Anthropologists challenge the modern division between nature and society

Valentin Denis describes how Philippe Descola and Bruno Latour analyze the intellectual history of the "grand partage," a concept defining the split between nature and society.

The author traces the evolution of this term, which Latour first used in the early 1980s. Latour initially borrowed the phrase from Jack Goody to describe the distinction between science and belief. However, Latour later shifted the meaning to represent the divide between nature and society.

Descola adopted this shifted meaning to critique how Western modernity views the natural world as a separate, objective background for human culture. Descola and Latour argue that the social sciences helped create this division to establish a field of study independent of biological determinism. They contend that this intellectual framework provided a justification for the modern project of conquering nature.

While Descola focuses on the history of anthropology to show how it projected Western categories onto other cultures, Latour examines modern societies to show how science itself is a human practice that can be understood through an anthropological lens. The two thinkers engage in a critical dialogue where they use each other's frameworks to challenge traditional views. Descola seeks a radical "other" in animist societies to highlight the singularity of Western cosmology.

Latour instead looks at the "strangeness" of our own scientific practices to show that modern humans are not actually separate from the rest of the world. Their combined work suggests that the perceived separation from nature is a modern illusion that hinders efforts to address ecological crises.