Pragmatic Imagination and the New Museum Anthropology

Book excerpt: Pragmatic Imagination and the New Museum Anthropology shifts museum anthropology’s relationship to the broader field from marginal to central by revealing the sophisticated transdisciplinary praxis (theory + practice) at the heart of current museum anthropologies. The book features international case studies that operate at the interfaces of critical museology, anthropology, material culture studies, art practice, and more. The theory of pragmatics proposes that meaning-making is collaborative and best evaluated through its impact in the world. Collectively the chapters in this volume evidence a ‘pragmatic imagination’ at work as museum anthropology practitioners ingeniously combine inventiveness (the possible) and practicality (the actual) in ways that drive the field forward. Defining museum anthropology as a pragmatic practice explicitly theorizes this work in order to mark its significance; demystify its processes of knowledge production; connect it more readily to debates within and beyond anthropology; and facilitate critique.