INTERPRETIVE ANTHROPOLOGY OR SCIENTIFIC ANTHROPOLOGY  pt2    1600w

Like many other anthropologists, Geertz began to draw upon on Boasian anthropology in order to guide his particular research methods and to be able to illustrate his translation of signifying culture as a significant text. Victor Turner alternatively took a slightly different approach to symbolic anthropology. In contrast with Geertz, Turner was interested in the way symbols were used to perform various social functions, and simply not how they affect the way individuals think. He was concerned with how exactly symbols were able to operate in the overall interest in conserving a society (McGee and Warms 2000:467).

In his article Symbols in Ndembu Ritual, Turner attempts to distinguish his analysis of symbols with more psychologically founded approaches. During his opening paragraphs Turner defines a symbol as “the smallest unit of ritual which still retains specific properties of ritual behaviour” (McGee and Warms 2000:478). According to Turner it is also important to keep interpretative and observational materials separate when examining them. By suggesting that each ritual has is designed with its own meaning he also suggests that certain dominant symbols are able to maintain a constant identity. For example, he mentions the use of fruit bearing trees and female fertility used in ritual context to illustrate the significance of ritual interpretation. Had the fruit bearing trees not been used in conjunction with female fertility, the entire interpretive outcome of the ritual might have been different. Here Turner mentions the limitations of anthropological analysis of such symbols (McGee and Warms 2000:486-487). The interpretation of symbols however, is not limited exclusively to the study of ritual practices, or socially constructed events.

Mary Douglas, another anthropologist known for symbolic anthropology challenges the generalization which suggests that most symbolic anthropologists fail to describe culture as universal