Anthropology, the indigenous and human rights: Which billiard balls matter most?

Abstract

Anthropology is uniquely positioned to open a new dimension of critical human rights discourse based on engaging indigenous rights. Moving toward a critical anthropology of human rights begins from the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The charge that this document reifies ‘indigenous’ and ‘rights’ is examined in light of reifications such as ‘primitive’ and ‘tribe’, referencing Eric Wolf’s assertion that cultures, societies and nations should not be treated as if they were bounded ‘billiard balls’. In reframing rights, Marx’s (1844) and others’ insights on human collectivity are useful. This reframing perforce questions the ipso facto legitimacy of nation-statism.