The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art

by James Clifford,  ,  , et al.

Book Overview

The Predicament of Culture is a critical ethnography of the West in its changing relations with other societies. Analyzing cultural practices such as anthropology, travel writing, collecting, and museum displays of tribal art, James Clifford shows authoritative accounts of other ways of life to be contingent fictions, now actively contested in post-colonial contexts. His critique raises questions of global significance: Who has the authority...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674698436
• ISBN13: 9780674698437
• Release Date: May 1988
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 398 Pages
• Weight: 1.56 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.4" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Outstanding anthropological essays

James Clifford's book considers how anthropology can exist in these postmodern times. Considering such phenomena as a museum exhibit which displays "primitive artefacts" next to contemporaneous "modern art pieces," Clifford discusses the way "Western" culture privileges its own culture at the expense of other cultures, clearly showing the ways assumptions of the definition of culture defines this privilege. Clifford's essay on the Mashpees on Cape Cod offers a striking example of directions in which anthropology can move to redesign its own project without privileging itself. A well-written, erudite text. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the workings of contemporary society.