Ecological anthropology

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Ecological anthropology is a sub-field of

Ecological anthropologist, Conrad Kottak published arguing^[clarification needed] there is an original older 'functionalist', apolitical style ecological anthropology and, as of the time of writing in 1999, a 'new ecological anthropology' was emerging and being recommended consisting of a more complex intersecting global, national, regional and local systems style or approach.^[4]

History of the domain and leading researchers

In the 1960s, ecological anthropology first appeared as a response to cultural ecology, a sub-field of anthropology led by

Benjamin S. Orlove has noted that the development of ecological anthropology has occurred in stages. "Each stage is a reaction to the previous one rather than merely an addition to it".

One of the leading practitioners within this sub-field of anthropology was Roy Rappaport. He delivered many outstanding works on the relationship between culture and the natural environment in which it grows, especially concerning the role of ritual in the processual relationship between the two. He conducted the majority, if not all, of his fieldwork amongst a group known as the Maring, who inhabit an area in the highlands of Papua New Guinea.^[2]

Patricia K. Townsend's work highlights the difference between ecological anthropology and environmental anthropology. In her view, some anthropologists use both terms in an interchangeable fashion. She states that, "Ecological anthropology will refer to one particular type of research in environmental anthropology – field studies that describe a single ecosystem including a human population".^[2] Studies conducted under this sub-field "frequently deal with a small population of only a few hundred people such as a village or neighbourhood".^[2]

Cultural Ecology influenced several anthropologists, including L. P. Vidyarthi and his concept of Nature-Man-Spirit (NMS) complex.

Globalization effects on the discipline

Studies under the discipline are concerned with the

See also

References

Notes