Applied Anthropology In Anthropology

Applied cultural anthropology is known to be “the use of ideas, techniques, and data derived from the field of cultural anthropology in the attempt to contribute to solutions to social problems” (Gwynne pp. 6). To be an applied anthropologist, you must have the basic skills of doing research, intervention, and policy development (Gwynne pp. 7-8). Applied anthropology has existed since the 19th century, but was not technically termed “applied anthropology.” Though researchers and anthropologists were interested in studying different cultures they also worked in academia. Franz Boas for example (Gwynne pp. 55) was an academic anthropologist who also took part-time jobs in other fields of applied anthropology and became the Father of American

7) in to this paper, the article “Before Your Very Eyes: Illness, Agency, and the Management of Tourette Syndrome” by Andrew Buckser interviewed and studied people who had Tourette Syndrome to see how they were able to manage their tics, vocal and motor, in public and to see how social and cultural experiences effect this neurological disorder. Throughout his research, he combined the strategies people used into three categories, displacement, misattribution, and contextualization (Buckser pp.174). People who used displacement to hide their tics usually left the public area they were in to be alone and let all their tics out at once so they were not as tempted to tic in public. Buckser had interviewed one woman who would take mile long walks to release her tics in solitude because she had to hide and cover them up in her house. Other people who do not have the opportunity to go on long walks created different ways of releasing their tics in private, such as “empty rooms, darkened theatres, back rows of lecture halls, and church services” (Buckser pp. 176). Even if they are not able to get away from people for a long enough time, people with TS use their pockets, clothing, or even desks to hide tics because it is invisible to people from another party. Another way of displacing a tic is to transfer it to a different body part that cannot be seen by someone you are talking to or someone who is looking at you. Distribution on the other hand is distracting people from what is really happening. One of the people Buckser interviewed had twitchy eyes but he blamed it on his contact lens’ acting up. Or others who pretend to sneeze or cough just to cover up their uncontrollable tic. (Buckser pp. 177). Vocal tics however are not as easy as motor tics to cover up in public. One interviewee had the problem of saying