Observations on the Mystique of Anthropology.

Before talcing up in more detail this customary indifference to social activism, we will try to sketch some key elements in this mystique of anthropology as it shapes the anthropologist's conceptions of himself and his discipline. These observations do not fit all anthropologists or all points of view within anthropology equally well. They are most apt if applied to American cultural anthropology and characterize less accurately the ethos of British and Continental anthropology. In addition, they bear most appropriately on the posture frequently assumed by anthropologists that Jules Henry calls the existential: "There have always been two trends in cultural anthropology; the formalistic and the existential; the preoccupation with parts versus the concern with wholeness; an interest in structure versus a search for meaning; the insistence on plotlessness versus the perception of plot. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]