Anthropology 110 Midterm

Unilineal cultural evolution

Unilineal cultural evolution

The notion that human socieities could br ranked along a single ladder of “progress”

Four subfields of anthropology

Cultural anthropology, Archaeology, Biological/physical anthropology, and linguistic anthropology

Cultural anthropology

Focuses on the social and cultural lives of living communities

Archaeology

Studies past cultures, by excavating sites where people lived

Biological anthropology

Focuses broadly on physical aspects of the human species:

• Human evolution

• Health and disease

• Behavior of nonhuman primates

• Human genetics

• Diet and nutrition

• Impact of social stress on the body

Linguistic anthropology

Studies how people use language

How people order their natural and cultural environments using linguistic categories

How language shapes group membership and identity

Culture

Those taken-for-granted notions, rules, moralities, and behaviors within a social group that feel “natural” and like the way things “should” be, it cannot be possessed

Ethnocentrism

The assumption that one’s own way of doing things is correct, while dismissing other people’s practices or views as wrong or ignorant

Cultural relativism

The moral and intellectual principle that one should withhold judgment about seemingly strange or exotic beliefs and practices

Franz Boas

• Father of American Anthropology

• Culture is about history

Diversity

Multiplicity and variety when there is both difference and similarity

Anthropology

The study of human beings, their biology, their pre-prehistory and histories, and their changing languages, cultures, and social institutions

Holism

Effort to synthesize the four subfields into a single comprehensive explanation

Cannot study anything without context

Comparative method

Allows anthropologists to derive insights from careful comparisons of two or more cultures or societies

Ethnographic method

Prolonged and intensive observation of and participation in the life of a community, is a qualitative methodology and a hallmark of cultural anthropology

Applied anthropology

Anthropological research commissioned to serve an organization’s needs and solve human problems

Elements of culture

• Learned

• Uses symbols

• Dynamic

• Integrated

• Shapes everybody’s life

• Shared

• Overcomes ethnocentrism

Symbol

An object, idea, figure, or character that represents something else and is intelligible through one’s cultural lens

Interpretive theory

The idea that culture is embodied and transmitted through symbols. Coined by Clifford Geertz.

Construction

Past collective experiences in a community; talking, thinking, and acting in response to a common set of goals and problems

Cross-cultural persepctive

Demonstrates the incredible flexibility and plasticity of the human species — human beliefs and practices come in many shapes and forms

Cultural is stabilized by:

Symbols, values, norms, and traditions

Values

Culturally desirable principles or qualities, typically represented by recognizable symbols

Norms

Typical patterns of behavior viewed by participants as the unwritten rules of everyday life. Often go unnoticed by people until they’re violated.

Traditions

Most enduring and ritualized aspects of a culture. Assumed to be timeless and usually reference history. Things have “always” been a certain way.

Expression of cultural in social institutions

• Patterns of kinship and marriage

• Patterns of economic activities

• Religious institutions

• Political institutions

Cultural appropriation

The unilateral decision of one social group to take control over the symbols, practices, or objects of another

Functionalism

• Cultural practices and beliefs perform important purposes for societies

• Social institutions operated in an integrated and balanced fashion

• Stable and smoothly operating and try to minimize social change

Linguistic relativity or Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

The idea that people speaking different languages perceive or interpret the world differently because of differences in their languages

Three basic reference frames

• Relative spatial reference system (RSRS)

• Absolute spatial reference system (ASRS)

• Intrinsic spatial reference system (ISRS)

Language

A system of communication consisting of units of meaning and rules to combine them (Grammar). Usually language is based on sounds but not always (Sign language).

Elements of language

• Systematic - consists of units organized into patterns according to a grammar

• Used to communicate

• Patterns of successful communication

Origins of language

• Evolutionary origins of language - Biological capacity for language as a whole

• Historical development of specific languages - How languages are related to one another and have changed through time

Pidgin

A mixed language with a simplified grammar, with features from two or more languages

Creoles

A language of mixed origin that has developed from a compex blending of two parent languages and that exists as a mother tongue for some part of the population

Language ideology

Refers to the beliefs people have about the superiority of one language or dialect and the inferiority of others

Langue

Formal rules of a language

Parole

Language as it is actually spoken by people

Phonology

Structure of speech sounds

Morphology

How sounds are formed into meaningful units

Syntax

The manner in which a language puts morphemes into meaningful relationships - sentences

Phoneme

Smallest unit of sound in a language that has psychological validity

Allophone

Phonetic difference that doesn’t change meaning

Morpheme

The smallest semantic unit of language; cannot be further divided. Represents a single idea like book.

Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK)

Knowledge that resides in local languages, songs, or specialized rituals — places researchers might not think to look

Four modes of subsistence

Foraging, Horticulture, Pastoralism, and Intensive agriculture

Foraging

Systematic search for edible things

Horticulture

Small scale subsistence agriculture

Intensive agriculture

Large-scale agriculture

Requirements of industrial agriculture

• Huge amounts of fossil fuels

• Chemical fertilizers

• Pesticides

• Water

Notion of resilience

Cultural groups have different ways of conceptualizing and adapting to climate variability

Interest of anthropology

Studying and documenting alternative ways of understanding food, environment, and climate change: political ecology

Research in cultural anthropology

• Most qualitative of the social sciences

• A holistic approach

• Long-term fieldwork in a community

• Application of open-minded cultural relativism

Fieldwork

• Defining methodology of cultural anthropology

• Allows insights that would not be possible with short visits, surveys, or brief interviews

• Can yield understanding of culture and behaviors that people themselves might not be aware of

Participant observation

Requires the researcher to live in the community they are studying to observe and participate in day-to-day activities

Informants

Any person an anthropologist gets data from in the study community

Interviews

Any systematic conversation with an informant to collect field research data; highlight structured to open-ended ones

Intersubjectivity

Knowledge about other people emerges out of relationships

Fieldnotes

Any information that the anthropologists writes down or transcribes during fieldwork

Headnotes and jottings

The mental notes an anthropologist makes while in the field, which may or may not end up in formal fieldnotes

Emic perspective

Using inside logic to make sense of thought/behavior/discourse

Etic perspective

Using categories and logic from outside a culture to make sense of it

Complexities of power and identity

Ethnographers often study marginalized populations

Sex vs. Gender

Sex is linked with biology, gender is linked with culture

Heteronormativity

Refers to cultural assumptions of “alignment” with respect to sex, gender, and sexuality

Gender systems

Cultural ideas and social patterns a society uses to organize men, women and those who do not fit either category

Transgender

A person whose gender identity does not correspond to the sex they were assigned at birth

Intersectionality

The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.

Changing family dynamics

• More women in workforce

• Fewer children

• More divorces

Families

Perform similar functions cross-culturally like comfort and belonging for members, a sense of identity, shared values and ideals, economic cooperation, and nurturance of children

Kinship

The social system that organizes people in families based on descent and marriage

Nuclear family

The family formed by a married couple and their children

Extended families

Larger groups of relatives beyond the nuclear family, often living in the same household

Clan

A group of relative who claim to be descended from a single ancestor

Lineage

A group composed of relatives who are directly descended from known ancestors

Exogamy

A social pattern in which members of a social group must marry someone from another, usually specified, social group. This has the effect of building political, economic, and social ties with other specified groups

Endogamy

A social pattern in which members of a social group must marry someone from the same group

Unilineal

Descent traced through one line, either males or females

Patrilineal

Reckoning descent through males from the same ancestors

Matrilineal

Reckoning descent through women, who are descended from an ancestral woman

Cognatic/Bilateral descent

Reckoning descent through both father and mother’s family

Polygamy

Any form of plural marriage. Previosuly far more common in Africa, Asia, the Americas, and the Pacific than they are today

Polygyny

When a man is simultaneously married to more than one woman

Polyandry

When a woman has two or more husbands at one time. Significantly rarer than polygyny

Matriarchy

Society in which women hold political power

Patriarchy

Society in which men hold political power

Levirate marriage

Childless female widow marries deceased husband’s brother

Sororate marriage

Male widower marries deceased wife’s sister

Partible maternity

Baby can have more than one mother, all of whom contribute to baby’s formations (through contribution of breast milk)

Partible paternity

Baby can have more than one father, all of whom contribute to baby’s formation (though contribution of semen)

Kinship Chart

A visual representation of family. Useful for diagramming biological relationships, if not the cultural meanings associated with these relationships.

Bride price

Exchange of gifts or money to compensate another clan/family for the loss of one of its women along with her productive and reproductive abilities in marriage

Dowry

A large sum of money or in-kind gifts given to a daughter to insure her well-being in her husband’s family

Wealth

Material resources, work and reproductive capacity, and inheritance rights when a member dies

Function of families

Managing their members’ wealth

Incest taboo

The cultural prohibition on sexual relations between certain types of kin

Arranged marriages

Parents may select partners from specific socioeconomic, religious, educational, or ethnic backgrounds

Pastoralism

Raising domestic animals in grassland environments using herd and household mobility

Three key forces of anthropology

Industrialization, evolution, and spread of European colonialism