How has the "business" of higher education affected the environment in which academics work? Who should be able to hold anthropologists ethically responsible—the research institution that sponsors the fieldwork or the community of people being studied? What happens when academics step out of the ivory tower and into the public realm? Why and how, do some anthropologists come undone by the challenges of the academy?

These are some of the questions posed in this innovative collection of essays. Accessibly written, ethnographically grounded, and theoretically informed, this volume faces contentious issues with honesty, integrity, and the occasional bout of humour. It touches on issues of ethics, teaching, the politics of peer review, and the ironies involved in attempting to make anthropology relevant in wider circles. It offers rare insight into the challenges and dilemmas that mark contemporary scholarship.