There is no inherent theoretical or political tendency within any discipline. More relevant are the wider social forces at play and the particularities of history. While many anthropologists in North America consider themselves liberal in social values and progressive in economic terms, this has not always been the case. The earlier version, especially that segment link to physical and archaeological anthropology, tended toward the more conservative and flirted with ideas of eugenics and notions of biological racial differences that are today discredited. Politically such early anthropologists maintained strong connections with economic elites that funded many of the prominent private universities.
One of the earliest political conflicts within the discipline of anthropology involved Franz Boas and Sylvanus G. Morley. Morely was a fourth generation white American whose middle class family had ties to New England’s political elites. At the center of the controversy was Morley’s work in central American during World War I on behalf of the U.S. Naval Intelligence agency. At the same time Morley was presenting himself as a practicing archaeologist of Mayan society.
Franz Boas, a German émigré, is widely identified as one of the founding figures of American anthropology. Boas was very much opposed to so-called scientific racism – the ideology that different races of humans have different inherent attributes like intelligence, physical capacity, etc. Boas used detailed empirical methods to document decisively that there were no inherent biological differences between putative races, rather all of humanity shared the same capacities. He took his scientific discoveries into the realm of politics where he advocated for racial equality, democratic practices, and the right of all people for equity and autonomy. Boas’ principles of honesty and fairness brought him into conflict with Morley’s deceptive use of archaeology as a cover for espionage. Boas publicly repudiated the action Morley and others connected to him and for his pains the American Anthropological Association censured him.
Both men continued their careers in anthropology, Morley working at the School for American Archaeology (known today as the School for Advanced Research) in Santa Fe. The school was, for much of the 20th century a center that attracted a host of conservative thinkers and was funded by heirs of major publishing empire who toyed with the politics of fascism. Boas was a professor at Columbia University were the students he trained went on to found most of the major departments of American anthropology in the 20th century.
The underlying conflict between individuals who value social justice and equality versus those that admire a more conservative and Tory future continues, as in society in general, within the worlds of anthropology today.
