“理解异文化的障碍：中英人类学研究的方法”座谈会
--英国科学院院士艾伦•麦克法兰教授访问中国社科院民族所
2007年10月12日，著名人类学家和历史学家，英国科学院(British Academy)院士、剑桥大学资深教授艾伦•麦克法兰(Alan Macfarlane)一行三人应邀访问中国社科院民族所，作了“理解异文化的障碍：中英人类学研究的方法”（Difficulty of Understanding Other Cultures: How Anthropology is Approached in Cambridge and in China）的讲座。
中国社科院民族所副所长黄行教授会见了客人并向客人简要介绍了民族所基本情况，希望加强与剑桥人类学界的交流和合作，欢迎剑桥学者参加国际人类学与民族学联合会第十六届世界大会（2008年7月15－23日，昆明）。
麦克法兰教授根据在印度、尼泊尔、日本、中国等国家的30多年来的人类学田野调查经历，阐述了理解异国文化的重要性、可能性、以及在理解异文化中的人类学方法使用及难点等。与会的中国学者也围绕异文化研究的方法、目的与意义等话题与麦克法兰教授进行了深入地探讨。讨论结束后，麦克法兰教授一行还访问了设在民族所四楼的国际人类学与民族学联合会第十六届世界大会（IUAES 2008）筹备委员会学术工作委员会办公室，并与工作人员合影留念。
陪同艾伦•麦克法兰来访的还有其夫人萨拉•哈里森（Sarah Harrison）、博士研究生罗嘉陵女士。社科院民族所参加座谈的有社会文化人类学研究室主任翁乃群教授、杨春宇，影视人类学研究室庞涛、雷亮中、张小敏、邓卫荣，宗教文化研究室刘正爱，经济研究室王剑峰，历史研究室易华，文献研究室木仕华。参加座谈的还有中国社科院亚太所龚浩群博士，中国人民大学社会学系博士后刘世凤，中国社科院研究生院硕士生殷鹏、关袆等。剑桥大学社会人类学系博士研究生罗嘉陵女士担任座谈会的翻译。座谈会由IUAES2008筹委会学术秘书杜发春副研究员主持。IUAES2008筹委会学术秘书张小敏和杜发春代表筹委会副秘书长、学术办公室常务副主任张继焦教授对剑桥学者的来访表示热烈的欢迎，并向麦克法兰教授介绍了近期学术筹备工作和已确认的299个专题会议情况。麦克法兰教授对IUAES2008世界大会的学术筹备工作取得的成绩表示赞赏，表示将参加2008年世界大会，并愉快地与学术办工作人员合影留念。
艾伦•麦克法兰现为剑桥大学社会人类学系教授，曾任系主任。他是英国科学院(British Academy)与欧洲科学院(Academia Europaea)院士、皇家人类学会(RAI)名誉副会长及皇家历史学会研究员。1941年他出生于印度，在英国受的教育，先后在牛津大学、伦敦政治经济学院（LSE）和伦敦大学东方和非洲研究学院（SOAS）学习历史和人类学，获博士学位。麦克法兰教授在喜马拉雅山区(尼泊尔和阿萨姆)有30年的田野经验，并研究英国和日本历史。他还是著名电视节目制作人，麦克法兰教授在著名的“第四频道”、“世界起飞的那一天”系列节目担任专家顾问。他关注现代世界诸起源及特性之比较研究，主要研究方向为历史、法律史、历史人口统计、人类学、社会学、计算和视觉媒体，研究对象覆盖三大文化区域：西欧、喜马拉雅地区（主要是尼泊尔、印度阿萨姆邦）和日本。相关的出版著作分为五种形式：专著和论文、软件和手稿、电视和电影、影碟、缩微胶片。麦克法兰教授著有关于英国、尼泊尔、日本及中国人类学及历史研究专著20余部，如《玻璃的世界》、《都铎和斯图亚特王朝英国的巫术》、《英国个人主义的根源》、《资本主义文化》和《绿色的金子：茶叶帝国》等。其著作被翻译成法文、德文、西班牙文、日文、韩文、中文等多种文字，在几十个国家出版。
目前，麦克法兰教授的著作已有三本在中国翻译出版：1．《玻璃的世界》（The Glass Bathyscaphe: How Glass Changed The World，Profile Books 2002），管可秾译，商务印书馆2003年。2.《绿色的金子：茶叶帝国》(Green Gold :The Empire of Tea, Ebury Press 2003) ，杨淑玲和沈桂凤译，汕头大学出版社2006年。3.《给莉莉的信：关于世界之道》（Letter to Lily），商务印书馆2006年。此外，他的《英国个人主义的根源：家庭、财产和社会变迁》(The Origins of English Individualism: The Family, Property and Social Transition，Blackwell, Oxford 1978)，中译本将于2008年由商务印书馆出版。
更多信息，请访问其个人网站：http://www.alanmacfarlane.com
（杜发春供稿）
Professor Alan Macfarlane from Cambridge University Visited IEA/CASS
On October 12th, Professor Alan Macfarlane from the Cambridge University UK visited the Institute of Ethnology & Anthropology at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (IEA/CASS). Professor Huang Xing, Deputy Director of IEA/CASS welcomed the guests from Cambridge University，Huang hoped that IEA/CASS would like to strength the academic ties with Cambridge, and welcome scholars from UK to attend the 16th World Congress of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences(IUAES 2008), to be held in Kunming, China, from July 15-23, 2008.
Accompanied by his wife, Mrs. Sarah Harrison, and his Ph.D student, Ms Jialing Luo from Cambridge University, an informal roundtable discussion has been held, with its theme focused on Difficulty of Understanding Other Cultures: How Anthropology is Approached in Cambridge and in China. Professor Macfarlane first asked two questions: Is it good to understand other cultures? Is it possible to understand other cultures? Then he gave a detailed explanation of the significances, possibilities, the anthropological approaches, and the difficulties of understanding different cultures from his own experiences in UK, India, Nepal, Japan and China during his field research over the past 30 years. Scholars from CASS exchanged views deeply with Dr. Alan Macfarlane on the approaches, goals and importance of understanding the different culture in other countries. There were more than 10 Professors from CASS attended this seminar, such as Dr. WENG Nai-qun, Dr. YANG Chun-yu, Professors PANG Tao, LEI Liang-zhong, ZHANG Xiao-min, DENG Wei-rong, Dr. LIU Zheng’ai, Dr. YI Hua, Dr. MU Shi-hua, Dr. WANG Jian-feng, Dr. GONG Hao-qun, Dr. LIU Shi-feng etc. This event was organized by Professor DU Fa-chun, interpreted by Ms Jialing Luo.
Alan Macfarlane is a Professor of Anthropological Science at the Cambridge University UK. He is a fellow of British Academy and a member of Academia Europaea. As an anthropologist and historian he has worked on England, Nepal, Japan and China. His research focuses on a comparative study of the origins and nature of the modern world. In recent years he has become increasingly interested in the use of visual material in teaching and research. Dr. Alan Macfarlane works in England, Japan, and Nepal, and he also has research interests in Burma and India. He has done research on English society of the fourteenth to nineteenth centuries, on the Gurungs of Central Nepal, and on the Nagas of the Burma-India border. He is interested in information retrieval systems and audio-visual media. His ongoing research includes the origins and consequences of capitalism in comparative perspective, individualism, and social theory. His published works cover English social history, demography in Nepal, and the industrial history of both England and Japan, totally there are 20 books have been published so far, three of which translated into Chinese: The Glass Bathyscaphe: How Glass Changed the World, Green Gold: the Empire of Tea, and Letter to Lily. Besides, one of his early works, The Origins of English Individualism: The Family, Property and Social Transition，Blackwell, Oxford 1978, will be published in China in 2008.
For more information, please visit his website: http://www.alanmacfarlane.com
(Provided by DU Fa-chun)