CONSENSUS RESPONSE TO THE “VANDERBILT REPORT” FROM THE WASHINGTON ASSOCIATION OF PROFESSIONAL ANTHROPOLOGISTS (WAPA): ADDING OUR VOICE
In response to the Report on the State of Scholarship in the Humanities and Humanistic Social Sciences (Vanderbilt Report, April 5, 2026), the following is a statement from the Washington Association of Professional Anthropologists (WAPA), one of the nation’s largest anthropology practitioner organizations. We represent practicing anthropologists from a broad range of subfields who work in small businesses, large corporations, colleges and universities, museums, local, state, and federal government agencies, domestic and global nonprofit agencies, consulting firms, and other settings. In these capacities we apply anthropology’s holistic, analytic and human-centered framework to conduct research, evaluate programs, design and develop programs and policies, shape business practices and products, collaborate with communities, develop and conduct media campaigns, and advocate for those in need.
We will focus this response specifically on the claims made about the utility of anthropology, as it is one of the social sciences singled out in the Report for degrading the quality of scholarship through what its authors view as excess politicization of knowledge, specifically due to a perceived academic prevalence of “relativistic” approaches to evidence and truth (where “relativism” in the Report is primarily defined in terms of the influence of postmodernism, poststructuralism, decolonization, feminism, anti-racist/social justice goals, and a purported “repudiation of longstanding ideals of rigor and objectivity”).
While we acknowledge that these approaches are part of a multivocal discourse in anthropological scholarship, to hold up that characterization front and center for use as an ideological cudgel – and the report clearly has its own politicized agenda – distorts and denigrates the discipline of anthropology as a rich, important and multifaceted field, and completely ignores the ways in which anthropological knowledge, theory and methods have been applied to a wide range of applied endeavors and occupations. It also misrepresents the nature of relativism as a stance that has a long and fruitful history in anthropology. Any field of study as broad as anthropology will have its schools of thought, trends, and controversies. Those “relativist” approaches assailed in the Report have, in their way, contributed to self-examination within the discipline and the evolution of thinking, methods, and yes, science. To know that, however, one has to look beyond the highly selective (and often misrepresented) samples of text cited in the Report. The authors did not do this, and in so limiting their own “data,” violated the very principles of objective scholarship they so ardently championed.
We are especially concerned that the one-sided critique in the Report (anthropologist Conrad Kottak called it a “hit job with footnotes”) could negatively influence students and young scholars who might be interested in pursuing anthropology as their field of study and as the basis for their careers. We therefore offer the following refutations and counterexamples to the distorted portrayal of anthropology in the Report, particularly in terms of its practical and real-world relevance.
First, however, we need to address the issue of relativism. The Report pans the notion that truth and evidence, science, and the standards for evidence are subjective, and situated, and that they might indeed be influenced by what it calls “non-epistemic factors” such as power configurations. Anthropologists who are WAPA members work across a wide range of populations and circumstances, and indeed we encounter ways of living and ways of thinking that differ, and sometimes call into question, accepted categories of knowledge and standards of evidence, precisely because it is part of our job to understand human variation as lived, thought about and experienced by people. We need to be able to interpret these situations from the perspective of those with whom we work. Thus, with respect to the issue of relativism, we assert that the theory and methods of anthropology are highly valuable in many applied contexts, not because they are ideological “projects” or agendas. That value, and it is a unique value, includes the willingness to consider the variation in epistemologies and experiences that might guide the beliefs and actions of people, which in turn may lead to improved human understandings and relationships, better treatment, better services, better products, more equitable opportunities, and better quality of life for those among whom we work. If the authors of the Vanderbilt Report choose to call that broad, pro-human purpose ideological, we find that strangely selective, since many fields and disciplines, from medicine, to education, to psychology, to social work, and others, can make the same claim as to underlying purpose.
The following are selected examples of specific kinds of occupations and professional roles for which anthropological theory and methods are key, many drawn from the actual experiences of WAPA members:
- Domestic and global public health. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline in public and global health. We use these to understand, for example, how a cultural group or society defines “being healthy,” what is their working typology of disease and causation and in turn appropriate healing practices, and what social and cultural forces increase vulnerability to one or more health conditions for them. In order to understand these things, we collaborate. We listen and learn from the populations at risk. Public health anthropology has repeatedly demonstrated worldwide that we cannot simply assume or impose standardized biomedical health frameworks, or use biomedical assessment tools. What we learn is then incorporated into public health communications and social mobilization programs, treatment protocols, prevention programs, provider practices, and policies that are more likely to be implemented and effective because they make sense for the affected population and respond to what is valuable for them.
- Environmental and climate research. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline in environmental and climate research. For example, working with fishermen as research partners (through both long-term cooperative research programs and individual shorter-term projects) draws on fishermen’s extensive, often multigenerational knowledge of both ocean conditions and the behavior of different fish and other species. This both improves our biological and climate science and creates relationships that increase trust between fishermen and both social and natural scientists. This work draws on theories from ecological, economic, and sociocultural anthropology related, for example, to the concept of sense of place, the importance of local community norms and values, and fleet-specific cultures (e.g., small vs. large vessels, and variations by target species and/or trip length).
- Education. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline in education, a logical domain of practice since education fundamentally involves cultural transmission. Using ethnographic and other approaches, anthropologists have examined cross-cultural modes of learning and communication, the social system in which education occurs, educational inequities, the cultural processes by which educational content is determined, and the sociolinguistic practices used in teaching. Education anthropologists have also looked at the broader context in which education occurs, in communities, families and groups outside a formal school setting and across the life-course. Recommendations from such research has been translated into policies and practices.
- Humanitarian and disaster relief work. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline in humanitarian and disaster relief work. In fact, an increasing number of applied anthropologists are deeply involved in “disaster anthropology.” Major disasters disrupt every aspect of the physical, cultural, economic lives of survivors. When emergency response, and particularly recovery needs outstrip local capacities, outsiders provide assistance, be it domestic or international. Without knowing local disaster coping strategies and past experience, response capacities, perceptions of recovery, perspectives regarding appropriate processes, distribution, participation, self-determination, and socioeconomic structures, great harm can, and has been done unwittingly by external “helpers.” Disaster-specialist anthropologists are able to identify, understand, and help design and manage collaboratively with local populations the best, most effective and most appropriate and ways to provide disaster assistance with the least damage and most benefit. There are numerous specific and detailed examples of this kind of significant anthropological contribution to people’s wellbeing in the literature.
- Product and human-centered design. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline in corporate and non-profit environments, and product design (e.g., human centered design, etc.). Human centered design (HCD), for example, typically employs ethnographic methods to understand interactions between people and technology in order to improve design, understand the context in which a particular technology or service would be used, and to “co-create” or “co-design” technological products and services with a focus on the end users. Importantly, the anthropological practices in HCD seek to work across “different epistemic communities” (see Carnes, VandenBroek and Brunson, 2024) to solve human problems, not privileging any particular stakeholders.
- Program evaluation. Anthropologists have long drawn on theory and methods from the discipline to conduct evaluations and assess the effectiveness and appropriateness of programs implemented both domestically and globally. Qualitative methods such as the collection of life history data (from interviews) or data on lived experience, for example, supplement survey and/or psychometric methods in monitoring and evaluation, often revealing the weaknesses of relying solely on quantitative methods. The qualitative data also provides added insight that can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of programs, informing program designers on factors that determine whether or not a program works. For example, evaluation surveys may show that participants in a training program for service providers increased their knowledge about counseling techniques, and that they retained this knowledge even months after completing the program. Despite that apparent success, life history and experiential interview data may show that only some of the trainees were actually able to incorporate that knowledge into practice, and may identify specific barriers that some trainees face. This application of a typical anthropological method would support adjustment of the program so that those barriers are addressed.
- Artificial intelligence. Anthropological theory, perspectives and methods are highly useful in the rapidly expanding arena of artificial intelligence (AI). In fact, cognitive anthropology was deeply involved in early research on neural networks and human cognition. As noted by Matt Artz, anthropology can “function not merely as a consumer of AI technologies but as an active architect of computational systems that preserve cultural complexity and interpretive depth. Further, by participating in all three dimensions—studying, using, and shaping AI—anthropologists can help ensure that computational methods serve rather than supplant our disciplinary commitments to understanding meaning, context, and the complexities of human experience” (https://anthrowork.org/interventions/ai-anthropology-a-new-opportunity-for-anthropological-work/).
- Adoption in other disciplines. As an overall comment, we note that methods and perspectives from anthropology have been so useful that they have been adopted by other disciplines that weren’t the subject of the Report’s ire, including communications, sociology, management, translational research, environmental design, international development, and others.
Finally, we invite any of the Vanderbilt Report authors to accompany WAPA members during their research, or talk to our members in person or online about their work in applied capacities. We call for Report authors to step out of their narrow box and see where they have misunderstood and mis-stated anthropological scholarship and its application to real-world settings. The Report as it stands, however well-intended it might have been, is unjustly detrimental to the growth and progress of anthropology as a productive career and useful field of study, and we as an organization stand ready to demonstrate how flawed the narrative promulgated in the report truly is.
THE WASHINGTON ASSOCIATION OF PROFESSIONAL ANTHROPOLOGISTS
