In Patterns through Time, anthropologist Norman E. Whitten, Jr., reflects on anthropology and academia through a memoir recounting his experiences from 1959–2016. His long career includes fieldwork among African-descended populations in Canada, North Carolina, Colombia, and Ecuador, and indigenous peoples in Colombia and Ecuador, with ongoing fieldwork in Amazonian Ecuador. Most of his experiences were shared with his late wife and intellectual partner, Dorothea “Sibby” Scott Whitten, and sometimes Sibby was the lead researcher, with Norman’s assistance. The book is valuable for its discussion of the relationship between ethnographic fieldwork and theory, as well as of the ways academia has changed, and not changed, in terms of politics, anthropological personalities, and intellectual debates. As a reflective memoir, it is an intriguing departure from Whitten’s ethnographies, because he offers inside stories about his personal experiences and engagement with other anthropologists. The main argument of the book is that ethnography is a theory-constructive endeavor, and Whitten draws on several examples from his career to demonstrate this point. He makes his case through entertaining stories from his early graduate experiences doing research on African American concepts of illness in segregated North Carolina, including the time that Margaret Mead criticized him for not studying high-status members of “intact” cultures.
The book begins with Whitten’s “novitiate years,” starting in 1959, and ends with a discussion of the future of anthropology, and it is written in a narrative style that is very readable. Throughout, he recounts how certain early experiences influenced him later in his various roles as graduate student, researcher, mentor, department head, and editor; each of these experiences taught him lessons that he offers to younger scholars. Reading Whitten’s reflections on his career and research, one can see why he emphasizes sound ethnographic data as the basis for anthropological theory. From the time he was a graduate student, he faced challenges when the data he gathered did not fit into dominant paradigms. However, these challenges led to the development of new theoretical directions. For example, Whitten’s research on cultural interpretations of illness among African Americans in the Piedmont area of North Carolina revealed European influence, rather than the African “survivals” emphasized by the Herskovits school. Although one medical sociologist seemed puzzled by the study, other people, including local black police officers, were very interested in the findings. Whitten faced other challenges as a student, including struggles with departmental politics; he effectively demonstrates how graduate school experiences, both positive and negative, can shape a person throughout his or her career.
The writing moves between reflections on academia and fieldwork, theories that developed from careful ethnographic research, and lessons learned from specific experiences. Whitten found useful theoretical models by drawing on an eclectic mix of scholarship coming from anthropologists working in different parts of the world. He advises students to be wary of anthropology’s dichotomies, such as science vs. humanities. Early in his career, he encountered other false dichotomies, such as pristine cultures vs. acculturated, and Afro-Ecuadorian vs. indigenous Ecuadorian peoples. Rather than study cultures as part of some evolutionary scheme, or as falling along a gradient of acculturation, Whitten focused on studying cultures in their own right as they adapted to regional, national, and global transformations.
In a telling example of how ethnography is theory-constructive, Whitten shows how attention to genres of music and art led to new insights. Some scholars in the late 1960s considered the study of music to be trivial and not worthy of serious research. To the contrary, Whitten found that analysis of musical genres among Afro-Ecuadorians, and ceramic arts and songs among Amazonian indigenous people, was key to understanding the contextual nature of gender relations, social networks, and interculturality. Painstaking, good old-fashioned kinship analysis revealed patterns of interethnic marriage in Amazonia. In chapter 3 Whitten gets deep into the Amazonian indigenous worldview, including recent developments. The Canelos describe him as a “perpetual student,” and Whitten explains that he has become enmeshed in their worldview, which has stayed with him.
Chapter 4 offers revealing insights into heading an academic department, which he did from 1983 to 1986, and Whitten emphasizes the often-overlooked role of support staff, who are crucial to the smooth running of a department. “Misogyny was rampant in the department,” Whitten writes (87). Many on the faculty couldn’t type, so professors dictated notes onto tapes or gave handwritten syllabi for the staff to type. Whitten recounts various forms of abuse of power over female staff, such as infringing on their personal time. He assigns nicknames for specific, disruptive faculty members, such as “the Pontificator,” and “Stomp Around,” and readers might recognize personality types that exist in many academic departments. Despite the difficulties, working with most staff, faculty, and graduate students was a positive experience, and much progress was made during those years, including the introduction of Macintosh computers to the department.
After discussing his engagement with recent theoretical trends and presenting critiques of the recent “ontological turn” in anthropology, Whitten summarizes the views of some scholars that anthropology is doomed. Yet he is encouraged by recent developments that continue to emphasize sound ethnographic data as the basis for theory construction.
This book is an interesting read on many levels and could be used in graduate courses on anthropological theory, as it tells the history of anthropology from the 1960s to the present through the lens of one person’s career. Readers will likely connect with certain experiences depending on their generation. Senior anthropologists might recall the relationship between theory and practice when teaching on a college campus during the tumultuous 1960s, or how changes in technology affect writing styles. Students will relate to the emotional roller coaster of surviving graduate school, and scholars at different points in their careers might ponder the relationship between dominant academic paradigms and the data they gather through ethnographic research. The book is sure to generate discussion and reflections on fieldwork, shifts in theory, and the history and politics of anthropology.
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[Review length: 990 words • Review posted on November 15, 2018]