James Ferguson (anthropologist)

James Gordon Ferguson
Ferguson at the University of Sussex, July 2016
Born	(1959-06-16) June 16, 1959
Nationality	American
Occupation(s)	Professor, scholar
Title	Susan S. and William H. Hindle Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences
Academic background
Education	B.A., M.A., Ph.D.
Alma mater	University of California, Santa Barbara, Harvard University
Thesis	Discourse, knowledge, and structural production in the "development" industry : an anthropological study of a rural development project in Lesotho (1985)
Academic work
Discipline	Anthropologist
Sub-discipline	Development studies
Institutions	Stanford University (2003 - ) University of California, Irvine (1986-2003)
Main interests	Political economy, Development studies, Migration

James Ferguson (born June 16, 1959) is an American anthropologist. He is known for his work on the politics and anthropology of international development, specifically his critical stance (development criticism). He was chair of the Anthropology Department at Stanford University. His best-known work is his book, The Anti-Politics Machine. He delivered the most prestigious lecture in anthropology, the Morgan Lecture, in 2009, for his work on basic income. He earned his B.A. in cultural anthropology from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an M.A. and Ph.D. in social anthropology from Harvard University.

Selected publications

• 2015, Give a Man a Fish. Duke University Press
• 2010, The Uses of Neoliberalism. Antipode, volume 41, supplement 1, 2010.
• 2006, Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order, Duke University Press.
• 1999, Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Urban Life on the Zambian Copperbelt, University of California Press.
• 1997, Editor, Anthropological Locations: Boundaries and Grounds of a Field Science (with Akhil Gupta), Univ. of California Press.
• 1997, Editor, Culture, Power, Place: Explorations in Critical Anthropology (with Akhil Gupta), Duke University Press.
• 1990, The Anti-Politics Machine: 'Development,' Depoliticization, and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho, Cambridge University Press. Republished in 1994 by University of Minnesota Press.

External links

• Ferguson's faculty profile at Stanford
• Interview with James Ferguson by 'Theory Talks'