Oldal 117 [117]
THE ENVIRONMENT AND ANTHROPOLOGY 115
Ecological anthropology also inspired the emergence of ethnoscience in the 1960s.
Ethnoscience investigates the concepts formed by the members of a given nation or
community about the world, including physical objects and abstract ideas alike, as
well as how they come to know the surrounding world, the opinions they form of
it and how they function in it. Its method and theoretical frames were initially closer
to linguistics, then later to cognitive psychology (see cognitive anthropology). The
best-known results of ethnoscience are its classifications, most of them highlighting
traditional taxonomies (ethno-taxonomy, ethno-botany, ethno-pharmacology).
Studies have revealed that the greater their functional use, the more extensive their
system of categories and names. In industrialized societies where people are isolated
from the natural environment, this taxonomic system is far less differentiated.
However, even in these societies there can be exceptions, for instance a community
which lives directly from natural resources, e.g. fishermen (in Kempton’s example).
(On ethnoscience and cognitive anthropology, see Borsos 2004; Kempton 2001).
Ethnoscience arrived at the study of traditional ecological knowledge in a natural
way and went on to utilize this knowledge through therapy and nature protection
(see the chapter Anna Varga: Nature Conservation and Traditional Ecological
Knowledge), or to solutions to contemporary environmental problems.
At the end of the 20" century, the focus shifted again in ecological anthropology,
owing to the radical change in the relationship between humanity and nature, the
increasingly conspicuous environmental problems, and the ensuing social and
economic issues. In addition to examining cooperation with the natural
environment and forming a balanced relationship, studies of activities which
disrupt the equilibrium between humanity and nature have come to the foreground.
The reinterpretation of modernization began in the 1980s, with questions
concerning the tilting of the ecological balance and dilemmas about the unstable
situation not only of nature but also of humankind. The terminological framework
was extended‘ and an important concept for the interpretation of contemporary
processes — maladaptation — emerged. This term signifies the use of certain forms
of subsistence which are incompatible with the environment, for instance if, due
to their development, they overexploit their environment, a process which
eventually leads to collapse (Borsos 2004; 34-35). Jared Diamonds well-known
work Collapse (2004) addresses this situation, as does Thomas Homer-Dixon’s
Environment, Scarcity, and Violence (1999), which discusses the correlations between
overuse and depletion of natural resources on the one hand and violent conflicts
on the other. The attention of anthropologists has thus turned to environmental
degradation and overuse of resources. They have begun to study the political, social
and economic dynamic that triggers the above-mentioned processes and the
conflicts that break out in response (Poncelet 2001: 274).
Anthropological research into the relationship between diverse groups and their
natural environment and into forms of adaptation and maladaptation, has acquired
a new aspect: that of globalization. Local processes are more and more deeply
influenced by global processes (climate change and the global economy), so the
consideration and understanding of these aspects are indispensable for research.
* Bruno Latour considers the most decisive new concept, that of the Anthropocene, as a tool for
leaving modernity behind (Latour 2013: 144). On the Anthropocene, see the chapter titled Green
history?