflected upon the
deconstruction of Orientalism and cultural hegemonism. It also shed light that white people were
given more powers to exercise while ruling the society and bringing changes in the community
in all the sphere of life. This involves a number of cultural features such as values, beliefs,
perceptions and ruling of society that allow the power to influence behavioural approaches and
ideas.
In context to the above, Orientalism is the study of set of projections and demeaning
representations regarding the conquests, exploitation with discriminatory powers by the
European powers in the Middle East countries. It was not related to promote about the reasoning
and the critical assessment on the literary background with an emphasis on the historical field
and cultural examination of the Middle East. This showed that the impact of the anthropological
researches on understanding about social trends was difficult and this led to a pessimistic school
of thought in analysing the associated philosophies (Huggan and Tiffin, 2015). It has been
evident from several sources that emphasised on national liberation movement after the post
colonisation that started right after the end of World War II. This led to the development of
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restructuring and deconstruction of the artery discourse and helped in finding the foreground to
the East.
Herein, the focus is establishing the national economy through rebuilding the national
culture with the help of remaining resources. The cultural modality is the fight for these colonies
who not only fought against the influence of the western culture but also use the fine lines
between the western cultures and the eastern cultures. The biggest challenge was to make the
public realise the significance of independence and discard the few emotions for parochial
nationalism. The post colonial critiques on the national culture is mainly dependent on the three
key features such as conscious self identification, expressing one's actions and language and
others' acknowledgement. Thus, the rebuilding focused on the relationship handling and
anticipating the results by solving the prevalent challenges, barriers and obstacles to safeguard
the people rights and new found independence. Henceforth, these critiques assisted in gaining the
perspectives of both western and eastern authorities to prevent such occurrence of situational
crisis in the near future.
Impact of the post-colonial
critiques on the development in 21st century
The overall impact of the post colonialism on the civilisation of the societies has helped
in establishing humanitarianism and assisted the assumptions of the society's ethnocentric
assumptions. This led to revolutionary changes in the societies that impacted the cultural aspects
and also helped in establishing a socialist approach (El-Tom, 2016). However, after the World
War II, it was evident that the entire world was divided into two parts namely the USSR (Union
of Soviet Socialist Republics) and USA (United States of America) which brought positive
changes in the world. The colonies which were mainly struggling in keeping up with formation
of new government and regulations also led to astonishing results. The resultant vector was the
birth of third world nations which is the developing nations. For instance, India, African
countries which were 54 in total number and it led to separate military law, constitution and
counter defence program to regulate the new found independence.
In addition to these, anthropological attitude is the outcome of forming the developing
nations. Alongside, there were social prejudices that put questions on the reliability and validity
aspects to survive in the society without getting challenged from the inadequacy of both
involvement and detachment (Ortner, 2016). Nevertheless, it also links with the other disciplines
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to know about the shortcomings that posed as threats to the human race and acted as obstacles.
There is also need to understand the behaviours' and ideas related to the systems and other sub
categories of the anthropological studies. Both dimensions in the form of applied and theoretical
founded the paths to minimise the issues and encourage the learnings about the urban
anthropology. This helped in the development of the new innovations and discoveries which
shaped the societal norms and helped the civilisation to move ahead without the worries of
having any expansion or developmental phases. Moreover, the impact is in positive ways and
gave responsibility in the hands of the countries public to learn and unlearn about the
anthropological aspects.
CONCLUSION
It has been summarized that anthropological aspects has led to the foundational studies
about the post-colonial critiques on imperialism and colonialism. This essay has concluded that
the principles involved have brought attention to the oppression and discrimination of people
who were trapped into the clutches of the European empires and were offering the services
without their mutual consent. It also shed light on dealing with public while providing them the
necessities. Moreover, it also overridden the contemporary science of race in anthropology to
promote the social construction under the legislative frameworks. Thus, it helped in gaining
knowledge and learnings about the human life.
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REFERENCES
El-Tom, A.O., 2016. Anthropology and Development; Challenges for the Twenty-First Century.
Huggan, G. and Tiffin, H., 2015. Postcolonial ecocriticism: Literature, animals, environment.
Routledge.
Katz, C., 2018. The expeditions of conjurers: Ethnography, power, and pretense. In Feminist
dilemmas in fieldwork (pp. 170-184). Routledge.
Mac Ginty, R. and Williams, A., 2016. Conflict and development. Routledge.
Ortner, S.B., 2016. Dark anthropology and its others: Theory since the eighties. HAU: Journal of
Ethnographic Theory.6(1). pp.47-73.
Spickard, J., 2019. The Sociology of Religion in a Post-Colonial Era: Towards Theoretical
Reflexivity. Religions.10(1). p.18.
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