by Giulianna Lamanna
I’m going to be completely honest right now. The Tribe of Anthropik is not an actual tribe, as the word has been defined by anthropologists. We’re much closer to a band, although we don’t technically fall within the boundaries of that definition either. (Also, if we were to start calling ourselves the Band of Anthropik, that would make it sound like we’re some kind of primitivist rock band. And although that would be pretty cool, unfortunately, none of us play any instruments.)
by Jason Godesky
One of the big changes for today is a new skin, hearkening back to the days of my yore–before the Tribe of Anthropik, before even Tribal Dawn, when my interests lay in the post-Roman period, in the British Isles, and I was better known for The Saxon Shore than contemporary politics. My original draw was the question of “the historical King Arthur,” and the legacy of that decade-long obsession is several shelves of scholarly tomes on the subject. At the time, I thought it was a purely academic exercise with no application. Now, I’m not so sure.
by Jason Godesky
Steve has left the Tribe of Anthropik. He and I disagreed constantly: that was a great strength for us. Of the original four members, Steve was always the hardest to get a hold of, the one that spent the least time with the rest of us. He was the most peripheral member, and I think that’s why so many of our best insights came from him. Over the past several months, though, he had become even more distant. He raised some very valid concerns, but he refused to talk to us about them. That he left without hearing us out is probably what hurt us most of all, but it’s provided an opportunity to revisit some very important questions. Given the events that preceded our month-long hiatus, it’s time for us to state publicly what we mean when we say, the “Tribe of Anthropik.”
by Jason Godesky
The Fifth World is an open source vision of the future. It’s our latest MediaWiki-based project, but instead of developing an encyclopedia with it, we’re trying to use it to develop an anthropology of the future. Users are completely free to use, edit, and add to the wiki as they see fit, creating a uniquely realistic, changing world. The name refers to the shared belief from the Maya and the Hopi that we currently live in the Fourth World, with three preceding worlds that were destroyed by humans losing sight of their relationship with the rest of the world. In each world, there was a small group that did remember their relationship with the world, and so survived to populate the next world. On 12 December 2012, according to the Maya calendar, the Fourth World–our world–will end, and the Fifth World will begin. But to fully explain what our Fifth World Project is, and why we’ve poured so much into it, a good bit of background is necessary.
