Wisdom sits in places by Keith H. Basso vs. Marcyliena Morgan

            Writing is viewed as an activity and study that is related to what people usually do inform of a text. Such kind of writings is located within both the social as well as the cultural framework. Therefore the anthropology of writing is characterized by its methodology. Research tools are essential as they help us to understand the social and the cultural perspectives thus allowing people to explore the various activities and contexts of writing and the meaning that is brought about by the readers, users and the writers. These methods that are often used are ethnographic and at time historical. They both are similar as they emphasizes on the users and the producers of the texts and on the manner in which they engage with the broader social activities and the communications that their actions are part of (Barton et al 9). This paper therefore will major its discussion on two ethnographies by Basso and Morgan illustrating some of the comparisons in their works.

            Wisdom sits in places is a linguistic ethnography book that talks about landscape and the language amongst the Western Apache. This book is written by a Keith Basso who was a rancher and had spent two decades in the field of the Western Apache researching. However, Marcliena Morgan is a professor in Harvard University. The book covers both the social as well as the cultural fundamentals of language and is largely used by both upper graduates as well as the graduates.

            Basso’s use of language and storytelling approach is completely unfamiliar to that of the Western approach thus giving the reader a good judgment of the apaches and good judgment of the place. Thus the people are able to judge that the Western Apache citizens and most likely other people usually view certain places as those that are being instilled with a power to educate individuals in the core ways of wisdom. He uses language as he talk of the name of the place. The name itself is adequate to bring to mind the necessary reaction and contemplation in those hearing the name. His language in exposing the landscape and language in the Western Apache gives us an understanding of the sacredness and the individualistic nature of the words and the place. Thus he has a high ability to explore in a readable manner he role that is played by language in the multifaceted but rather convincing theme of the people’s connection to a place. Thus he is an outstanding storyteller who makes good use of the highly thrilling but mysterious worlds of the Western Apaches to come to live. He thus is well informed of the place and even knows the language of the place thus allowing him to be composedly knowledgeable, free of cant and terminology and also enjoyably entertaining. Thus he is able to turn linguistics anthropology into a fictional art. However, Morgan maintains a social space in her narration as she uses laughter so as to accomplish her social goals. Therefore language relates with the prosperity of the ethnographic and the folk work on the African American language.

            For Basso to collect his data during his research, he usually travelled with Apache consultants who used to explain the places names. He thus quotes comprehensively the words of his consultants often hence allowing them to be both descriptive as well as analytical. However Morgan throughout her research and ethnographic work, she was assisted by a group of hip-hop musicians from Los Angeles, her individual family who lived in Chicago and also a few rural population from Mississippi (Morgan 10).

            Basso’s writing is setting poetry of the human experience which is basically the naming of the world. In doing so, he devotes his research with the rarest of the academic qualities such as the sense of spiritual exploration. It is only through his clear eyes that we are able to have a quick look at the spirit of an outstanding people and their land and when we look away we are able to see our world once again. However, Morgan’s style of writing is straight forward and easy to get to as she integrates individual story with qualitative as well as numerical data and demonstrates every element of her learning with convincing ethnographic data. This ethnography offers the widespread line that dash throughout the entire body of research.

            Basso’s work is quite thoughtful, convincing, entirely informed and also interestingly written and quite enjoyable while reading.  His work is well guided within the landscape and it has related story telling of the people of the Western Apache. However Morgan’s research is ore valid as she analyses both the quantitative as well as qualitative information using the integrated lenses of the past, linguistics, legends, opinionated economy as well as culture.

            Basso’s work is essential to us as it enables us to understand and appreciate the diverse manner in which we as the human beings think or even act within our world. It enables the contemporary readers to increase their understanding that wisdom is something that is gained by means of long meditation on the symbolic aspect of the physical landscape and the stories that are connected to that place through the name of hat place. Hence there is a relationship with the past and this affects the way we perceive a place. Morgan on the other hand advocates for the appreciation of the diversity of languages in the speeches so as to better understand the anthropology of the speech of the community and its member’s unrestrained competence (Duranti 63).

            Morgan examines the language in terms of the shifting and multifaceted African American culture and the American speech communities, way of doing things, arts as well as politics. Thus the ethical issue on language and education of the youth, gender, culture and identity is well addressed through the research that was carried out on the African American culture. Therefore Morgan is able to fully address the issue on the extent of Afro-American linguistic learning which has conventionally persuaded the language of the youthful town males through the provision of accessibility to the overlooked members of the community in the African American culture. However, Basso’s work was worth risking taking the research as it establishes an ethical approach to the people’s mind as his work clearly demonstrates the way of living for the people with their land. It also involves the creation of an ethical landscape that is appropriate for a culture to thrive in and a development of memories for that specific place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

            Barton, David, and Uta Papen. "The anthropology of writing: understanding textually-mediated social worlds." (2010).

            Duranti, Alessandro. Linguistic Anthropology: A Reader. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009. Print.

            Morgan, Marcyliena H. Language, Discourse and Power in African American Culture. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Print.