Introduction: Engaged Anthropology vis-à-vis Michael Burawoy’s Public Sociology — A View from Poland

Abstract

Engaged anthropology is analyzed in this text as part of the engaged social sciences. The author uses Michael Burawoy’s concept of public sociology and Thomas Hylland Eriksen’s concept of public anthropology to organize the anthropological field and distinguish four types of anthropology: academic; critical; applied; and public and engaged. Public anthropology is understood here as the participation of anthropologists in public debate while engaged (in the strict sense of the term) on behalf of a community under study. This introduction to Engaged Anthropology in a Time of Growing Nationalism [Antropologia zaangażowana w czasie nacjonalistycznego wzmożenia; Kultura i Społeczeństwo 2020, no. 2] presents the main issues of the volume’s papers on the theoretical and practical problems of engaged anthropology as seen from Poland.