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CRISIS IN TRAINING AND EMPLOYMENT:
REFLECTIONS ON A FIELDWORK EXPERIENCE'
David E. Vandevert
Department of Anthropology
University of Utah
Salt Lake City, Utah
The following discussion is limited to a few comments concerning
academic training and preparation for both fieldwork and professional
employment. The issues raised will then be related to the context of
of my own recent fieldwork experience, and a few suggestions for
improvement will be made.
The principle point to be stressed is that there seems to be an
ever-increasing gap in the interim between training, fieldwork, and
achievement of a professional status, either in academia or else-
where.  This may be partially due to a problem-oriented emphasis in
anthropology, but it is also related to the changing face of academic
and non-academic employment opportunities.
Whether their interests are in human biology, archeology, or
ethnology, most students preparing for fieldwork are preoccupied with
the delineation of a "legitimate" research problem. That is, most
anthropologists search for and define a specific problem during the
course of preparation for their fieldwork and later analysis. The
importance of this mode of inquiry cannot be denied, as it is a
necessary precondition for attaining more sophisticated methodology,
data collection and analyses. For as we all know, science does not
progress simply by the uncritical compilation of data: synthesis,
abstraction and generalizations are necessary to achieve higher level
laws and principles. However, we cannot forget the need to question
critically the nature and kinds of problems we are dealing with
today.
One of the reasons that our discipline is presently not very
marketable is that we are overconcerned with problems generated by
our own colleagues. We should ask, "Whose problems and what issues
are we attempting to find solutions to?" Are we simply concerned
with those problems and issues that are at any one time in vogue in
the profession, or can we deal with issues of the present world, and
social problems that are of concern to the group being studied, and
of our own society? Rather than asking our students and researchers
to find the ultimate cause, for example, of patrilateral parallel
cousin marriage, or to quantify the exact carrying capacity of a
prehistoric Great Basin hunting and gathering group, we must also
direct our anthropological skills to seeking solutions to such prob-
lems as health, inflation, political repression, standards of living,
and a host of other issues that affect the group we are studying, and
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within our own society as well. By no means is this a new issue in
anthropology, but it often becomes of only secondary importance in
the realities of professional training.
The point is that there is often a great gap between problems,
as defined by current debates in the discipline, and those of the
people we are studying; and institutions, communities and events in
our own society to which anthropology should be able to contribute
more effectively. There is a growing crisis in anthropology, which
is not unlike that of the crisis in medicine: greater reductionism
(in anthropology, specialization) which is no longer appropriate for
scientific tasks and social responsibility (Engel 1977). This
creates a "tunnel vision," as Gardner (1977) describes it, which
prevents problem solving outside the anthropologist's specialty.
Few can dispute that there is also a crisis in the academic
employment of anthropologists. This crisis is related to overspe-
cialization and the problem orientation of mainstream anthropology.
In what they viewed as an "optimistic assessment of the future for
academic employment" D'Andrade et al. (1975:772) calculated that
after 1982 more than two-thirds of all Ph.D.'s in anthropology will
have to find employment outside of the academic world, and they will
be able to use very little of the training they received in graduate
programs. It is recognized, however, that this situation is not
unique to the field of anthropology. In many fields Ph.D.'s are
being produced at a rate far above those required as college and
university teachers. Wolfle and Kidd note that only about a quarter
of the new doctorates of the 1970's will be needed in their respec-
tive academic departments, and the projected annual production of
50,000 new doctorates in the 1980's requires "sustained, long-range,
carefully planned programs" for their utilization in "major social,
health and environmental problems that beset mankind" (1971:790).
The question is: are graduate students currently being prepared
to become marketable in such non-traditional areas of employment?
Can the discipline "twist," as Landgraf (1977) expressed it, and
adjust itself to such imminent realities? Anthropologists may soon
be reaching a point at which they are specializing themselves outside
of a job market by achieving their Ph.D. status via solutions to
esoteric problems, but without knowing how to contribute something
useful, innovative, and marketable. There are those who would argue
that it is ethically and morally wrong to judge and make the kind of
decisions that are demanded in today's world of international trade,
commerce, development, administration, politics, etc. But perhaps it
is just as wrong ethically to remain neutral and passive in such
issues. And as Jansen states, "If it limits its own scope, anthro-
pology cannot remain a viable science" (1973:328).
So, how do these issues relate to my own fieldwork experience?
My dissertation research was in Iran from September, 1976, to
May, 1978. Prior to my arrival in Iran, I was preparing for a vil-
lage demographic study, hoping to pursue the issue of the domestic
1[35
mode of production in relation to recent land reform. However,
having previously lived in Iran, I knew that a research grant simply
would not be sufficient to support my family there. But I also knew
that, once there, I would be able to obtain employment in which I
could pursue research, probably in a village setting.
Within a month I was employed by the Village Health Worker (VHW)
project, administered by the Department of Community Medicine at
Pahlavi University in the southern city of Shiraz. My official job
title was Administrative and Research Assistant, and the responsi-
bilities were as varied as such a title implies.
The VHW project is designed to provide basic health care for a
number of villages about 40 miles outside the city of Shiraz. The
project recruits villagers to serve as VHWs, after an intensive
training program. I selected a village in which a VHW was assigned,
and continued my research for 16 months, spending three and some-
times four days a week in the community.
Essentially, I had two research sites: both the village and
the Department. This provided a broad perspective on the processes
and problems involved in health care delivery--a perspective which
would not have been as clear had I lived only in the village. I
also felt that both my research and work addressed problems and
issues considered relevant and important by both the innovating
institution and the target population to which health services were
directed.
However, during the course of my research, I occasionally had
second thoughts about such a fieldwork situation. After all,
dividing time between the city and the village simply does not fit
stereotypes of an anthropologist totally "immersed" in his or her
community. But in reflecting upon the experience, I believe there
were certain advantages of such an approach.   The villagers associ-
ated me with the VHW project and almost immediately accepted my
presence there. There was no need to obtain a research permit or an
arbitrarily assigned counterpart Iranian investigator, nor was there
a time limit of three months placed on my fieldwork--all of which
are logistic barriers for most anthropologists doing research in
Iran without local institutional affiliation. Furthermore, most of
the time spent in the field was productive. That is, the depression
or lack of motivation that periodically overcomes fieldworkers who
spend long, uninterrupted periods at their site simply was not
experienced because of the weekly retreat to the city (or, on the
other hand, the weekly retreat to the village!).
In retrospect, my academic preparation for fieldwork was some-
what peripheral to needs encountered in the field: i.e., those
needs of the Department and my own revised research interests. I
was associated with an innovative project closely monitored nation-
ally and internationally which became a model for developing a
viable health care delivery system in many areas of rural Iran.
Although the Department's faculty and some of the VHW's staff
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recognized certain advantages of having an anthropologist's per-
spective in field and administrative decisions, the situations and
problems for which they sought advice had little resemblance to
problems discussed in anthropological seminars back in the U.S.A.
Although training in anthropology was useful, such additional skills
as cost-effective analysis, public relations, national and regional
planning, and curriculum development would have been useful. I
found that I was inadequately prepared to make more of a contribu-
tion to the Department's planning and administrative activities,
problems which took some time to overcome. And I seriously doubt if
this inadequacy is unique only to this situation: whether one is
working in marketing, administration or public programs, certain
skills beyond those of an anthropologist are necessary to perform on
an equal basis with colleagues from other disciplines. If anthro-
pologists are to compete successfully in the job market outside
academia--and it looks like this is the future direction they will
have to go--their training and professional preparation will have to
include skills that are marketable and in demand by employers.
Inadequate preparation for today's job market is not necessar-
ily the fault of faculty and advisors; rather, it is more a result
of academic anthropology's concern with problems as defined by
current issues in the field situation. This is not to imply that
all of anthropology is irrelevant and incapable of dealing with real
human issues; but with increasing specialization, there is an inher-
ent danger that our concern with theoretical and often esoteric
problems is simply one of our greatest barriers to relevancy and
productive employment at the present time.
In conclusion, a few potential solutions may be suggested:
1. We should critically examine and reformulate the kinds of
questions and models we are dealing with in terms of current issues
and human problems.
2. It is imperative that students be informed of the employ-
ment crisis in academic anthropology before they make a decision to
pursue anthropology as a profession. Courses, or portions of
courses, should communicate the employment issue, and departments
should develop avenues by which their graduates can become market-
able outside academia.
3. Students should be encouraged (required?) to take courses
in such areas as administration, public policy, trade, marketing,
etc. in order to acquire skills that are marketable. A person armed
only with the solution of a problem he has reached in research and
the writing of his dissertation is not really prepared to become an
executive in the World Bank, a policy-maker in the World Health
Organization, or a social services administrator for a local city
government.
4. We must overcome the stigma that academic positions in
"status" colleges and universities are the only legitimate places of
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employment for anthropologists. I can think of few disciplines
whose professionals are as concentrated in academia as are anthro-
pologists.
5. A combined employment-research position may serve as a
viable means by which to finance fieldwork for graduate students in
these lean times. It can also provide a practical experience, while
at the same time generating more insights into the total forces of
the research situation. This is especially true if the situation
resembles mine, where the employer is somehow connected .o or work-
ing with the research population.
NOTES
lAn earlier version of this paper was presented at the Southwestern
Anthropological Association Annual Meeting, Santa Barbara, March
29-31, 1979.
REFERENCES CITED
D'Andrade, R. G., E. A. Hammel, D. L. Adkins and C. K. McDaniel
1975   Academic Opportunity in Anthropology, 1974-1990.   American
Anthropologist 77:753-773.
Engel, George L.
1977   The Need for a New Medical Model:   A Challenge for Bio-
medicine. Science 196:129-136.
Gardner, Burleigh B.
1977   The Anthropologist in Business and Industry.   Anthropolog-
ical Quarterly 50:171-173.
Jansen, William H.
1973   The Applied Man's Burden:  The Problem of Ethics and
Applied Anthropology. Human Organization 32:325-329.
Landgraf, John L.
1977   Can Anthropology Twist?  Some Observations on Past History.
Anthropological Quarterly 50:205-209.
Wolfle, Dael and Charles V. Kidd
1971   The Future Market for Ph.D.'s.  Science 173:784-793.