Unwrapping the Sacred Bundle: Reflections on the Disciplining of Anthropology

Lively, forceful, and impassioned, Unwrapping the Sacred Bundle is a major intervention in debates about the configuration of the discipline of anthropology. In the essays brought together in this provocative collection, prominent anthropologists consider the effects of and alternatives to the discipline’s standard four-field structure based on the integration of archaeology and biological, socio-cultural, and linguistic anthropology. While the contributors are not in full agreement with one another, their critiques all diverge from official definitions of anthropology as having a fixed, four-field core. They argue for the historical contingency of the discipline’s present configuration and question its efficacy. The essayists consider the fragmented state of anthropology, its relation to other disciplines and the public sphere beyond academia, the significance of the convergence of linguistic and cultural anthropology, and whether or not anthropology is the best home for archaeology. Daniel A. Segal and Sylvia J. Yanagisako provide a powerful introduction to the volume.Unabashed in their criticism of the four-field structure, they trace its origins to nineteenth-century social evolutionary thought. Urging active engagement with other disciplines, they address the fears that anthropology will cede its claim to empirical integrity if it embraces the humanities. The editors are keenly aware that anthropology is too protean and complex to be remade along the lines of any master plan, and this volume does not offer one. It does open discussions of anthropology’s institutional structure to all possible outcomes, including the refashioning of the discipline as it now exists. Contributors James Clifford Ian Hodder Rena Lederman Daniel A. Segal Michael Silverstein Sylvia J. Yanagisako