Anthropology--A Science?

I wonder what everyone thinks about the decision of the Anthropologists to omit the word "science" from their mission statement. Is this a move back to a more humanistic conception of their discipline? Is this good or bad for anthropology, or for science?

You can find the most recent NY Times article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/science/14anthropology.html?_r=1&ref=scien...

Seems to smell of postmodern thought and termology, never seems to be a good thing for science.

I wonder if this will result in a split?

I think that defining anthropology is easy if you point and say: "It's what those people, and those people, and those people, and those people do when they say they're doing anthroplogy." The problem comes when you try to create a synthetic definition. It's fiendishly difficult at best, impossible at worst, and I think the definition that kicked off the recent brouhaha was a well-intentioned but spectacularly tone-deaf attempt to do it.

Anthropology, as its constituted in the US anyway, is four distinct fields -- physical, cultural, and linguistic anthropology, plus archaeology -- with different methods, assumptions, problems, and (sub-)disciplinary cultures. Their unification into a single field that's defined as "science" took place at a time -- the late 19C -- when the dominant methods in all four fit the standard model of what science studies and how it works. Cultural anthropology and archaeology have changed a *lot* since then . . . moving away from looking for universal patterns and toward understanding particular cultures in all their individuality and complexity. That doesn't make them part of the humanities, but it puts them closer (say) to sociology and at least some branches of history than it does to (say) anatomy and physiology -- which is what physical anthropology would be classed as if the species it studied wasn't H. sapiens.

Hence the problem: The "big tent" that encompasses those four areas is lumpy and bulging and starting to split at its seams. If you were drawing the disciplinary boundary lines today, from scratch, you'd never create "anthropology" as it now exists. But since it *does* exist, it's in anthropologists' best interest to preserve it . . . and figure out how to define it in a way that doesn't make any subdiscipline *too* unhappy.

They'll sort it out . . . but the recent statement was like a first pass that should *never* have been allowed out in public. :-)

I agree that this was a "first pass that should never have been allowed out in public"--it seems that the group is starting to backpedal already!

The stones and bones wing approximates a natural science. In a practical sense, this is less possible for cultural anthropology. From a strictly methodological point of view, ethnography is like witchcraft when compared to a controlled experiment. However, I don't see anything in the mission statement from the AAS that precludes any anthropologist from donning the mantle of social science, such as those working in social anthropology.

Putting undue strain on my tired synapses, I remember many years ago being impressed in one anthropology course by ethnographic observations {made very many years ago}, like for example far northern North American Indian tribes religious rites to decide the direction of a hunt, were explained in some detail.

Then with natural science and math applied, it turns out the directions derived from the ceremonies were mathematically random. It was theorized, using the biology of the day, that this kept populations of game animals from being lowered to a non recoverable level in some areas. I think the point was inferred that many ceremonies have or have had survival value.

My courses were only introductory but it seems like a tough chore to separate the disciplines completely

edited in an attempt at clarity.