What can we learn from the Chagnon controversy about anthropological ethics?
What can we learn from the Chagnon controversy about anthropological ethics? (1200 words)
Napoleon Chagnon studied the Yanomamo for most of his professional life and he wrote a frequently edited book with the title describing this tribe a ‘The fierce people’; however, this created so much controversy that in the last two editions he had to omit it as it questioned the ethics on what we call people.
The Chagnon controversy centres on the accusation made by the investigative journalist Patrick Tierney in his book Darkness in El Dorado where he accuses Chagnon and James Neel of breaching anthropological ethics. His accusations not only brought to light the gross wrong doings of these two men but also questions of anthropological ethics, which will explore in this essay.
In Darkness in El Dorado, Patrick Tierney accuses both Neel and Chagnon of committing serious abuses against the Yanomamo. For Neel, Tierney accuses him of helping to make the measles epidemic worse rather than better, purely so that he could benefit and improve his professional gain. This measles epidemic spread through the Yanomamo and killed thousands of people and Tierney accused him committing the wrong actions to fight the epidemic in order to better his findings. Tierney’s basis for these accusations stemmed from the fact that Neel worked with the Atomic Energy Commission which within the company took part in a shocking program. In this program, innocent patients at the Strong Memorial Hospital, including women, children and the terminally ill, were injected with radioactive substances to test for the toxic effects of atomic radiation on humans; all of this was done without the patient’s knowledge nor consent. When the program was exposed it was impossible to locate the files so while Tierney does not accuse Neel of this also, he merely infers the questionability of Neel as it poses the question: how could Neel know what was happening when he was so close to the program? The
Napoleon Chagnon studied the Yanomamo for most of his professional life and he wrote a frequently edited book with the title describing this tribe a ‘The fierce people’; however, this created so much controversy that in the last two editions he had to omit it as it questioned the ethics on what we call people.
The Chagnon controversy centres on the accusation made by the investigative journalist Patrick Tierney in his book Darkness in El Dorado where he accuses Chagnon and James Neel of breaching anthropological ethics. His accusations not only brought to light the gross wrong doings of these two men but also questions of anthropological ethics, which will explore in this essay.
In Darkness in El Dorado, Patrick Tierney accuses both Neel and Chagnon of committing serious abuses against the Yanomamo. For Neel, Tierney accuses him of helping to make the measles epidemic worse rather than better, purely so that he could benefit and improve his professional gain. This measles epidemic spread through the Yanomamo and killed thousands of people and Tierney accused him committing the wrong actions to fight the epidemic in order to better his findings. Tierney’s basis for these accusations stemmed from the fact that Neel worked with the Atomic Energy Commission which within the company took part in a shocking program. In this program, innocent patients at the Strong Memorial Hospital, including women, children and the terminally ill, were injected with radioactive substances to test for the toxic effects of atomic radiation on humans; all of this was done without the patient’s knowledge nor consent. When the program was exposed it was impossible to locate the files so while Tierney does not accuse Neel of this also, he merely infers the questionability of Neel as it poses the question: how could Neel know what was happening when he was so close to the program? The