Anarchist Free University, Toronto

Anarchist Anthropology

Come one! Come all! Tuesdays (started Sept. 20th, newcomers welcome!)- 196 Manning Ave. at 7 pm; just south of Dundas, 4 blocks west of Bathurst (thanks Alan!)

Course outline

facilitator: richardm (wasichu AT gmail.com) if you can, email me prior to the next class.

Course background:

The highly institutionalized disciplines of the social sciences (sociology, economics, criminology, anthropology, etc.) had their origins in the colonial and imperial expansion of the so- called west; with its attendant mass murder, emergence of the nation- state and its alter ego, the vertically integrated political and economic entity known as the corporation, structured transnational capital flows disguised as the ‘free market’, and the manufacture of consent through explicit programs of political war and repression, physical and mental coercion, and a vast and powerful propaganda industry. Despite this history, over the last 125 years anthropology has been one of the few intellectual projects that arose from the colonial apparatus whose practitioners have observed that other, alternative social forms and practices exist and are relevant for an understanding of the human condition. The social practices that early anthropologists observed were often based on the notion of egalitarianism and maintaining de- centralized structures of social power. These forms and practices were of tremendous, perhaps infinite variation in terms of human behavior. And this wide variation precluded the notion that individual societies paralleled or preceded or fit in anywhere along a single or even multiple ‘progression’ to modernity, capitalism and so- called representative democracy.

For all its imperial roots, anthropology has been the one discipline geared toward documenting these kinds of societies, and thus has been able to elucidate the fact that primitive societies in terms of social and cultural creativity and practice do not exist. Indeed, some of the most socially creative societies are the most egalitarian. Early anthropologists used the condescending and myopic perspectives of the colonial, yet still were able to see the creativity they were encountering and transmit that knowledge despite their own racist and imperial leanings. This realization of the “range of human possibility” combined with an ethnographically- based methodological approach rooted in conversation, interview, and dialogue inched these early anthropologists closer to an understanding of the webs of shifting social values and practice that are geared toward social and cultural creativity and diversity that at specific moments opened up what can be considered anarchic spaces. In these societies, social practice can be linked with parallel core anarchist values such as self- organization, voluntary association, and mutual aid, among others.

Course description:

This course is an investigation and consideration of a body of social theory and practice that does not yet exist. By formulating ideas and dialogue and practicing principles of a participatory and egalitarian intellectual project, we hope to in a small way engage in a conversation of anarchist principles and the idea of an anthropology, a study of human experience and condition that has relevance for revolutionary change. We will do so by using ethnography, material culture, and archaeological data to investigate particular societies, communities, and cultures that provide insight into the practice of basic principles of human behavior, anarchist principles in varying cultural and social contexts and settings. The basic ideals early anarchists observed were recognized as having been in existence across a universe of human social experience. Incidentally, Bakunin, Kropotkin and others clearly recognized that they were inventing nothing particularly special in the sense that they knew many societies were already putting into practice what they were writing down. We will continue to elaborate specific practices that can and are being undertaken by varying communities locally and around the globe, and to document how their example contributes to a revolutionary project of social change.

Some questions we might consider, but are in no way limited to: How can we build a body of social theory based on change? What is the meaning of revolution? How can we deprive structures of domination of their sustenance? How do we re- organize away from centralized political and economic power? What forms can direct democracy take in terms of implementing a participatory and egalitarian consensus process among and between communities? How can we build a better world within the shell of the old?

Course schedule (this is a flexible schedule and is subject to change, transformation, omission, digression, and insurrection)

Please don't worry about too much reading. We will streamline the readings as the sessions progress. Also, note there are four films scheduled over the course. There may be additional films added over the course of the semester.

week 1- Introductions- Meet and greet everyone in class and talk a little about one another’s background in anarchist thought and practice and anthropology. This meeting will have an initial discussion of the purpose of the course and a conversation as to how we want to run the class. Talk a little bit about anthropology. Snacks? Readings for week 2- Graeber- Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology pp. 1- 50. Graeber- The New Anarchists (all).

week 2- Discussion of Fragments- Some questions to think about: How do anarchism and anthropology overlap? What alternative social relations and practice can be drawn from anthropology? Are we really that different? How can we apply alternative social practices as part of a program of revolutionary counterpower? What are examples of counterpower in cultures and societies? In our own insurrectionary communities? Readings for week 3- Graeber- 50- 100; Clastres- Archaeology of Violence.

week 3- Discussion of Fragments- Tenets of the non- existent science. Consideration of a new kind of anthropology. What is meant by an anarchist view (theory) of the state and the non- state? How do hierarchies also construct their own negation? What are some of the dimensions of a non- alienating experience? Readings for week 4- Primitivist authors.

week 4- Discussion of Primitivism. View The Corporation. View Surplus. How do the primitivist writers employ anthropology effectively? How do they create a mythical notion of the diversity of human social and cultural experience. How does the corporation represent a concerted effort to eliminate the very idea counterpower? How does the corporation set itself up for its own demise? Readings for week 5- Mauss- The Gift

week 5- Discussion of The Gift. Alternative forms of economics as documented and interpreted by Mauss. Think about the alternative moral dimensions of Mauss’ argument. How do gift economies differ from barter economies? What are the examples of the differing kinds of prestation? How might these be relevant to us ‘after the revolution’? Readings for week 6- Franz Boas- Social organization of the Inuit, Kwakiutl; Haida Social and Mythical Discourse; Kwakiutl Religious Thought.

week 6 Discussion of Inuit, Kwakiutl and Haida readings. View Atanarjuat (The Fast Runner). How is this body of ethnography and anthropology helpful to an anarchist view/ theory of social practice? What do these societies tell us about ourselves and the potential for social change? What aspects of these non- state societies are part of a program of building and maintaining counterpower? Readings for week 7- Meadows- ancient Maya political economy.

week 6- Discussion of ancient and contemporary Maya culture. The gift economy, engaged withdrawl, and the absence of state power in ancient and modern times. The contemporary Maya of southern Belize. Was ancient Maya society really a state? What might be some structures of counterpower in the ancient example? How do the contemporary Maya of southern Belize embody Graeber’s notion of an engaged withdrawl from the state? Reading for week 7- Trobriand Social Organization, Magic, and Religion. Bourdieu- Symbolic Violence and Linguistic Habitus. Churchill- selections from A Little Matter of Genocide.

week 7- Discussion of Trobriand Social Organization, Magic, and Religion; Discuss the notion of Symbolic or Spectral Violence and its potential in several cultural contexts- Ojibwa Bear Walking, also Asmath notions of war. Compare these examples to contemporary social organization and mechanisms that concentrate rather than diffuse power. Compare with violence perpetrated by the state. Discuss the ideas of symbolic power and symbolic violence versus state violence and construction of power, violence, and warfare. Readings for week 8- The Berdache in Native American Societies.

week 8- Modern forms of kinship- race, gender, class. Engendered bodies- third, fourth, and fifth genders in indigenous societies. Discuss the implications of the berdache in terms of a gendered counter power.

week 9- Diaspora, ethnogenesis, and egalitarianism. The Metis, The Garifuna of the western Caribbean, Maroon cultures of Surinam, the Seminole of South Florida. Readings for week 10- Communiques from the EZLN, reports from Bolivia, Argentina, and Venezuela, reports from the resistance in Iraq.

week 10- Discussions of contemporary social movements and their links with counterpower, violent and non- violent resistance, and contemporary insurgency. View The Take- Klein and Lewis' documentation of worker run factories in Argentina. How do these examples fit into our conception of counterpower? How do their existences augur change? What aspects of these movements reflect anarchist principles? Which aspects do not?

week 11- Implementing the alternatives- anarchist principles and anthropology Liberation of the imaginary. Partay (?!?)