Use when building the conceptual/theoretical argument of an American Anthropologist (AA) manuscript into a four-field contribution — whether the work is ethnographic, archaeological, biological, or linguistic. AA rewards a portable concept and reflexive argument over a bare finding or thick description alone. Structures the argument; it does not run analyses or write fieldnotes.
SkillScore77Maintained
Automatic
◆Research pack
Last verified 8/15/2026
What it changes
Passed 17 of 22 test cases with the skill, and 9 of 22 without it.
Without skill41%
With skill77%
Checks it passed that the model alone missed
Includes the exact section header 【Concept】.
Includes the exact section header 【Core claim】.
Includes the exact section header 【Positionality】.
and 6 more in the full report
10 fixed7 passed either way3 still failing2 broke
Pass-rate lift
+36 pp
Tokens
+5%
Agent turns
0%
Response time
-24%
Model gemini-3.6-flashMeasured 8/15/2026v117 of 22 cases passed with skill
Tokens, turns and time describe resource use, not a dollar price.
See it in action
One of 10 test cases the skill fixed. Same model, same prompt, with and without the skill.
1 of 10
Prompt
I am a socio-cultural anthropologist studying digital labor platforms, but I want my paper's concept of 'algorithmic friction' to be usable by linguistic and archaeological anthropologists as well. Format my theoretical argument.
What was checked, without and with the skill
Checked
Without skill
With skill
Explains how anthropologists in other subfields can import the concept or mechanism into their own research.
Passed
Passed
Includes the exact section header 【Scope + portability】.
Missed
Passed
case-14 · gemini-3.6-flash · 8/15/2026 · answers are capped and redacted
What's inside
The instructions your model reads when the skill loads.
SKILL.md73 linessingle file
Theory & Argument Building (amanthro-theory-building)
At AA, evidence is not a contribution until it is attached to an argument other anthropologists can
use elsewhere. This skill turns fieldwork, material, or measurements into theory: explicit concepts,
mechanisms or interpretive logics, scope conditions, and positionality, in the idiom appropriate to
your subfield. Thick description is necessary at AA but not sufficient — the "so what" must travel.
When to trigger
The ethnography/data are rich but the conceptual payoff is thin
A reviewer said the paper is "descriptive," "undertheorized," or "just a case"
You need to state concepts, mechanisms, and scope conditions explicitly
You must make your positionality and relationship to the field part of the argument
Build the argument (by mode of work)
Ethnographic / interpretive paper
Concept — define the key analytic precisely; distinguish it from neighbors and from the
interlocutors' own terms (and say where you keep their term and why).
Interpretive logic / mechanism — the social process: who does what, with what meaning, under
what constraints. Make it legible without flattening complexity.
Evidence-to-claim link — show which fieldwork moments, utterances, or materials ground each
claim, and what would have disconfirmed your reading.
Scope conditions & portability — where the argument holds and where it does not. Portability ≠
universalizing the particular.
Archaeological / biological paper
State the substantive question the material/biological evidence addresses before the methods.
Translate findings into a claim about social life or human variation that anthropologists can use,
not only a site- or specimen-specific result.
Linguistic-anthropology paper
Show what the language practice indexes (identity, power, ideology, cognition) beyond its form.
Connect the discourse/grammar analysis to a cultural or social argument readers in other fields share.
Reflexivity & positionality (an AA hallmark)
Make explicit who you are in this field — your relationship to interlocutors, how access shaped
what you saw, and how your position bears on the interpretation. AA practices an ethics of care;
Use when building the theoretical argument of an American Political Science Review (APSR) manuscript into a discipline-level contribution — whether the work is formal/game-theoretic, empirical with explicit mechanisms, interpretive, or normative. APSR rewards a clear, portable argument over a bare finding. Structures the argument; it does not run analyses.