For now, I'd prefer us to avoid a default format or template for articles on "cultures" or "peoples", even avoiding the notion of "cultures" (note the plural) as a clearly established definition. Could we let the structure of anthropology articles take on the forms that best match the issues and contents addressed by the articles themselves? Each ethnographic case raises new categories of knowledge --isn't that why we do the cross-cultural, cross-linguistic anthropological studies to begin with? Aren't they, in part, as checks on what were originally Western ways of knowing (and not just "what is thought to be known)?
I certainly don't want to set up a cultural checklist, but it does look a bit as though I have.
Allow me to explain myself...
I'd like to see each article shaped according to its content and the CZ community encourages an engaged authors' voice. A template is not particularly conducive to either of these, but I do think that it is important to cover major areas of anthropological inquiry as fully as possible. I guess what I was looking for was an organized set of writing prompts that would be useful to authors in the process of developing a new article. Once those prompts and the all important "Is there anything else you'd like to add?" are answered, I imagine most articles will reorganize themselves according to the content.
