I think it's important that we track the larger trends, which include many efforts by major departments to continually reinforce cross-subdisciplinary bridges. For instance, my own department at Arizona is moving to an integrated core sequence for graduate students, replacing a system where cores were divided up by subdisciplines. However, many of us pursue research problems that require us to collaborate with colleagues from other subdisciplinary backgrounds. I mention only the classic research problem that is important for my own work, the history of the peopling of the Americas, where historical linguistics, molecular genetics, paleoarchaeology, and social anthropology all contribute to ongoing debates. Another notable site of integration is the rapidly-growing subdiscipline of medical anthropology, where colleagues from every background work on common problems.
Feminist anthropology provides yet another example.
These are concerns that bring diverse subdisciplines together, and counter the fissive forces that Shea documents. A second point involves the reorganization of the American Anthropological Association. But the biggest problem wasn't the occasional failure to have any practitioners, or any archaeologists or linguists, on the board. For me, anthropology is indeed a coherent discipline. Check this box if you would like this submission to be considered for publication as a letter to the editor in the printed Chronicle.