The Invention of Culture

Roy Wagner

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780226423319
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

In anthropology, a field that is known for its critical edge and intellectual agility, few books manage to maintain both historical value and contemporary relevance. Roy Wagner's The Invention of Culture, originally published in 1975, is one.Wagner breaks new ground by arguing that culture arises from the dialectic between the individual and the social world. Rooting his analysis in the relationships between invention and convention, innovation and control, and meaning and context, he builds a theory that insists on the importance of creativity, placing people-as-inventors at the heart of the process that creates culture. In an elegant twist, he shows that this very process ultimately produces the discipline of anthropology itself.Tim Ingold's foreword to the new edition captures the exhilaration of Wagner's book while showing how the reader can journey through it and arrive safely—though transformed—on the other side.

chapter 1

The assumption of culture

The idea of culture

Anthropology studies the phenomenon of man, not simply man’s mind, his body, evolution, origins, tools, art, or groups alone, but as parts or aspects of a general pattern, or whole. To emphasize this fact and make it a part of their ongoing effort, anthropologists have brought a general word into widespread use to stand for the phenomenon, and that word is culture. When they speak as if there were only one culture, as in “human culture,” this refers very broadly to the phenomenon of man; otherwise, in speaking of “a culture” or “the cultures of Africa,” the reference is to specific historical and geographical traditions, special cases of the phenomenon of man. Thus culture has become a way of talking about man, and about particular instances of man, when viewed from a certain perspective. Of course the word “culture” has other connotations as well, and important ambiguities which we shall examine presently.

By and large, though, the concept of culture has come to be so completely associated with anthropological thinking that if we should ever want to, we could define an anthropologist as someone who uses the word “culture” habitually. Or else, since the process of coming to depend on this concept is generally something of a “conversion experience,” we might want to amend this somewhat and say that an anthropologist is someone who uses the word “culture” with hope—or even with faith.

The perspective of the anthropologist is an especially grand and far-reaching one, for the phenomenon of man implies a comparison with the other phenomena of the universe, with animal societies and living species, with the fact of life, matter and space, and so forth. The term “culture,” too, in its broadest sense, attempts to bring man’s actions and meanings down to the most basic level of significance, to examine them in universal terms in an attempt to understand them. When we speak of people belonging to different cultures, then, we are referring to a very basic kind of difference between them, suggesting that there are specific varieties of the phenomenon of man. Although there has been much “inflation” of the word “culture,” it is in this “strong” sense that I will use it here.

The fact that anthropology chooses to study man in terms that are at the same time so broad and so basic, to understand both man’s uniqueness and his diversity through the notion of culture, poses a peculiar situation for the science. Like the epistemologist, who considers “the meaning of meaning,” or like the psychologist, who thinks about how people think, the anthropologist is forced to include himself and his own way of life in his subject matter, and study himself. More accurately, since we speak of a person’s total capability as “culture,” the anthropologist uses his own culture to study others, and to study culture in general.

Thus the awareness of culture brings about an important qualification of the anthropologist’s aims and viewpoint as a scientist: the classical rationalist’s pretense of absolute objectivity must be given up in favor of a relative objectivity based on the characteristics of one’s own culture. It is necessary, of course, for a research worker to be as unbiased as possible insofar as he is aware of his assumptions, but we often take our culture’s more basic assumptions so much for granted that we are not even aware of them. Relative objectivity can be achieved through discovering what these tendencies are, the ways in which one’s culture allows one to comprehend another, and the limitations it places on this comprehension. “Absolute” objectivity would require that the anthropologist have no biases, and hence no culture at all.

The idea of culture, in other words, places the researcher in a position of equality with his subjects: each “belongs to a culture.” Because every culture can be understood as a specific manifestation, or example, of the phenomenon of man, and because no infallible method has ever been discovered for “grading” different cultures and sorting them into their natural types, we assume that every culture, as such, is equivalent to every other one. This assumption is called “cultural relativity.”

The combination of these two implications of the idea of culture, the fact that we ourselves belong to a culture (relative objectivity), and that we must assume all cultures to be equivalent (cultural relativity), leads to a general proposition concerning the study of culture. As the repetition of the stem “relative” suggests, the understanding of another culture involves the relationship between two varieties of the human phenomenon; it aims at the creation of an intellectual relation between them, an understanding that includes both of them. The idea of “relationship” is important here because it is more appropriate to the bringing together of two equivalent entities, or viewpoints, than notions like “analysis” or “examination,” with their pretensions of absolute objectivity.

Let us take a closer look at the way in which this relation is achieved. An anthropologist experiences, in one way or another, the subject of his study; he does so through the world of his own meanings, and then uses this meaningful experience to communicate an understanding to those of his own culture. He can only communicate this understanding if his account makes sense in the terms of his culture. And yet if these theories and discoveries represent uncontrolled fantasies, like many of the anecdotes of Herodotus, or the travelers’ tales of the Middle Ages, we can scarcely speak of a proper relating of cultures. An “anthropology” which never leaves the boundaries of its own conventions, which disdains to invest its imagination in a world of experience, must always remain more an ideology than a science.

But here the question arises of how much experience is necessary. Must the anthropologist be adopted into a tribe, get on familiar terms with chiefs and kings, or marry into an average family? Need he only view slides, study maps, and interview captives? Optimally, of course, one would want to know as much as possible about one’s subjects, but in practice the answer to this question depends upon how much time and money are available, and on the scope and intentions of the undertaking. For the quantitative researcher, the archeologist dealing with evidences of a culture, or the sociologist measuring its effects, the problem is one of obtaining an adequate sample, finding enough evidential material so that one’s estimates are not too far off. But the cultural or social anthropologist, although he may at times be concerned with sampling, is committed to a different kind of thoroughness—one based on the depth and comprehensiveness of his insight into the subject culture.

If the thing that anthropologists call “culture” is as all-encompassing as we have assumed, then this obsession on the part of the fieldworker is not misplaced, for the subject culture is as much a separate world of thought and action as his own. The only way in which a researcher could possibly go about the job of creating a relation between such entities would be to simultaneously know both of them, to realize the relative character of his own culture through the concrete formulation of another. Thus gradually, in the course of fieldwork, he himself becomes the link between cultures through his living in both of them, and it is this “knowledge” and competence that he draws upon in describing and explaining the subject culture. “Culture” in this sense draws an invisible equal sign between the knower (who comes to know himself) and the known (who are a community of knowers).

We might actually say that an anthropologist “invents” the culture he believes himself to be studying, that the relation is more “real” for being his particular acts and experiences than the things it “relates.” Yet this explanation is only justified if we understand the invention to take place objectively, along the lines of observing and learning, and not as a kind of free fantasy. In experiencing a new culture, the fieldworker comes to realize new potentialities and possibilities for the living of life, and may in fact undergo a personality change himself. The subject culture becomes “visible,” and then “believable” to him, he apprehends it first as a distinct entity, a way of doing things, and then secondly as a way in which he could be doing things. Thus he comprehends for the first time, through the intimacy of his own mistakes and triumphs, what anthropologists speak of when they use the word “culture.” Before this he had no culture, as we might say, since the culture in which one grows up is never really “visible”—it is taken for granted, and its assumptions are felt to be self-evident. It is only through “invention” of this kind that the abstract significance of culture (and of many another concept) can be grasped, and only through the experienced contrast that his own culture becomes “visible.” In the act of inventing another culture, the anthropologist invents his own, and in fact he reinvents the notion of culture itself.

Making culture visible

In spite of all he may have been told about fieldwork, in spite of all the descriptions of other cultures and other fieldworkers’ experiences he may have read, the anthropologist first arriving among the people he will study is apt to feel lonely and helpless. He may or may not know something about the people he has arrived to work among, he may perhaps even be able to speak their language, but the fact remains that as a person he must start from scratch. It is as a person, then, as a participant, that his invention of the subject culture begins. He has heretofore experienced “culture” as an academic abstraction, a thing allegedly so diverse and multifaceted, yet monolithic, that it is difficult to grasp or visualize. But as long as he cannot “see” this culture in his surroundings, it is of little use or comfort to him.

The immediate problems facing the beginning fieldworker are not likely to be academic or intellectual; they are practical, and they have a definite cause. Disoriented and dazed as he may be, he often encounters a good deal of trouble in getting settled and making contacts. If a house is being built for him, all sorts of delays occur in the work; if he hires assistants or interpreters, they fail to show up. When he complains about delays and desertions the usual lame excuses are offered. His questions may be answered by obvious and deliberate lies. Dogs bark at him and children may follow him about in the streets. All these circumstances stem from the fact that people are usually uncomfortable with a stranger in their midst, more especially with an outsider who may be crazy, dangerous, or both. Often they create difficulties for him as “defenses,” to keep him at a distance or at least stall him off while he is considered and examined more closely.

These delays, defenses, and other ways of putting off the fieldworker are neither necessarily hostile (though they may be) nor unique in human interaction. “Distance” of this sort is a common occurrence in the beginning stages of what might possibly become a close personal involvement, such as a friendship or a love affair, and it is commonly pointed out that too much familiarity at this point would tend to undermine the mutual respect of the parties concerned. However this may be, human beings in all societies are usually more perceptive than we give them credit for, and life in a small community is generally far more intimate than the newcomer imagines. Courtesy, an age-old “solution” to the problems of human encounter, has made situations of this sort the basis of a high art, and the kindest thing a distraught fieldworker can do is at least suspect his hosts of courtesy.

However much these first encounters are jarred by misunderstanding, masked by formalities, or cushioned by courtesies, they nevertheless must take place, for the simple facts of being human and being in a place generate certain dependencies on their own account. Thus it is often the most trivial and ludicrous occasions, like looking for a place to relieve oneself, trying to operate a stove, or dealing with the landlord, that form the bulk of a beginner’s social relations. In fact, these occasions offer the only available “bridge” for empathy between stranger and native; they “humanize” the former, making his problems so readily understandable that anybody could sympathize with them. And yet the laughter and warmth that comes so easily on these occasions can never be a substitute for the more intimate and penetrating companionship and understanding that are such an important part of life in any culture. A relationship which is based on simplifying oneself to the barest essentials has nowhere to go—unless one is willing to permanently adopt the role of village idiot.

Whether or not he finds these initial encounters satisfying, the fieldworker will nevertheless try to follow them up and build them into more substantial friendships. He will do this because he is lonely, perhaps, or because he knows that if he is to learn something about these people and their way of life, he will have to learn it from them. For casual acquaintance is the accepted prelude to closer relationship in all human societies. But as soon as he attempts anything more ambitious than simple pleasantries, he begins to experience contradictions in his basic expectations of how people should conduct their affairs. This will not involve things as abstract as “ideas” or “points of view,” at least not at this stage, but ordinary notions of “common decency,” and perhaps subliminal effects that tend to make one vaguely uncomfortable, such as physical closeness, rapidity of movement, gestures, and so on. Should the well-meaning stranger, perhaps feeling guilty because of the “mistakes” he has already made, redouble his efforts at friendship, he will only succeed in compounding his difficulties further. Perhaps, as in many small communities, the ties of friendship are so encompassing that a “friend” is expected to fit into the roles of confidant, kinsman, creditor, and business partner all at once; possibly there are excessive reciprocal expectations, or a kind of “one-upmanship” hospitality, or even strong feelings about the solidarity of friends in factional disputes.

These initial frustrations can be expected to build up, for the pattern for friendship is often repeated in many other particulars of social life. Gradually the fieldworker begins to feel his effectiveness as a person undermined, and it is small consolation to know that the local people may be “humoring” the stranger, or trying to make life easy for him. Better an honest mistake than a false conviviality. Even the most tolerant and well-meaning outsider, who keeps his own counsel and strives to avoid showing his frustration eventually finds the strain of trying to maintain his own thoughts and expectations while “respecting” those of the local people extremely wearing. He may feel inadequate, or perhaps suspect that he has allowed his ideals of tolerance and relativity to trap him in a situation that is beyond his control.

This feeling is known to anthropologists as “culture shock.” In it the local “culture” first manifests itself to the anthropologist through his own inadequacy; against the backdrop of his new surroundings it is he who has become “visible.” The situation has some parallels within our own society: the freshman first entering college, the new army recruit, and anyone else who is compelled to live in “new” or alien surroundings, all have had some taste of this kind of “shock.” Typically the sufferer is depressed and anxious, he may withdraw into himself, or grasp at any chance to communicate with others. To a degree that we seldom realize, we depend upon the participation of others in our lives, and upon our own participation in the lives of others. Our success and effectiveness as persons is based upon this participation, and upon an ability to maintain a controlling competence in communicating with others. Culture shock is a loss of the self through the loss of these supports. College freshmen and army recruits, who find themselves, after all, in another segment of their own culture, soon establish some control over the situation. For the anthropological fieldworker, however, the problem is both more pressing and more enduring.

The problem also exists, though not exactly in the same way, for the people the anthropologist has come to work among. They are faced with an odd, prying, curious-looking, and strangely naive outsider in their midst, one who, like a child, keeps asking questions and must be taught everything, and who, also like a child, is apt to get into trouble. In spite of the defenses that have been erected against him, he remains an object of curiosity and often fear, fitting many of the rather ambiguous stereotypes of the “dangerous” outsider, or perhaps the conniving Westerner. The community may experience a mild “shock” of its own—perhaps we ought to call it “anthropologist shock”—and become self-conscious about its doings.¹ It finds “control” an important problem, too. But the community’s problem is not the anthropologist’s problem of managing personal competence in dealing with others. The community’s problem is simply controlling the anthropologist.

The solution for all concerned lies in the anthropologist’s efforts to control his culture shock, to deal with the frustration and helplessness of his initial situation. Since his control involves acquiring a competence in the local language and ways of life (and who but the natives are experts in this?), the local people are given a chance to do their part in controlling the outsider, domesticating him, as it were. And here is where the anthropologist’s experiences differ from those of missionaries and other emissaries of Western society. The latter are often compelled by their chosen roles and apprehensions of the situation either to interpret their shortcomings as personal inadequacy—and go crazy—or as native cussedness and slovenliness, thus reinforcing their own elitist self-images.

But anthropology teaches us to objectify the thing we are adjusting to as “culture,” much as the psychoanalyst or shaman exorcises the patient’s anxieties by objectifying their source. Once the new situation has been objectified as “culture,” it is possible to say that the fieldworker is “learning” that culture, the way one might learn a card game. On the other hand, since the objectification takes place simultaneously with the learning, it could as well be said that the fieldworker is “inventing” the culture.

The distinction is a crucial one, though, from the standpoint of how an anthropologist comes to understand and explain the situation he experiences. The fieldworker’s belief that the new situation he is dealing with is a concrete entity, a “thing” that has rules, “works” in a certain way, and can be learned, will help and encourage him in his attempts to come to grips with it. And yet in a very important sense he is not learning the culture the way a child would, for he approaches the situation already an adult who has effectively internalized his own culture. His efforts to understand the subjects of his research, to make them and their ways meaningful, and to communicate this meaningfulness to others, will grow out of his abilities to make meaning within his own culture. Whatever he “learns” from his subjects will therefore take the form of an extension or superstructure, built upon that which he already knows, and built of that which he already knows. He will “participate” in the subject culture, not in the way a native does, but as someone who is simultaneously enveloped in his own world of meanings, and these meanings will also participate. If we recall what was said earlier about relative objectivity, we remember it is the set of cultural predispositions that an outsider brings with him that makes all the difference in ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword to the Second Edition
• Preface to the Second Edition
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1. The Assumption of Culture
• 2. Culture as Creativity
• 3. The Power of Invention
• 4. The Invention of Self
• 5. The Invention of Society
• 6. The Invention of Anthropology
• Notes
• Index