Response for 3/9

The question of if anthropologists help to fabricate the culture they study interested me even before I read the texts by Michael Ames. I wondered, especially after going to the AMNH and seeing the culture halls, if by choosing certain items and displaying them in a particular manner if anthropologists and museum curators were able to promote a certain view of a culture. This issue is explored in Ames’s chapter titled “How Anthropologists Help to Fabricate the Cultures They Study.” In the case of Northwest Coast Indian art anthologists such as Franz Boas helped to promote this particular art form and because of this the art began to become popular and was assimilated more into mainstream society and became an acceptable form of art. Museums, art galleries, and curators began arranging exhibitions and providing commissions for native artists in order for them to create more work. This promotion has created a demand for Northwest Coast Indian art and is the reason for its proliferation in recent years. Therefore anthropologists helped to manufacture the objects they study. Their research and curatorial activities directly contributed to the development of the things they were studying. This is just one example of how anthropologist are able to fabricate the cultures they study, but I feel as though this can be the case for many other forms of anthropology.