Is neuroanthropology just “social theory with technical jargon,” giving us “street cred”? Are we doing anything “different from interpretive anthropology with its system of symbols”? Why invoke brain biology, we haven’t spent years studying the minutiae of brain circuitry and chemical interactions like real brain experts. Why even bother with the mention of neurotransmitters and such, which bastardizes the rich contribution that anthropology makes to understanding ourselves.
These are some of the comments I’ve seen about our site, some on the Internet, some in emails. In an initial answer to that, I pointed to Greg’s introduction, of listening to our informants and building explanations based on ethnography as well as to some of the limitations we bump up against in the dominant forms of social theory today.
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