Political ontology

Part of a series on
Anthropology
Outline History
Types Archaeological Biological Cultural Linguistic Social
Archaeological Aerial Aviation Battlefield Biblical Bioarchaeological Environmental Ethnoarchaeological Experiential Feminist Forensic Maritime Paleoethnobotanical Zooarchaeological
Biological Anthrozoological Biocultural Evolutionary Forensic Molecular Neurological Nutritional Paleoanthropological Primatological
Social Cultural Applied Art Cognitive Cyborg Development Digital Ecological Environmental Economic Political economy Feminist Food Historical Institutional Kinship Legal Media Medical Museums Musical Political Psychological Public Religion Symbolic Transpersonal Urban Visual
Linguistic Anthropological Descriptive Ethnological Ethnopoetical Historical Semiotic Sociological
Research framework Anthropometry Ethnography cyber Ethnology Cross-cultural comparison Participant observation Holism Reflexivity Thick description Cultural relativism Ethnocentrism Emic and etic
Key concepts Culture Development Ethnicity Evolution sociocultural Gender Kinship and descent Meme Prehistory Race Society Value Colonialism / Postcolonialism
Key theories Actor–network theory Alliance theory Cross-cultural studies Cultural materialism Culture theory Diffusionism Feminism Historical particularism Boasian anthropology Functionalism Interpretive Performance studies Political economy Practice theory Structuralism Post-structuralism Systems theory
Lists Anthropologists by nationality Anthropology by year Bibliography Journals List of indigenous peoples Organizations
v t e

This article may be too technical for most readers to understand. Please help improve it to make it understandable to non-experts, without removing the technical details. (June 2022) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Political ontology is an approach within anthropology to understand the process of how practices, entities (human and non-human), and concepts come into being or are enacted.^[1] The field takes as its focus 'conflicts involving different assumptions about 'what exists,'"^[1] over metaphysical entities, how to understand ecosystems and environment, the nature of animals and plants, and how communities collectively adjudicate what is real. Political ontology emerged as part of the ontological turn, particularly in the works by Mario Blaser, Marisol de la Cadena and Eduardo Viveiros de Castro.