Anthropology of the Life Cycle
To consider the life cycle as a whole and its principal stages and transitions.
-
Keith Hart
- Male
- Paris
- France
- Latest Blog Posts (35)
- Discussions (842)
- Events (1)
- Groups (25)
- Photos (7)
- Photo Albums
- Videos (5)
Keith Hart's Groups
-
Action Group 4 OAC
40 members
-
Anthropology of Death
93 members
-
The Human Economy
54 members
-
Anthropology of Theatre
15 members
-
Ethnographic Writing
214 members
Keith Hart's Discussions
Does the OAC need a new social model?
4 Replies
Started this discussion. Last reply by John McCreery 11 hours ago.
Using the OAC chat room
1 Reply
Started this discussion. Last reply by Francine Barone Apr 10.
Keith Hart's Page
The Memory Bank: A New Commonwealth ver 5.0
I have recently posted two pieces on the potential for an anthropology of world society using the resources made available by the internet.
The digital revolution and me
Studying world society as a vocation
I have made two other attempts at telling my story (both sung to an old Hoagy Carmichael tune):
Manchester on my mind
Africa on my mind
About my website.
Banks are slower-moving deposits of fast-moving flows, whether of water, information or money. This website is my Memory Bank, but it is meant to reach out to a public that shares my aims. The two great human memory banks are language and money which are converging into a single network of digital communications in our time. The idea of a 'New Commonwealth' refers to the possibility that money might serve the purposes of economic democracy more fully than it has; but beyond that to the need to make a world society fit for all humanity.
We face an extraordinary moment in history when the old structures are palpably failing. The formation of a global civil society, even a world state, is an urgent task. Anthropology has a distinguished past, but it has an even greater role to play in future, not necessarily as an academic discipline, but perhaps as an interdisiciplinary project: to discover what we need to know about humanity as a whole if we would make a better world. Such a project depends on making full use of the emerging social and technical synthesis entailed in the digital revolution.
The digital revolution and me
Studying world society as a vocation
I have made two other attempts at telling my story (both sung to an old Hoagy Carmichael tune):
Manchester on my mind
Africa on my mind
About my website.
Banks are slower-moving deposits of fast-moving flows, whether of water, information or money. This website is my Memory Bank, but it is meant to reach out to a public that shares my aims. The two great human memory banks are language and money which are converging into a single network of digital communications in our time. The idea of a 'New Commonwealth' refers to the possibility that money might serve the purposes of economic democracy more fully than it has; but beyond that to the need to make a world society fit for all humanity.
We face an extraordinary moment in history when the old structures are palpably failing. The formation of a global civil society, even a world state, is an urgent task. Anthropology has a distinguished past, but it has an even greater role to play in future, not necessarily as an academic discipline, but perhaps as an interdisiciplinary project: to discover what we need to know about humanity as a whole if we would make a better world. Such a project depends on making full use of the emerging social and technical synthesis entailed in the digital revolution.
Latest Activity
John McCreery replied to Keith Hart's discussion Does the OAC need a new social model?"Abraham, could you say a bit more about "socio-based subsistence modeling"? The phrase produces a kind of grey fuzz in my brain and a few more details would be helpful to be sure that I know what you are writing about."
Abraham Heinemann replied to Keith Hart's discussion Does the OAC need a new social model?"In answer to Keith's question, I would answer YES.
As a comparative beginner in these topics I will try my best to both not be a lurker and also share something
Both this thread and the Anthropology's Suicide thread seem to be on…"
Alessandro De Cola joined Keith Hart's group
Economic anthropology
A forum to discuss how economic anthropology might be regenerated by taking advantage of new social forms such as this one.
Will Reichard replied to Keith Hart's discussion Does the OAC need a new social model?"Fascinating discussion, and again draws me back to current business education. In two years getting an MBA, I think the word "cooperative" came up exactly once, and in passing, despite being a perfectly valid alternative corporate form.…"
Keith Hart's Blog
Anthropology, society and the unconscious mind
I am coming round to a view of anthropology as a mixture of late Durkheim and Jung. It's why what the others call ethnography is not what we do and what anthropologists do is to some extent occult, so we hide it like a dirty secret when it is in fact the source of why we get it right more often. How do we turn the bits of concrete fieldwork, the individuals and events, into a partial vision of the whole society we study? By immersing ourselves in the social life and conversations of a place…
ContinuePosted on April 14, 2012 at 7:30pm — 15 Comments
tactical cosmopolitanism
Two members of the University of Witwatersrand African Centre for Migration and Society asked how foreign migrants to South Africa cope with hostility sometimes amounting to xenophobia. In this short version of a longer journal article, they come up with the answer -- tactical cosmopolitanism -- and offer a list of its characteristics. As I read this and…
ContinuePosted on November 28, 2011 at 2:00pm — 2 Comments
Did the machines win?
Over on nettime-l, a list for those who once thought "tactical media" was the way forward, the old question of men and machines has been revived with due acknowledgment to Marshall McLuhan. One contributor exclaimed that "of course the machines won" and another said this was "simplistic Luddite rubbish". This was my response.
I can't speak for Mark Stahlman, but I don't imagine that anyone who can write so interestingly…
ContinuePosted on October 18, 2011 at 9:00am — 5 Comments
Mary Midgley on some modern myths that might interest you
Brilliant 5-mins video riff by philosopher Mary Midgely on some modern myths that sustain morality: Working Class, Market, Common Good and Selfish Gene. I won't add any commentary here, but I sure would be glad of yours, if you have any.
Posted on December 28, 2010 at 3:00pm — 4 Comments
keith@oac
Marx between Mill, Mayhew and Dickens
Phil Swift's brilliant post on the relevance of Henry Mayhew's 19th century investigations of London's working classes for a politicized ethnography today has set off many reverberations inside my skull. One issue is the relationship between Mayhew's project and Marx's. Both are highly critical of the social causes of the… Continue
Phil Swift's brilliant post on the relevance of Henry Mayhew's 19th century investigations of London's working classes for a politicized ethnography today has set off many reverberations inside my skull. One issue is the relationship between Mayhew's project and Marx's. Both are highly critical of the social causes of the… Continue
Posted on November 18, 2010 at 2:00pm — 2 Comments
Keith Hart's Photos
Keith Hart's Videos
-
-
Handsome Johnny
Added by Keith Hart
-
© 2012 Created by Keith Hart.
Powered by 
.
Comment Wall (608 comments)
You need to be a member of Open Anthropology Cooperative to add comments!
Join Open Anthropology Cooperative
Indeed! One day this will have to be in person.
Thank you for adding me!
Thank you Keith for sharing that article. Really helpful for me. It's truly one of the central debates behind economic anthropology, although, I've been told that many anthropologists side with the substantivists, which does make sense in consideration of the discipline's aims. However, I think that it's interesting to think about that debate in relation to a lot of recent ethnographies of finance...are they taking a substantivist or formalist approach or neither? I guess it sort of makes the idea null? Or perhaps that's just a random idea. Thank you for sharing, I will definitely take a look at it. And revision is chaotic, but I am making my way through as best I can.
Thank you Keith! It looks great!
Keith,
Thanks very much for your email. It has indeed been a long time, in a galaxy far, far away. Afraid I'm just an old-fashioned guy (or, well, just old) when it comes to blogs, tweets, and Facebook friends -- I've barely come to terms with the idea of email. It's so disconcertingly quick. The Open Anthro Coop seems a good idea; I'm just not sure about being quite that public and "open." I do like to tend my little patch of brambles on the Web, at www.peripheralstudies.org , where I've downloaded much of my ravings.
Hope this direct email gets to you; don't really understand the mechanism of adding and responding to Comments on the Coop page.
Best regards,
Lee
View All Comments