Weaponizing Anthropology (Counterpunch)

A wonderful book on the complexities and serious ethical concerns of improper use of social science for warfare. Price doesn't just challenge the ethical questions, he leaves the entire argument of counterinsurgency via social science without any room for serious rebuttal.

Price's Weaponizing Anthropology is the most frightening short book that I have read since Foucault's Discipline and Punish or the more recently published papers from law Professor Fred H. Cate. I suspect that just as it has been with Foucault and Cate that I will return to Price's book again and again.Truly a brutal book which at once has nothing to do with Anthropology and at the same time has everything to do with it.This book gives a great deal but if you have any notion that this book is solely about some facet or even the state of Anthropology as a field of study then you are in for a most troubling awakening--for something is already afoot in our Universities and publicly funded colleges.Perhaps, the most important and timely book I have read in past year.

Thank you for revealing these growing and secretive PRISP programs on our university campuses. Covert PRISP scholars in our college classrooms sounds eerily reminiscent of the East German Stasi. Could this program have metastasized in the 9 years since its conception? Only courage and transparency can help us now as we speed down the slippery slope in the never ending "War on Terror."

An essential piece, in logically discerning the United States' fallacy of greatness. Price's book should be required reading in middle schools.

A great book. It provides info not readily available until now. A bit repetitive because it is a compilation of articles

David Price has written another great book about the uses of social science, especially anthropology, by governments and the power elite. Particularly importnat is the ICSP details- where the student loan "awards" are used as a cudgel to force grad students to work as spies. The awards cost can be converted into debt at triple the amount- and since most of us are groaning under normal student debt, this is unbearable! All three of his books on this topic are worth reading, both for anthropologists and people concerned about higher education in the US.

Interesting viewpoints expressed, comes off a bit like a conspiracy nut at times though. Also, quite a few grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. (Given the paranoidal gist of this book, I began to wonder if the CIA had implanted these mistakes in order to discredit Price!?)More than anything, this book gave me food for thought. Lumpy, stodgy food, but food nonetheless. Probably an essential read if you are thinking of joining the Peace Corps, or if you have some interest in the Military Industrial Complex. Just know that some of the thinking on display is not very 'joined up'.

I really enjoyed this book! The author does a great job laying out the many problems which currently plague the anthropological discipline. Although, the book is focused on the US and the military courting of anthropologists for human terrain systems, and thus lacks some applicability for Canadian students (or non-American students generally). It nevertheless provides a great deal of material to consider.