Ethnographic explorations of intellectual property

Simple item page
dc.contributor.authorCoombe, Rosemary
dc.contributor.authorChapman, Susannah
dc.date.accessioned2026-02-26T14:50:11Z
dc.date.available2026-02-26T14:50:11Z
dc.date.issued2020-08-27
dc.description.abstractEthnographic research into intellectual property (IP) gained traction in the mid-1990s. During this period international trade agreements mandated that all states introduce minimum IP protections, property rights in intangible goods were expanded to encompass new subject areas, international Indigenous Peoples’ human rights were being negotiated, and protecting biodiversity became a global policy concern. Anthropologists considered IP extension in terms of the processes of commodification the law enabled, the cultural incommensurability of the law’s presuppositions in various societies, the implications of these rights for disciplinary research and publication ethics, and the modes of subjectification and territorialization that the enforcement of such laws engendered. Recognizing that IP clearly constrains and shapes the circulation of goods through the privatization of significant resources, critical anthropological examinations of Western liberal legal binary distinctions between public and private goods also revealed the forms of dispossession enabled by presuming a singular cultural commons. Anthropologists showed the diversity of publics constituted through authorized and unauthorized reproduction and circulation of cultural goods, exploring the management of intangible cultural goods in a variety of moral economies as well as the construction and translation of tradition in new policy arenas. The intersection of IP and human rights also prompted greater disciplinary reflexivity with respect to research ethics and publication practices. Analyzing how IP protections are legitimated and the activities that their enforcement delegitimizes, ethnography illustrated how the law creates privileged and abject subjectivities, reconfigures affective relationships between people and places, and produces zones of policing and discipline in processes of territorialization.</p>en
dc.description.versionPublished Version
dc.format.extent40
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.authororcidCoombe, Rosemary
dc.identifier.authororcidChapman, Susannah§0000-0002-7754-9259
dc.identifier.citationCoombe, R & Chapman, S 2020, Ethnographic explorations of intellectual property. in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Anthropology. Oxford University Press, pp. 1-40. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190854584.013.115
dc.identifier.doi10.1093/acrefore/9780190854584.013.115
dc.identifier.endpage40
dc.identifier.isbn9780190854584
dc.identifier.otherORCID: /0000-0002-7754-9259/work/79584674
dc.identifier.startpage1
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/18583
dc.language.isound
dc.publisherOxford University Press
dc.relation.urihttp://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190854584.013.115
dc.rights© 2020, Oxford UNiversity Press. Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Anthropology. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use.
dc.rights.accessrightsopen access
dc.statusPeer reviewed
dc.subjectBranding
dc.subjectTranslation
dc.subjectTraditional knowledge
dc.subjectTerritorialization
dc.subjectSubjectivity
dc.subjectPiracy
dc.subjectMoral economy
dc.subjectIntellectual property
dc.subjectCultural circulation
dc.subjectCommodification
dc.subject[SocietyPoliticsEthics]
dc.titleEthnographic explorations of intellectual property
dc.type/dk/atira/pure/researchoutput/researchoutputtypes/contributiontobookanthology/entry
Files
Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Thumbnail Image
Name:
Coombe_and_Chapman_2020_Ethnographic_Explorations_of_Intellectual_Property.pdf
Size:
3.6 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Description:
Published Version
Download
Collections
School of Society, Politics and Ethics