Portuguese Anthropology: beyond academia
“Anthropology can be applied to everything”. This is one of the first ideas that is taught when we start to study the discipline. However, when we consider the professional world in Portugal, we understand another reality: despite the advantages inherent to the application of Anthropology in the various businesses and professional environments, this discipline is almost non-existent, and often unknown to the stakeholders. Business Anthropology is a practically unexplored concept. Despite the growth and integration of the area at the international level, there’s still a long way to go within doors, made more sinuous due to the existing hostility from the anthropological academic community. The main focus on Anthropology in Portugal is found in academia, teaching, and academic research, and out of a fear of losing the “purity” of the discipline’s academic knowledge, there’s a stigma related to Business Anthropology and the professionals involved with it.
All this has been instilled in us by the experience of the past 3 years. When we finished our studies, we were faced with the question: “What now?”. The academic environment was over-saturated with professionals, and opportunities were scarce. We then decided to explore other possibilities, specifically in the professional world and we came up with the conclusion that, in Portugal, there were no companies with a focus on Business Anthropology, contrary to other countries, such as Spain, Denmark, Brazil, and others.
With that information, we started to consider the possibility of creating our own company. We wanted to create a project that not only allows us to work in our field but also provided new opportunities for ourselves and other Anthropology professionals, to expand awareness and create value based on anthropological knowledge.
However, there were some obstacles: we did not have any experience in business management, and we did not have the capital to start the project. Our first step was to learn about business management. After concluding a program of the Portuguese Employment and Formation Institute (IEFP) focused on entrepreneurship, we applied for a program to support the creation of companies, known as “Start-Up Voucher”, in which we were selected, gaining financial and operational support in the project, as well as validation of your goals. Since then, two years have passed. In that time, after spending a year designing our project, we created the company, in April 2020, under the name “Ambigrama”.
Along this path, we participated in dozens of meetings with professionals and institutions from different areas to present our work and make known our services and the benefits that we could bring to their organizations. Some went well, others not so much, but we noticed that more and more people outside academia had knowledge of what anthropology is and the value it has. This was something that made us very happy and that didn’t let us give up.
In terms of work, despite the many “noes” we’ve heard, we started to build our portfolio of ethnographic research projects and in-depth interviews on the topic of gender equality, work with museums and municipal councils, participate in archaeological excavations and studies of human osteological remains, writing reports, articles and speaking about the subject at seminars. Currently, we seek to expand the range of projects and areas in which we operate since, as a holistic discipline, anthropology allows us to be multifaceted professionals who adapt to any situation where our intervention is needed.
The path has not been easy, mainly due to the global pandemic situation we are experiencing. The Portuguese and world economy has suffered from this new reality, and opportunities have diminished this past year. It was not an easy year for anyone, and we are no exception. However, we continue to believe in the project, and despite the difficulties, there is a constant growth of the project, and we hope to get through this moment and come out stronger and able to succeed.
Along this journey, we learned that innovation and new ideas are not always easy to bring forth. But we also learned that there is an opportunity for these ideas to flourish. Every day, the knowledge of Anthropology grows, the benefits and advantages of its application on the professional world are more and more known. Even with the pushback from some in the academia, this progress can’t be stopped. We believe that we can help develop this discipline in Portugal, to help other anthropologists to get interested and enter it, and help Anthropology grow in our country.
