Encyclopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropology
The relationship between Marxism and anthropology has been both fruitful and often antagonistic. There are several distinct phases which can be described.
First of all, there are Marx and Engels’s own writings on anthropological topics which formed the basis for much self-consciously orthodox research in official *Russian and *Chinese anthropology. Secondly, there is anthropological work inspired by later Marxist theorists: most of this has been carried out since the early 1970s and can be divided into two broad streams, structural Marxism and what I shall call cultural Marxism. Finally, we can also point to important areas of work which could be characterized as ‘post-Marxist’, in the sense that they have been deeply influenced by the authors’ encounter with Marxist ideas, but with little or no trace of dogmatic attachment to Marxist principles.
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