ABSTRACT

This introduction to the special issue Qualifying Sociality through Values interrogates the relationship between sociality and values, two concepts that have gained increasing traction in anthropology, but which have not previously been jointly considered. It presents the twofold agenda of the special issue which is to explore how sociality is valued and how values affect sociality. It opens up these ambiguous and morally charged concepts and discusses their utility and ethnographic purchase as tools for understanding social life in practice. The introduction also outlines the contributions and the special issue’s principal findings. Sociality is rendered as a multilaterally value-shaped and ambiguously valued situated practice which is subject to both extension and contraction. Values come out as multi-purposive evaluative criteria which operate as open-ended social resources to different effects, imparting both direction and contingency.

摘要

特刊“通过价值观界定社会”的导论审问了社会与价值观之间的关系，这两个概念在人类学中越来越受到关注，但以前并未被共同考虑过。它提出了本期特刊的双重议程，即探讨社会性如何被重视以及价值如何影响社会。它打开了这些模棱两可和道德规范的概念，并讨论了它们的实用性和人种学购买方式，作为在实践中理解社会生活的工具。引言还概述了贡献和特刊的主要发现。社会被视为一种多边的价值型和模棱两可的情境实践，它既受制于扩张，也受制于收缩。