nomothetic inquiry

is a kind of inquiry referring to the search for regularities or general laws (nomos) rather than the description of specific instances. Anthropology (in contrast with ethnography), is a nomothetic or science of 'general laws'.

nomothetic Referring to the general rather than the specific, e.g., the search for regularities or general laws rather than the description of specific instances (cf. ideographic).. . . An idiographic inquiry, Radcliffe-Brown explained, aims to document the particular facts of past and present lives, whereas the aim of nomothetic inquiry is to arrive at general propositions or theoretical statements. Ethnography, then, is specifically a mode of idiographic inquiry, differing from history and archaeology in that it is based on the direct observation of living people rather than on written records or material remains attesting to the activities of people in the past. Anthropology, to the contrary, is a field of nomothetic science. As Radcliffe-Brown declared in his introduction to Structure and Function in Primitive Society in a famous sentence that, as an undergraduate beginning my anthropological studies at Cambridge in the late 1960s, I was expected to learn by heart 'comparative sociology, of which social anthropology is a branch, is . . . a theoretical or nomothetic study of which the aim is to provide acceptable generalisations.' (ingold radcliffe-brown lecture)

is aimed at arriving at general propositions or theoretical statements. It idiographic inquiry is aimed at documenting the particular facts of past and present lives.

He did so in terms of a contrast, much debated then but little heard of today, between idiographic and nomothetic inquiry. An idiographic inquiry, Radcliffe-Brown explained, aims to document the particular facts of past and present lives, whereas th aim of nomothetic inquiry is to arrive at general propositions or theoretical statements. Ethnography, then, is specifically a mode of idiographic inquiry, differing from history and archaeology in that it is based on the direct observation of living people rather than on written records or material remains attesting to the activities of people in the past. Anthropology, to the contrary, is a field of nomothetic science. As Radcliffe-Brown declared in his introduction to Structure and Function in Primitive Society in a famous sentence that, as an undergraduate beginning my anthropological studies at Cambridge in the late 1960s, I was expected to learn by heart 'comparative sociology, of which social anthropology is a branch, is . . . a theoretical or nomothetic study of which the aim is to provide acceptable generalisations.' (Ingold 2007 :21)

nomothetic inquiry, n.All

nomothetic inquiry