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Trouillot (1991) finds that anthropology’s raison d’être sprang from a Western desire to study the Other, the unknown, the primitive, the savage. He states: “Anthropology did not create the savage. Rather, the savage was the raison d’être of anthropology. Anthropology came to fill the savage slot…” (Trouillot 1991: 40). He believes that the creation of the Other arose from the ‘discovery’ of the New World by Columbus in 1492, implying the creation of the Other rose from Western contact with non-Western peoples. Stuart Hall adds to this, noting that the Portuguese were exploring the African coast as early as 1430

(Hall 1996:190). Emerging from this Age of Discovery (loosely 15th-18th century)

and the later Age of Colonial Expansion (19th-20th century) were accounts of

other lands and peoples, travel narratives, colonial surveys and maps,

ethnographic reports, and even fictional utopias (the line between which was not always clear). These travel accounts and writings obliterated Europe’s

microcosm creating both a sense of self and a sense of the Other (Trouillot 1991). Hall (1996) also identifies that Europe, the “West”, began to identify itself as an entity and as an opposite to the Other during the Ages of European Expansion. He writes,

The two processes—growing internal cohesion and the conflicts and contrasts with external worlds—reinforced each other, helping to forge the new sense of identity that we call “the West. (Hall 1996:197)

The conflicts that Hall mentions here occurred over many centuries and include challenges to and from the Islamic world—the Moor Invasion and the Crusades— and challenges from the East—the Mongol and Tartar invasions from Central Asia (see Hall 1996:196-197).

These travel writings also fed a demand for knowledge of the Other, the

elsewhere, and often, the public as well as some scholars did not necessarily care if such descriptions were realistic or accurate. Mbodj (2002) writes that exaggerations and misrepresentations of lands and peoples were often depicted

on 16th and 17th century maps. Unknown terrains were filled in with geographical

guesses and colorful or sometimes fantastical depictions. “Big animals,

costumes, cities, and kings were the favorite theme. Images of strange peoples were juxtaposed with biblical episodes and ancient myths” (Mbodj 2002:45). Typically, such maps were produced in color and with images for scholars, rulers, and the wealthy, whereas maps with distances and navigational instructions were produced separately for sailors in black and white (Figure 2.1) (Mbodj 2002). These maps and travel writings were frequently inaccurate or exaggerated, and they were often marketed to the public as entertainment, while seemingly providing knowledge of other lands, peoples, and cultures. Anthropology as a field emerged from this demand for knowledge of the Other, slowly severing the imaginary from the believed scientific. “Anthropology came to fill the savage slot

and travel accounts—and soon to be played, perhaps, by unexpected media…” (Trouillot 1991:29).

Figure 2.1 Map of Africa by Sebastian Münster, an Influential Cartographer of the Mid-16th Century (Münster, 1554).

In addition to Europe’s nascent sense of self and its binary reflection, the savage, Trouillot (1991) lists two other themes that contributed to the West’s sense of self and its general conception of the world: (1) a vision of utopia (the ideal state) and (2) a vision of order (the ideal state of affairs). Order includes that which was imposed on the savage, but also order within the West itself, especially political and ideological order. Trouillot sees this thematic trilogy

(savage, utopia, order) as being the shaky baseline upon which anthropology is constituted.

Hall (1996) writes in a similar vein to Trouillot about the creation of the Other or “the Rest” and its link to the foundation of social science. Hall

demonstrates that the creation of social science stems from the Enlightenment and social theories of man (Hall 1996). Social scientists of the Enlightenment period examined early stages of socio-economic development, contrasted “civilized nations” and “savages and barbarians,” and helped to form the theoretical framework for the idea that humans developed along a single sequence, divided into a series of stages that ended with modernity or

civilization, though theorists differed on what factors drove these stages (Hall 1996: 220). The enlightened or the West was purported to be the apex of modernity, of progress, of civility, and was proved as such with discursive language and figures like the “noble vs. ignoble savage” and “rude and refined nations” (Hall 1996:221). So the Other or “the Rest” as an opposite or binary was formed by and help form the Enlightenment, the West, and modern social

science.

Although both Trouillot (1991) and Hall (1996) trace the beginnings of anthropology/social science to the formation of the Other and the West in their articles, they recognize that these fields and the consequent foundations or ideas upon which they are built are not relegated to the past alone. Hall (1996)

recognizes that the creation of the Other and the way in which the West talks or writes about it and itself in relation to the Other, became a powerful discourse

that shaped perceptions and practices, including practices within anthropology that continue today. Trouillot (1991) recommends a future anthropology that is critical and reflexive, one that condemns these traditional themes of savage, utopia, and order, but one that also studies their history and how they helped shape the discipline (Trouillot 1991:22-23). Anthropologists must recognize and deconstruct the savage slot.