David Graeber - Academic Career

Academic Career

In 1998, two years after completing his PhD, Graeber joined Yale University as an assistant professor. In May 2005, the Yale anthropology department decided not to renew Graeber's contract, preventing him from coming up for consideration for tenure as he would otherwise have been scheduled to do in 2008. Pointing to Graeber's highly regarded anthropological scholarship, his supporters (including fellow anthropologists, former students, and activists) accused the decision of being politically motivated. More than 4,500 people signed petitions supporting him, and well-known British anthropologist Maurice Bloch called for Yale to rescind its decision. Bloch, who had been a professor of anthropology at the London School of Economics and the Collège de France, and world renowned scholar on Madagascar, made the following statement about Graeber in a letter to the university:

"His writings on anthropological theory are outstanding. I consider him the best anthropological theorist of his generation from anywhere in the world."

The Yale administration argued that Graeber's dismissal was in keeping with Yale's policy of granting tenure to few junior faculty and Yale gave no formal explanation for its actions. Graeber has suggested that his support of a student of his who was targeted for expulsion because of her membership in GESO, Yale's graduate student union, may have played a role in the university's decision.

In December 2005, Graeber agreed to leave the university after a one-year paid sabbatical. That spring he taught two final classes: an introduction to cultural anthropology (attended by over 200 students) and a course entitled “Direct Action and Radical Social Theory” – the only explicitly radical-themed course at Yale he ever taught.

On 25 May 2006, Graeber was invited to give the Malinowski Lecture at the London School of Economics; his address was entitled "Beyond Power/Knowledge: an exploration of the relation of power, ignorance and stupidity". The anthropology department at the university honors an anthropologist at a relatively early stage of their career to give the Malinowski Lecture each year, and only invite those who are considered to have made a significant contribution to anthropological theory. That same year, Graeber was asked to present the keynote address in the 100th anniversary Diamond Jubilee meetings of the Association of Social Anthropologists. In April 2011 he presented the anthropology department's annual Distinguished Lecture at Berkeley, and in May 2012 delivered the Second Annual Marilyn Strathern lecture at Cambridge.