CONTEXTUALIZING CRITICAL ANTHROPOLOGY: A Metacritique

Abstract

Critical Anthropology as a theoretical project of man's self-enlightenment, i.e. his acquaintance with his true potential, is based on certain apodictic premises which are absolved from critical investigation. The most important one is the a priori presence of the human phenomenon in the form of a universal 'we' that is also the epistemological center of all knowledge and consciousness. In the texts of Foucault and Derrida this premise is situated within the cultural milieu of anthropocentrism, which represents a continuation of the centuries old metaphysical discourse of the Occident. The ramifications of this thesis for the theory of Critical Anthropology are examined in the concluding paragraphs.