HAU, Journal of Ethnographic Theory

HAU, Journal of Ethnographic Theory

HAU, Journal of Ethnographic Theory, is a new, international, peer-reviewed, open-access and copyleft journal which aims to situate ethnography as the prime heuristic of anthropology, and return it to the forefront of conceptual developments in the discipline.

The journal covers a wide range of topics, and will publish articles focusing on any region of the world, beyond the Himalayas. Its current Managing Editor is Stéphane Gros, researcher at the Centre for Himalayan Studies (CNRS).

The inaugural issue will be available online on November 30, 2011. See the preview at haujournal.org.

The idea for the journal arose from two concerns. The first relates to the increased relevance allocated in the discipline to philosophical and social theory at the expense of ethnography, and the second to the wider crisis in academic publishing and the possibilities afforded by the digital revolution and the recent open-access initiatives in the humanities.

HAU welcomes submissions that strengthen ethnographic engagement with received knowledges, and revive the vibrant themes of anthropology through debate and engagement with other disciplines, exploring domains held until recently to be the province of economics, philosophy and the natural sciences. The journal is motivated by the need to reinstate ethnographic theorization in contemporary anthropology as a potent alternative to its “explanation” or “contextualization” by philosophical arguments, moves which have resulted in a loss of the discipline’s distinctive theoretical nerve.

HAU shall also include non-peer review sections for special essays (i.e., lectures or unedited manuscripts) and two further sections for translations and reprinting of classics of ethnographic theory.

Editors in Chief: Giovanni da Col (Cambridge) and Justin Shaffner (Mary Washington University)

Managing Editor: Stephane Gros (CNRS)

Editor-at-Large: David Graeber (Goldsmiths)

Associate Editor: Rachel Douglas Jones (Durham)

Editorial Assistants: Philip Swift, Mylene Hengen (EHESS), Harriet Boulding (SOAS)