In a collection such as the present volume, one expects to find both detailed expositions of particular theoretical models or analytical frameworks – typically identified with individual authors or definite schools of thought – and more general surveys of a disciplinary field or area of academic discourse. In this context the papers by M. G. Smith and Sandra Wallman represent the first category of contribution; this paper falls into the second. As such, it is my intention to provide a broad discussion of currently influential social anthropological approaches to the study of ethnicity and racism, in order that those authors' exegeses of their own positions might be understood within their wider setting. This paper is not, however, intended merely to serve as a prolegomenon to Smith and Wallman. In the closing section I shall sketch in some of the alternative approaches which social anthropologists might – and, indeed, should – explore in their attempts to understand ethnicity and ‘race relations’.

Social anthropology and boundary maintenance

Before proceeding to the main body of the discussion, it is necessary to engage in some ground-clearing; in particular, it is important to define as precisely as possible, on the one hand, what is being included within the category of ‘social anthropological approaches’, and, on the other, what is being excluded and is not to be discussed in detail here. In other words, what are the boundaries of social anthropology and where do they lie?