ABSTRACT
As it turned out, the degree in philosophy was probably much better training for writing popular anthropology than continuing to study anthropology. In The Racing Tribe, author actually took this one step further, and instead of having the usual compulsory chapter agonizing over the ethical and methodological difficulties of the participant-observation method and the role of the participant observer, he borrowed the language of self-help psychobabble—one know, the whole one-must-nurture-their-inner-child business—and expressed the problem as an ongoing battle between author's inner participant and inner observer. The chapter describes the bitchy squabbles that these two inner voices engaged in every time a conflict arose between roles as honorary member of the racing tribe and as detached scientist. The companies mainly commission the studies for information and insight, but also in some cases for the public-relations benefits—to have their names associated with interesting and important research.
