Anthropology: a practice of theory

This discussion, which introduces the first of two issues of the ISSJ devoted to social and cultural anthropology, focuses on the expansion of anthropological methods and concerns beyond what can be written or visually apprehended, and addresses the paradoxical but substantive advantages of the discipline's intensively localized focus in field research (ethnography) for the analysis of global phenomena. The author argues that the increased importance of agency and practice has coincided with an emphasis on multiple modernities to make a culturally reflexive approach both pragmatically useful and empirically rich. While anthropology may itself be increasingly implicated in global and local identity politics, its ability to recognize that phenomenon - a potential liability - also enhances its capacity for social and cultural criticism and analysis.