This is to announce a survey, prepared and administered by Nikki Kuper (an Honours student in anthropology at Macquarie University, Australia), as part of her Honours thesis research. Nikki’s study is concerned with “examining the factors at stake in debates about the use of anthropologists and anthropological knowledge in military operations.” She is especially interested in “the nature of debates and discussions within the anthropological community in regards to the Human Terrain System (HTS).” Nikki intends for the research to “help inform and contextualize debates about the ethics, consequences, and benefits of anthropological involvement in military operations, and will hopefully assist in analysing future ethical dilemmas likely to arise through the use of anthropological knowledge in highly political contexts.” The survey will take about 15 to 20 minutes to complete, and it can be accessed here:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=2HgHXDxMlbdXjLWZn6quzg_3d_3d
Arthur
21 July 2010
Would anyone in Human Terrain risk his or her job for this? I wonder if this person’s response rate will be abysmally low.
Maximilian Forte
21 July 2010
Nikki Kuper, in an email message to me, promised that the results of the survey would be shared. I have not heard from her since, and I believe her work has finished and she has moved on. I regret having bothered to waste my time advertising this. I did fill out the survey, and found several serious problems with the questions, the available answers, and I noted these in my response. On the other hand, I am relieved that I chose to decline being interviewed by her, especially as some of her blog statements show that she has an axe to grind for HTS. Anytime someone contacts me with a question about the “tone” of the debate, it is easy to sniff out their intentions and real concerns. As if “tone” were somehow the really important issue here.