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Status and Exchange in the Profession of Anthropology
Author(s) -
HURLBERT BEVERLEY MCELLIGOTT
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
american anthropologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.51
H-Index - 85
eISSN - 1548-1433
pISSN - 0002-7294
DOI - 10.1525/aa.1976.78.2.02a00020
Subject(s) - elite , ranking (information retrieval) , sociology , educational anthropology , distribution (mathematics) , anthropology , political science , ethnography , law , mathematics , computer science , politics , mathematical analysis , machine learning
This is a study of the distribution of Ph.D.s in anthropology who obtained their degrees from and who are teaching in Ph.D.‐granting departments in the United States and Canada. 1358 graduates of 80 departments are considered. A quantitative method of ranking departments, based upon exchange theory principles, is applied to this universe and its results compared to the results of a qualitative ranking carried out by the American Council of Education (A.C.E.) based upon personal evaluation of departments by anthropologists themselves. An elite is designated and the degree to which that elite dominates the academic profession is expressed in terms of the distribution of its graduates as faculty of elite schools, other Ph.D.‐granting schools, and non‐Ph.D.‐granting schools as compared with the distribution of nonelite graduates among those same faculties. A suggestion is made concerning the social structure of the academic profession of anthropology based on the results of the study.