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"Anthropology never has had a distinct subject matter, and because it doesn't have a real method, there's a great deal of anxiety over what it is."
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"Human cultures vary widely in the plants they use to gratify the desire for a change of mind, but all cultures (save the Eskimo) sanction at least one such plant and, just as invariably, strenuously forbid certain others. Along with the temptation seems to come the taboo."
"I've often been accused of making anthropology into literature, but anthropology is also field research. Writing is central to it."
"Younger anthropologists have the notion that anthropology is too diverse. The number of things done under the name of anthropology is just infinite; you can do anything and call it anthropology."
"He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature."
"It is not as if farming brought a great improvement in living standards either. A typical hunter-gatherer enjoyed a more varied diet and consumed more protein and calories than settled people, and took in five times as much viatmin C as the average person today."
"If origin defines race, then the entire human race is African."
"Anthropology is the most humanistic of the sciences and the most scientific of the humanities."
"One-on-one revenge was common in foraging societies, and kin-against-kin blood feuds were common in tribal societies that had not been pacified by a colonial or national government, particularly if they had an exaggerated culture of manly honor."
"I think feminism has had a major impact on anthropology."
"The point of literary criticism in anthropology is not to replace research, but to find out how it is that we are persuasive."
Explore more quotes by Clifford Geertz
"People keep asking how anthropology is different from sociology, and everybody gets nervous."
"Has feminism made us all more conscious? I think it has. Feminist critiques of anthropological masculine bias have been quite important, and they have increased my sensitivity to that kind of issue."
"I was trained in the '50s as a New Critic. I remember what literature was like before the New Critics, when people stood up and talked about Shelley's soul and such things."
"Gender consciousness has become involved in almost every intellectual field: history, literature, science, anthropology. There's been an extraordinary advance."
"If I remember correctly, a writer is someone who wants to convey information. Language or writing is a code."
"I don't write drafts. I write from the beginning to the end, and when it's finished, it's done."
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