The Anthropologist as Curator

Why do contemporary art curators define their work as ethnography? How can curation illuminate the practice of contemporary anthropology? Has the curator become a general model of the contemporary cultural worker? Does anthropology risk disappearing as a specific discipline within the general model of the curatorial?
The Anthropologist as Curator collects together the research of international scholars working at the intersection of anthropology and contemporary art in order to explore these questions. The essays in the book challenge what it means to do ethnographic work, as well as the very definition of the discipline of anthropology in light of what it means to work as a curator. The contributors examine these ideas from a variety of angles, including from the perspectives of anthropologists who have set up their own exhibitions, those who have conducted fieldwork on the arts and collecting practices, including participatory practices, digital images and sound, and contributors who are currently working in a curatorial capacity at a museum.
With case studies from the US, Canada, Germany, Brazil, Mexico, India, and Japan, the book represents an international perspective and is relevant to students and scholars of anthropology, contemporary art, museum studies, curatorial studies, and heritage studies