Johan Rasanayagam and Monica Heintz, fellow researchers at Max Planck Insitute for Social Anthropology Halle/Saale, Germany, are organizing an interesting workshop for December 2005. Interesting especially to those who have followed the multiple reflections on anthropology`s inherent moralities (i.e. start reading here) that had been initiated by Dustin M. Wax at Savage Minds.

From Heintzand Rasanayagams call for paper (outdated): Many philosophers and the founders of modern social science considered morality, alongside religion and law, to be the key regulator of society, thus giving moral values a centrality that was not reflected subsequently in the interest social studies accorded to the field. Indeed while there is a well developed anthropology of both religion and law, the anthropology of morality remains relatively neglected. Recently, however, some anthropologists have attempted to explore the theme of morality and even to use it as an analytical concept. A common approach which seems to be emerging is to focus not on actual values or value systems themselves, but on the reflective processes by which individuals make choices between different evaluations or courses of action. The anthropology of morality should be about discerning the link between values which are derived from a larger metaphysical whole, and actual beliefs and practices; and about how people make of themselves a certain kind of person through reflection upon the practices and models found in society. Morality can be seen as the site where people represent power or the exercise of authority to themselves, evaluate it, and the either decide to submit to it, exploit it or oppose it. Following the initial steps taken by the new ethnographies of moralities, the time has come to attempt to construct a coherent theoretical concept of morality and suggest how it can be used by anthropologists to contribute to the explanation of social phenomena. How can we develop tools that will help us avoid normative judgements? How can we escape our own value system, that we can describe other value systems, and then arrive at a new view of our own? How do we recognize manifestations or reflections of moral values, in other words the raw empirical data for this topic? ...

via Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology Halle/Saale, Germany

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