试论表述危机之后人类学的本体论转向

A Discussion on the Ontological Turn in Anthropology after the Crisis of Representation

人类学本体论转向产生自对表述危机的批评,这种转向从哲学层面上看,是从认识论转向本体论,即在认识论层面不存在不可互译的概念图式或语言,但在"实体"或"本体论"层面会有差异性。这一脉络沿着格尔茨解释人类和戴维森哲学对表述危机的批评,最终走向反表征主义的本体论。从人类学研究看,是民族志形态的转变,这种说法包括从研究者转向研究对象及研究区域形态,走向地志学研究。这一脉络沿着实验民族志对表述危机的反应,最终走向重视"实体"的本体论。本体论贯穿了研究对象到研究者文本到对象的过程,以情境化理解的手段实现一切人对一切人的认识。

The crisis of anthropological representation is a notion that appeared in the mid-1980 s. It refers directly to the foundations of anthropological epistemology,and is highly skeptical about the possibility of the anthropologists' understanding the authenticity of the cultural representation of the "other'. Two books,Writing Culture,and,Anthropology as Cultural Critique—An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences,provided this concept of the crisis of representation. Articles by Assad,Rabinjo,Clifford,and Crapanzano in Writing Culture are all masterpieces on the crisis of representation. In the latter book, Marcus and Fisher summarized the origin of the anthropological crisis of representation. In anthropological discourse,the"crisis of representation"can be divided into two types: one is the crisis that occurs in narrating facts,which is mainly due to the relationship between the "narrator"and the "narrative"—this is an internal problem in representation. The other is the crisis from "seeking facts",which is mainly due to the relationship between "fact"and"narrating"—this is an external problem in representation. In the crisis of representation,ethnography is not regarded as authoritative as it had been during earlier stages of scientific ethnography,and was widely questioned by scholars.Geertz's interpretation of anthropology argues that ethnographic authority is the act of writing that derives from a creative,self-serving,cultural,and historical scenario in which the author is inevitably an individual who negotiates his own experiences with that of others. Therefore,anthropology is essentially literature,rather than traditional science.Because the subjects have different levels of depth,the interpretation of anthropological ethnography,to a certain extent,has taken the object of study as the ethnographers themselves—to reflect the process of the production of knowledge by anthropologists,and take the research process of the subject as the object of ethnography. According to Marcus,various forms of experimental ethnography are the way to exit of the predicament of the crisis of representation,and he and Clifford summarized the various experimental ethnographic positions in their books.Seen from the two ways of getting exiting the crisis of representation—interpretation of anthropology and experimental ethnology,they both focus on the ethnographers themselves,and try to solve the problem of epistemology from an epistemological point of view. The concept of the ontological turn originated from the criticism of the crisis in epistemology—this shift did not form a consensus,and it manifests itself in the world as a variety of ontological studies. Whether ontology is a regression,what is itself directed,these are creating more attention of the anthropologist.The ontological turn comes from the criticism of the point of view of the crisis of representation.In the early 1990 s, philosophical circles questioned the idea of the crisis of representation. Philosophers, represented by Davidson and McDowell,attempted to eliminate the problem of the crisis of representation from the epistemological level. Anthropologists,represented by Rümberg,applying Davidsonian philosophy,points out that the crisis of representation is not necessary and is false knowledge-wise,and that there is no incomprehensible situation on the epistemological level.The real difference lies in the substantive or ontological level,from which the ontological turn originates.Martin Palecek and Mark Risjord,after reviewing the literature on ontological research in recent years,analyzed four unifying themes: 1) Searching for the most abstract categories in culture in ethnographic analysis: people,relationships,power,property,etc.; 2) learning theoretical courses from the academic community and then applying( or correcting) the concepts of the locals to anthropological theory; 3) anti-resrepresentation;and 4) extendingknowledge conjectures.La Tour's emphasis on the ontological issue is that science is only one of many existential models,and it leads people to judge all values by a single standard. He intends to establish a new philosophical anthropology to present the complexity posed by modernity. At the same time,he considers the socalled learning and understanding require leaving room for different modes,and then captures different "existencies"by understanding the reproduction of different modes. De Koehler believes that ontology has always been the core and one of the basic elements of anthropology. He proposed four types of ontologies: the animosity of all things,the taboo of totem,naturalism,and classificationism to unify the relationship between nature and culture.The crisis of representation stems from the assumption of modernism,the question "we can portray it as the world itself does,"and anthropology as a challenge to the ethnographic authority. Reflections on and criticisms of this crisis have shifted to the ontological turn. To sum up,the argument that there is an "ontological shift"is controversial in the first place. French philosophical anthropology holds that ontological research has always focused on the development of anthropology, and that there is no point in talking about "turning".This argument neglects to reflect on the research of anthropology for the understanding of the researchers. More Western scholars think that there is a turning point, and that the majority of ChinaScholars believe so as well. The second is,"ontology"turned to what exactly? Specific ontology or unified understanding from context can be divided into two categories. At the philosophical level,anthropological ontology is a shift from epistemology to ontology,that is,there is no non-translatable conceptual schema or language at the epistemological level,but there are differences at the level of"entity"or"ontology. "This vein follows Geertz's critique of the crisis of presentation of humans and Davidsonian philosophy, and eventually to antirepresentational ontology. From the perspective of anthropology,it is a change in the morphology of ethnography. This theory includes the shift from the researcher to the research object and the study of the regional morphology,and to the study of geography. This vein,along with the reaction of the experimental ethnography to the presentation of the crisis,eventually came to attach itself to the ontology of "entity"( the role of objects and artifacts in culture). Anti-representationism and the emphasis on the entity,as the two important aspects of ontology,and the context of terrain,"geontology "or"thing",etc. entered the field of ontological anthropology.