Pedagogies of Judgement: A Dialogue Between Theology and Anthropology of the Good

In anthropologist Joel Robbins’ pioneering work on divergences within cultural anthropology about the goals of anthropology and crucial differences between anthropology and theology on this matter, he diagnoses anthropology with a lack of criteria and training in rendering critical judgments on the ‘dark’ situations that anthropologists encounter. I suggest that the trouble anthropologists have with critically addressing the darkness of poverty, oppression and suffering is due to an inability to articulate standpoints on what counts as good. Following Robbins’ argument that anthropology can learn practices of rendering judgment from theology, I offer an ethnographic description and analysis of the way theology trains students in delineating their theological position and developing practices of judging in order to explore avenues toward anthropological ways of doing so. Building on the hermeneutical insight that judgment is an integral part of Verstehen, I argue that practicing judgment may not only further the critical capacity of anthropology but also enhance our ability to understand other ways of imagining the good.