David Sausdal
Associate professor | Associate senior lecturer
Den ontologiske blænding : Om den ontologiske vendings metodiske og politiske problemer
The ontological blinding. On the methodical and political problems of the ontological turn
Author
Summary, in English
This article takes a critical look at "the ontological turn". It argues that two key problems arise from the ontological turn: one methodical, the other political. First of all, the article points to the difficulties of studying the "radical Other" in ontological terms. If the supporters of the ontological turn are right in their claim that anthropology should not study multiple "world-views" but essentially different "worlds" altogether, then how, we ask, does one approach this methodologically? Put in other words; with what registers can we as anthropologists conceive and describe ontological others in ways that do them and not just the anthropologists/ anthropology justice? Secondly, the "construction" of difference, inherent in an anthropological endeavor that advocates radical difference as an analytical point of departure, is problematic in relation to the impact that anthropology has outside academia. As history so vividly has shown us, dividing the world into radically different Others offers itself to political constructions of not only equal Others but often inferior ones.
Publishing year
2013
Language
Danish
Pages
101-119
Publication/Series
Tidskriftet Antropologi
Volume
67
Document type
Book chapter
Publisher
Copenhagen University
Topic
- Sociology
Keywords
- (Anti)essentialism
- C/culture
- Exoticism
- Objectification
- Ontology
- World(view)s
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 0906-3021
- ISBN: 9788788825596