Decolonization has been a buzzword in anthropology for decades, but remains difficult to grasp and to achieve. This groundbreaking volume offers not only a critical examination of approaches to decolonization, but also fresh ways of thinking about the relationship between anthropology and colonialism, and how we might move beyond colonialism’s troubling legacy.

Soumhya Venkatesan describes the work already underway, and the work still needed, to extend the horizons of the discipline. Drawing on scholarship from anthropology and cognate disciplines, as well as ethnographic and other case studies, she argues both that the practice of anthropology needs to be and do better, and that it is worth saving. She focuses not only on ways of decolonizing anthropology but also on the potential of ‘a decolonizing anthropology’.

Rich with insights from a range of fields, Decolonizing Anthropology is an essential resource for students and scholars.

"A thoughtful, inviting, student-sensitive book that exudes conviviality in knowledge traditions and meaning-making. Venkatesan goes beyond prescriptive abstractions on the need for effective conversational inclusivity in rethinking the colonial logics underpinning anthropological thought and practice. Enthusiastically recommended."
—Francis B. Nyamnjoh, University of Cape Town

"This interrogation of a key moment in anthropological life comes from a practitioner who is also a teacher and learner. Venkatesan's three-year dialogue with students has opened up arguments and questions about decolonization in a surprisingly fresh, accessible and broad ranging way. At once conversational and deeply reflective, her work considers all over again anthropology's conditions of possibility."
—Marilyn Strathern, University of Cambridge

"[A] highly introspective and positioned critique of anthropology as an academic discipline and a sociopolitical practice … [A] call to action for anthropologists to rethink the discipline as a living practice with the potential to shape more than just the future of academia."
—Alicja Staniszewska, Suomen Antropologi

Soumhya Venkatesan is Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Manchester.