NACDL

In 1978, Colin Turnbull posed a question to his fellow anthropologists: Could anthropology, as the discipline that purported to make sense of humankind, see the humanity in those whom society has condemned to death?

“[T]he approach of anthropology is dual — or should be,” he said. “As a science it looks for organization, structure, consistency…As a humanity it is concerned with values and with people. In this latter respect we have to deal with whether capital punishment is cruel and unusual.”¹ If anthropology was to hold itself out as the academic spokes-discipline for the value of life — any life — and the need to understand all of humanity, then it had to start with those most vilified “others” right here at home.

For Turnbull, the question was a rhetorical one; the cruel and unusual nature of capital punishment seemed obvious to him. In his investigations of prisoners on death row, what he saw were bodies languishing in physical captivity — but what he witnessed was the human spiri