It Happens Among People: Resonances and Extensions of the Work of Fredrik Barth

Published by Berghahn Books 2019

It Happens Among People

Resonances and Extensions of the Work of Fredrik Barth

Edited by: Keping Wu and Robert P. Weller

Volume 8 in the series WYSE Series in Social Anthropology

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781789204292

Overview
Contents

About this book

Written by eleven leading anthropologists from around the world, this volume extends the insights of Fredrik Barth, one of the most important anthropologists of the twentieth century, to push even further at the frontiers of anthropology and honor his memory. As a collection, the chapters thus expand Barth’s pioneering work on values, further develop his insights on human agency and its potential creativity, as well as continuing to develop the relevance for his work as a way of thinking about and beyond the state. The work is grounded on his insistence that theory should grow only from observed life.

Author / Editor information

Keping Wu is Associate Professor at the Department of China Studies in Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. Trained as an anthropologist, she had previous teaching and research positions at Sun Yat-sen University, National University of Singapore, and The Chinese University of Hong Kong. She has recently published Religion and Charity: The Social Life of Goodness in Chinese Societies, co-authored with Robert P. Weller and Julia Huang (Cambridge, 2018).

Robert P. Weller is Professor of Anthropology at Boston University. Most of his work concentrates on Chinese societies in a comparative context, frequently with a focus on the problem of religious meaning and authority. His most recent book is How Things Count as the Same: Memory, Mimesis, and Metaphor, co-authored with Adam Seligman (Oxford, 2019). He is currently working on urbanization and religious change.

Keping Wu is Associate Professor at the Department of China Studies in Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. Trained as an anthropologist, she had previous teaching and research positions at Sun Yat-sen University, National University of Singapore, and The Chinese University of Hong Kong. She has recently published Religion and Charity: The Social Life of Goodness in Chinese Societies, co-authored with Robert P. Weller and Julia Huang (Cambridge, 2018).

Reviews

“While Barth might not be the ‘star author’ in fashion in academia today, invisible in many of the scholarly discourses, he is without any doubt a member of the small group of anthropologists who will be a source of inspiration for generations to come…I highly recommend this book, especially for readers interested in the future of anthropology and Barth’s place in it. Clearly, Barth keeps fuelling new thoughts and perspectives in the global anthropological community.” • Anthropology Book Forum

“The entire volumes testifies to Barth’s long-lived relevance in anthropological theory and practice.” • Choice

“This is an unusually interesting volume. Part conventional Festschrift for Fredrik Barth (one of the most significant and influential anthropologists, also one of the most original and distinctive, of the second half of the twentieth century), but also part record and outcome of Barth’s specific influence in China and makes for a very distinctive volume.” • James Laidlaw, University of Cambridge

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
List of Figures Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Robert P. Weller and Keping Wu Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Humility First: Fredrik Barth in His Own Words—and Mine Unni Wikan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	17
2. Transacting Knowledge and Value: Fredrik Barth and the Tactics of Mutual Incomprehension Michael Herzfeld Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	44
3. Cosmologies in the Remaking: Variation and Time in Chinese Temple Religion Robert P. Weller Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	61
4. Building Infrastructure and Making Boundaries in Southwest China Keping Wu Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	82
5. On Nomads of South Persia Thomas Barfield Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	104
6. The Language of Trust and Betrayal Gunnar Haaland Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	121
7. Khan and Sufi: Two Types of Authority in Swat, Northern Pakistan Charles Lindholm Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
8. Values and the Value of Secrecy: Barthian Reflections on Values and the Nature of Mountain Ok Social Process Joel Robbins Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	159
9. Paradigm Change in Chinese Ethnology and Fredrik Barth’s Influence Ke Fan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	171
10. An Overall Generative Approach: Fredrik Barth’s Contribution to Anthropological Research and Writing Chee-Beng Tan Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	191
Afterword. A Rooted Cosmopolitan Remembered Ulf Hannerz Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	209
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221

Language: English
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 242
Keywords: extends insights of fredrik barth; social anthropology; eleven leading anthropologists; frontiers of anthropology; pioneering work on values; insights on human agency; human agencys potential creativity; thinking about and beyond state; theory grow from observed life

eBook

Published: November 4, 2019
ISBN: 9781789204292