Special section: Psychological Anthropology

Stodulka, Thomas; Funk, Leberecht

Abstract

In this special section we introduce current research in psychological anthropology, a subdiscipline that sits at the cusp of anthropology and psychology, and which looks back at 100 years of scholarship in the USA, but has only recently (re-)emerged as concerted scholarly engagement in other domains. Psychological anthropology is in many regards related to cultural psychology, transcultural psychiatry, and cultural sociology as it shares their interest in human behavior and experience at the interface of culture, history, psychology, and psychiatry. It is, however, distinct from neighboring disciplines through its grounding in ethnography, a long-term perspective, and its openness to mixed methods that can include both qualitative and quantitative methodologies. In the following, we point out why we think it is important for psychological anthropology to become a multi-sited and multi-vocal project that takes inspiration from US anthropology and extends to Europe and other academic landscapes.