B - Geertz, Clifford Chapters from The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books. 1973.

1. A program for the future of anthropology (as of 1972)
   1. From the interpretationS of culture (Boas) to the interpretation of cultureS
   2. From simple definitions

      1. check a collection of more or less classical definitions.

         "[the culture concept] ([1966] p.89)
         1. denotes an historically transmitted pattern of meanings
         2. embodied in symbols,
         3. a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms
         4. by means of which men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and attitudes toward life... ([1966] p.89)

      2. Varenne's non-definitions

         to political struggles that can escalate to major massacres
      3. to "interpretation" and the withdrawal from "answering our deepest questions" ([1973] p. 30)
2. Arguments for the usefulness of anthropology in international politics: explaining what was happening in the then "new" States in terms of anthropological work from the Parsonian framework.

Clifford Geertz in the New York Times