2014 AAA Annual Meeting
\nWashington, DC \u2014 December 3\u20137, 2014<\/p>\n
Deadline for abstracts: March 31.<\/strong> (Submission by March 26 very much appreciated.)<\/p>\n Surveying the relatively limited anthropological contribution to the study of revolution, Bj\u00f8rn Thomassen asked in a 2012 article, \u201cWhy are anthropologists so strikingly silent about political revolutions?\u201d He used this absence to issue a clarion call: \u201cthe study of political revolutions ought to figure more prominently in both ethnography and anthropological theory.\u201d Even as it was being described, this observed disconnect between anthropology and revolution was ending. Anthropologists have increasingly been on-the-scene in major upheavals including Latin American revolts against neoliberalism and regime-unseating protest movements from Argentina to Egypt to Thailand to Ukraine. Arguably, this new engagement with the experience and process of revolution is now bearing fruit. This panel is part of the process by which a new anthropology of revolution is being produced.<\/p>\n Anthropology offers several angles of insight into political revolution. Observers have called for an anthropological role for revolution around the cultural construction of politics, the ritualistic nature of revolutionary actions, and the lived experience of revolutionary events.\u00a0 Both ethnographic engagement and a cultural approach to concepts like a popular mandate, democracy, and \u201cthe people\u201d can help explain how political actors and actions produce revolution.\u00a0 Some early anthropological attempts to theorize revolution extended the anthropology of other aspects of social life into heady moments of political transformation. The revolutionary experience was an extension of religious feeling for \u00c9mile Durkheim and of liminality and communitas for Victor Turner.\u00a0 Contributors to this panel may explore how anthropology can help rethink the concept and process of revolution.<\/p>\n The late twentieth-century fracturing of the international left and criticism of grand narratives pushed attention away from revolution as an object of anthropological study. In the decades since, more anthropological attention has been paid to resistance and local political action than to societywide transformations. Nonetheless, serious examination of resistance, autonomy, the subaltern, and the domains and weapons of \u201cthe weak\u201d offer a valuable new perspective. Panelists are invited to discuss how such approaches \u201cfrom below\u201d can offer insight into classical and contemporary forms of revolution.<\/p>\n Recent years have seen major political upheavals that expand quickly, involve enormous numbers of people, and rely less on armed violence as a means. These characteristics have allowed ethnographers, who carry out time-limited fieldwork with a limited capacity to risk their lives, to experience revolutionary changes and document dramatic events at a closer distance. Ethnographers are encouraged to use this panel to reflect on these experiences. How is new ethnographic engagement with disruptive politics and political turning points changing our view of revolution?<\/p>\n Is contemporary revolution a different social object than in previous decades? Is revolution undergoing a change in form and meaning as it becomes more approachable? What theoretical reflections emerge from a closer engagement between ethnographers and revolution? What is the place of ethnographic reportage in the swirling processes of communication through which on-the-ground events become a society-wide revolution and a worldwide spectacle?<\/p>\n Please send your title and abstract to<\/strong> Carwil Bjork-James via e-mail to c.bjork-james [at] vanderbilt.edu. Abstracts may be of any length, but panelists should prepare to submit an abstract of 250 words or less, and to register for the conference by April 10. Conference details are online at http:\/\/www.aaanet.org\/meetings\/Call-for-Papers.cfm<\/a> http:\/\/www.aaanet.org\/meetings\/index.cfm<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 2014 AAA Annual Meeting Washington, DC \u2014 December 3\u20137, 2014 Deadline for abstracts: March 31. (Submission by March 26 very much appreciated.) Surveying the relatively limited anthropological contribution to the study of revolution, Bj\u00f8rn Thomassen asked in a 2012 article, \u201cWhy are anthropologists so strikingly silent about political revolutions?\u201d He used this absence to issue…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2052,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2052"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19\/revisions\/22"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/cbjorkjames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}