The sociologist’s guide for writing anthropological, lesson 2
Thursday, June 25th, 2009Nouns which suggest that things are finished and uniform are to be avoided as much as possible. These run the risk of getting the stamp “essentialistic”, which is one of the Deadly Sins in writing anthropological. For the anthropologist everything is complex and in flux from one state to another. Therefore, if applicable, try to rewrite your nouns into gerunds (usu. words ending on -ing).
Examples:
politics = politicizing
religion = religioning
See Tweed’s Crossing and Dwelling. A Theory of Religions for an excellent argument on the use of gerunds.
