The study of scientific communities using the tools and perspectives of cultural anthropology. It treats scientists not as pure reasoners but as members of a distinct culture with its own rituals, taboos, initiation rites, kinship systems, and oral traditions. The anthropologist of science might study how lab meetings function as tribal councils, how citation practices serve as gift exchange systems, how conference presentations operate as prestige competitions, and how "revolutionary" discoveries are actually negotiated through complex social processes. It reveals that the white coat is a cultural costume, the lab is a ritual space, and peer review is a sophisticated form of tribal gatekeeping. This approach doesn't deny that science produces truth—it just shows that truth-production is always also culture-production.
Example: "Her anthropology of science dissertation examined how theoretical physicists use hand gestures and whiteboard drawings as a form of ritual communication—a tribal language unintelligible to outsiders but sacred to initiates."
by Abzugal March 11, 2026
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