ANTHROPOLOGY AT THE RIVER STICKS: A SHORT GUIDE TO UNDERSTANDING OF "HUMAN BOMB" IN CONTEMPORARY INTERPRETATIONS OF ISLAMIC SUICIDE TERRORISM

Abstract

Islamic suicide terrorism has recently often been studied by social and humanistic disciplines such as politology, sociology, psychiatry, anthropology and military theory. Western authors mostly deal with this phenomenon by "understanding" and condemning it at the same time, and trying to find certain regularities in its manifestation, in order to help prevent terrorist actions in the future. In dealing with suicidal terrorism, Western anthropology arguably becomes most concretely involved in the discourse of political instrumentalization of science. The author of this text argues that anthropology – together with related social sciences – loses its critical dimension in the process and becomes biased, and consequently loses its objectiveness. This is why in this paper he attempts to provide a model for somewhat different approach to understanding this phenomenon.