Paper short abstract:

Being part of a state-dependent university system, Greek anthropology retains a critical stance towards the view of culture-as-civilisation which underlies the nation-building project. Such questioning of positivistic agendas and interpretations defines the development of the discipline in academia.

Paper long abstract:

Over the last decades, the usage of the concept of 'culture' has stirred great controversy among anthropologists, yet it remains one of the central concepts of the discipline. While issues are still debated in the anthropological centres of Europe and America, in the European periphery, where the discipline has been a newcomer, the development of the concept as an analytical tool has run into additional difficulties at the level of both academic and other hegemonic socio-political discourses.

The case of Greece exemplifies this predicament perfectly. Putting anthropology in the academic map, prompts Greek anthropologists to enter into discussion not only with long established and discursively powerful disciplines such archaeology, history and folklore, but also with the state and its cognate hegemonic discourses. In varying degrees, these actors conceive 'culture' positivistically and conflate it with 'civilisation'. In this way, they extend the term's genealogy to the glorious and ever-present ancient Greek past while simultaneously fix the eye to the European Union present of the country. These processes mean that 'Greek anthropology' has to juggle with variant conceptualisations of 'culture', retaining its critical stance as a distinct discipline while simultaneously being part of a state-dependent university system. What appears to be at stake here, are not only issues concerning the meaning of culture, its content and its uses as a concept, but also the development of anthropology itself and its embeddedness into the Greek academia.

Moreover, with Greece becoming a multicultural society, hosting increasing numbers of migrants from former East Europe, Asia and Africa, the discussion over the content and meaning of 'culture' has acquired an urgent character. Seeing a challenge as an opportunity, Greek anthropology positions itself critically in a field of contested definitions of 'culture', both within Greece and the wider academic community, where theoretical deliberations, ethnographic accounts, academic writing and teaching coalesce with strongly rooted hegemonic societal positions and institutional practices. In this quandary Greek anthropology continually resets its agendas and retunes its interpretations.