Anthropology Quiz 1

spring 2026

Archaeology Anthropology

The study of human culture through their material remains

Prehistoric Archaeology

Studying the human past without writing through their remains

Historical Archaeology

Studying the human past in societies that have written documents

Underwater Archaeology

The study of submerged archaeological sites

Archaeology of contemporary life

The study of the material culture of the recent past

Biological Anthropology

Examines the ways human are biologically similar and different from other animals

Primatology

The study of non-human members of the order of mammals called primates, to which human also belong

Paleoanthropology

The study of human evolution based on the fossils record

Forensic Anthropology

Uses anthropological knowledge to identify human remains at crime scenes, battlefields and sites of possible human right violations

Linguistic Anthropology

The study of how humans use language and other symbols to communicate

Historical Linguistics

The study of language change over time

Ethnography of Communication

The description of the contexts that makes human communication effective and meaningful

Sociolinguistics

The study of relationships among language variation and social context

Cultural Anthropology

Describes/analyzes the beliefs people have about their social and material worlds. Humans act according to learned knowledge systems

Applied Anthropology

involves the application of anthropological theories, methods, and findings to solve practical problems.

Medical anthropology

an example of both an applied and theoretical area of study that draws on all four subdisciplines to understand the interrelationship of health, illness, and culture.

Relativistic Perspective

Requires anthropologists to interpret specific cultural practices and values in the context of the people who live them

Miner

help us look at our own culture from a different perspective

ETHNOCENTRISM

Usually entails the notion that one's own culture is superior to everyone else's. Using the practices of your own people as a yardstick to evaluate how well the practices of other people “measure up” *

Example: Americans tend to value technological advancement, industrialization, and the accumulation of wealth.

Empircal Perspective

Anthropological knowledge is acquired through observation or experimentation

Participant Observation

Obtaining insight into another culture/way of life by taking part (immersing as much as allowed) into another system/culture

Evolutionary or Adaptational Perspective

HOW WE CAME TO BE WHO WE ARE. Cultural change over time. ADAPTATIONIST draws attention to the central point of evolutionary theory. How groups cope with their social and cultural environment. Assumes that all societies are changing all the times

Comparative Perspective

Every culture contact moment is comparative. Comparison to one’s own culture is not simply convenient; it is central to the anthropological enterprise

Comparison helps us*: to understand what it means to be human and to increase self-understanding and to understand others

Comparison is used to learn

What humans have in common. How we differ. How we change

Cultural Anthropology

Compares ideas, morals, practices, and systems within or between cultures.

We might compare the roles of men and women in different societies, or contrast how different religious groups conflict within a given society.

Difference between anthropology and other social sciences

Like other disciplines that use comparative approaches,

such as sociology or psychology, anthropologists make

comparisons between people in a given society.

• But, unlike sociology and psychology, anthropologists

also compare across societies, and betweeen

humans and other primates.

How is cross-cultural COMPARISON valuable to anthropology

• Assess human variety

• Identify and celebrate the distinctive (things that are unique to particular communities)

• Reduce ethnocentric bias

• Discover human regularities (universal patterns of human behavior)

• Document change or stability

• See ourselves more analytically

How comparison helps us to reduce ethnocentric bias

By confronting assumptions that we take to be logical, reasonable, or self evident with actual data

Sociology

the scientific study of human society, social behavior, patterns of relationships, and culture, examining how individuals and groups interact and how social structures influence human action and consciousness at micro (individual) and macro (societal) levels

MAGIC

Magical thinking, or superstitious thinking, is the belief that

unrelated events are causally connected despite the absence

of any plausible causal link between them, particularly as a

result of supernatural effects

Trobrianders used magic

to overcome fear. Magical thinking

gives them a sense of control over dangerous storms that their

technology was not proved against. …

Malinowski

generalized that when people are engaged in important activities that have an element of risk, they would create practices for managing that risk psychologically, if they can’t do it technologically. He also stated that one can find examples of magical thinking in modern civilizations. He holds that any primitive people has a body of empirical knowledge, comparable to modern scientific knowledge, as to the behavior of nature and the means of controlling it to meet man's needs.

Holistic Perspective

Anthropologists try to understand and theorize

about human society in all their complexity.

Holism

is the perspective on the human condition

that assumes that mind, body, individuals, society, and

the environment interpenetrate, and even define one

another.

• In Anthropology, HOLISM tries to integrate all that is

known about human beings and their activities.

• Holism means that an anthropologist looks at the entire

context of a society when analyzing any specific

feature.

For example, to understand the Japanese tea

ceremony, anthropologists might investigate

Japanese religion, aesthetics, history, as well as the

economy.

How does anthropology interprets/explains culture change

a dynamic, ongoing, and inevitable process, rather than a static state. It is understood as a response to both internal and external factors, where changes in one aspect of culture (e.g., technology) lead to changes in others (e.g., social values) because of the interconnected nature of cultural system

Traditions

Traditions remain as long as they serve a function

hunters/gatherers

There aren’t straight lines from past to present (hunters/gatherers aren’t our past)

Magic of Trobriand Island

used magic to overcome fear. Trobriand case study is a prime example of functionalism—understanding that social institutions, rituals, and beliefs exist to meet specific human needs, both psychological and social. magic as a tool. Magic provides individuals with a sense of control and confidence, reducing anxiety in the face of uncontrollable natural forces Trobrianders did not use magic when fishing in the safe, predictable, and calm inland lagoons. However, they used elaborate magical rituals when fishing in the high-risk, unpredictable open sea.

Cultural relativism

the essential methodological approach of understanding a group's beliefs, values, and practices within their own cultural context, rather than judging them by one's own standards. It aims to counter ethnocentrism

how anthropologists view culture change

as dynamic, adaptive, and constantly changing rather than fixed. Culture changes through internal innovation or external contact, driven by environmental shifts, globalization, and social interaction

Thomas Hobbes

provides the justification for why, in his view, humans need to be controlled by a higher power. Anthropologists generally argue that his view of human, non-state societies is wrong, but understanding his ideas is essential to understanding the history of Western political thought and the, often, ethnocentric assumptions that shaped early social science

Participant Observation

helped us detour from this West-

centered perspective and made us focus on differences &

similarities between cultures

• There aren’t straight lines from past to present

The Other

a term that has been used to describe people whose customs, beliefs, or behaviors are different from one’s own

Anthropology traces its roots

to ancient Greece

• West vs. East…..White European Descent vs. Other

400 BC Herodotus

Greece as the dominant culture of the West and Persia as the dominant culture of the East.

Savage-Barbarism

Who cannot speak Greek.

• Greek= language of reason

• Non-Greek= those devoid of the facility to reason or to

act according to logic.

The European Age of Enlightenment (17th -18th

centuries)

Rise of scientific and rational philosophical thought.

• A period of intellectual development that planted the seeds

of many academic disciplines, including Anthropology.

• Humanistic writings/discourse: David Hume, John Locke,

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, etc.

• They based their work on philosophical reason rather than

religious authority, and asked important anthropological

questions.

Evolutionary Theory

In 1859 British naturalist Charles Darwin/On the Origin of

Species..

• Some variants survived and reproduced, and others

perished.

• New species slowly evolved even as others continued

to exist.

• Clash between Evolutionary theory and religious

doctrine

Herbert Spencer

He linked societies to biological organisms, each of which adapted to survive or else perished.

• Spencer later coined the phrase "survival of the fittest" to describe this process.

• Theories of social evolution (Spencer’s) seemed to offer a “good explanation” for the apparent success of European nations as so-called advanced civilizations

natural selection

Animal and plant species change, or evolve, through time

under the influence of a process called natural selection

Origin of the Species

the foundation of evolutionary theory, proposing that species change over time through natural selection rather than remaining static

Charles Darwin

he created the theory of evolution by natural selection fundamentally shifted anthropology from creationist views to a biological, evidence-based understanding of human origins.

MODERN ANTHROPOLOGY

came into being along with the development and scientific

acceptance of theories of biological and cultural evolution

19th Century Anthropologists

assumed a linear evolutionary tract, where people were placed depending on their physical and cultural particularities.

Cultural Evolution

Europe used ethnocentric theories of cultural

evolution to justify the expansion of their empires.

• Conquered peoples described as “backward”,

“primitive”, “uncivilized”, and thus, unfit for survival

unless colonists “civilized” them to live and act

as Europeans did.

• Theories of cultural evolution in the 19th century

took no account of the successes of small-scale

societies that had developed long-term adaptations

to particular environments.

• They didn’t recognize any shortcomings of

European civilization, such as high rates of

poverty and crime.

ARMCHAIR ANTHROPOLOGY

Analysis of culture was based in hearsay and third-hand

information or existing written accounts.

• No actual contact with subjects of study.

• Seeing culture from a distance meant drawing

comparisons that place the anthropologist’s culture as

superior to the one being studied… Ethnocentrism

ARMCHAIR ANTHROPOLOGY. Armchair anthropologists were unlikely to be aware of their ethnocentric

ideas because they did not visit the cultures they studied.

Armchair ethnography

those who wrote about cultures didn’t have to leave

their armchair; they just read all the histories and travelers’ accounts and put

them together into their version of that culture and society.

James Frazer (1890)- The Golden Bough: A Study of Comparative Religions

One of the first books to describe magical and religious beliefs

of different culture groups around the world.

Was not the outcome of extensive study in the field. Instead, to

formulate his study Frazer relied on the accounts of others

who had traveled (scholars, missionaries, and government

officials)

E.B Tylor (“Primitive Culture”/Definition of Culture

The first professor of anthropology at Oxford University in

1896

• An important influence in the development of sociocultural

anthropology as a separate discipline.

• Defined culture as “that complex whole which includes

knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any

other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a

member of society.” His definition of culture is still used

frequently today and remains the foundation of the culture

concept in anthropology.

Ruth Benedict

they believed “All of us are susceptible to making armchair assumptions

about other people’s behaviors because we filter information

through our own cultural lenses”

Jared Diamon (Armchair) “Collapse”

Societies collapse because of overpopulation and human

behaviors which destroy their environment.

• His writings tend to overlook detailed cultural knowledge and

substantial differences among cultures (e.g., how cultures

succeed, transform, or fail)

• Anthropologists and historians question Collapse

• Collapse due complex ecosystem in which multiple

elements interact

• Example: deforestation of Easter Island was not due to

human hubris but rather to predatory Polynesian rats

• The declining population was not a result of

deforestation but rather of the introduction of European

diseases.

Off the veranda approach

pioneered by Bronislaw Malinowski in the early 20th century, revolutionized anthropology by shifting from "armchair" theorizing to immersive, long-term fieldwork. It demands that anthropologists live among the people they study, learn the local language, and use participant observation to understand the "imponderabilia of everyday life" firsthand

survival of the fittest

refers to natural selection, where organisms best adapted to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce, passing advantageous traits to offspring

Franz Boas

Between the 1920s and 1930s anthropology assumed its

present form as a four-field academic profession in the

United States under the influence of German-born

American anthropologist .

• He helped define the discipline and trained many of the

most prominent American anthropologists of the 20th

century.He also opposed racist and ethnocentric evolutionary

theories. Based on his own studies, including his

measurement of the heads of people from many cultures,

Boas argued that genetic differences among human

populations could not explain cultural variation.

• Boas urged anthropologists to do detailed research on particular cultures

and their histories.

• His theoretical approach became known as historical particularism, and

it forms the basis for the fundamental anthropological concept of cultural

relativism.

Ruth Benedict

Fieldwork:

• Pueblos of New Mexico

• The natives of Dobu in Melanesia

• The Indian tribes (chiefly the Kwakiutl) of the American

Northwest coast.

“The purpose of Anthropology is to make the world safe for

human differences”

“The arrogance of race prejudices is an arrogance which

defies what is scientifically known of human race”

• Best known for Patterns of Culture (1934) and The

Chrysanthemum and the Sword: Patterns of Japanese

Culture (1946), which remain key anthropological and

cultural works, Benedict also wrote Zuni Mythology (1935)

and Race: Science and Politics (1940).Found a different pattern of male and

female behavior in each of the cultures

she studied, all different from gender role

expectations in the United States at that

time. In addition, she was the first

anthropologist to study child-rearing

practices and learning theory within

social groups.

Culture

a set of beliefs, practices, and symbols that are

learned and shared. Together, they form an all-

encompassing, integrated whole that binds people

together and shapes their worldview and lifeways.

belief refers not just to what we “believe” to be right or

wrong, true or false. Belief also refers to all the mental

aspects of culture including values, norms, philosophies,

worldview, knowledge, and so forth. Practices refers to

behaviors and actions that may be motivated by belief or

performed without reflection as part of everyday routines.

What’s biological and What is cultural

So very much of who we are is impacted by both culture

and biology that it is a fruitless endeavor to try and

separate them out as if they were two different

domains.

• Instead, we can work from the assumption that

everything, no matter how rooted in our biological

makeup, is processed through, regulated by, and

made meaningful with culture.

Age of Discovery (1400s-1700s)

-       The colonizing nations: Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, France, and England also wanted scientific explanations and justifications for their global dominance. -       European ideas of right and wrong were used as a measuring stick to judge the way that people in different cultures lived

Characteristics of Culture

1. Humans are born with the capacity to learn the culture of any social group directly or indirectly.

2. Culture changes in response to internal and external factors

3. Humans are not bound by culture, they have capacity to conform to it or not or change it

4. culture is symbolic, individuals create and share the meanings of symbols in their society

5. the degree to which humans rely on culture distinguishes us from other animals

6. human culture and biology aare interrelated. our bio growth and development are impacted by culture.

Historical Particularism

each society has its own

unique historical development and must be understood

based on its own historical context.

shackles of tradition

bind each and every one of us

salvage ethnography

The collection of records useful to assist people in reviving

their own languages and cultural practices

Fieldwork

research method in anthropology, involving long-term, direct participation and observation of a community's daily life, known as participant observation

"Going native"

a researcher becoming so deeply involved in a community that they abandon their objective, academic perspective, adopting the local culture’s habits, beliefs, and, in extreme cases, abandoning their original research goals

Cultural Variation

refers to the, diverse range of beliefs, practices, languages, and, social behaviors that distinguish human societies worldwide.

Enculturation

the anthropological process by which individuals learn and internalize the norms, values, behaviors, and language of their own culture, primarily during childhood but continuing throughout life.

In 16th century cosmography discourse, three objects appear

in propinquity to the non-European Other:

a. The Demonic

b. The Ancient

c. Gold and Spices

20th C culture

first time seen as cultural difference, cultural diversity

colonial Anthropologists

helped colonial government produce propaganda to construct native people as savage, they were viewed as experts but had not done fieldwork like Boas, produced culture steeped in racism which helped the abusive europeans control and go over the rest of the world

Adam Kuper

argues that the anthropologists in the

field were largely ignored by government officials as

eccentrics,

Talal Asad

argues that the contributions of early anthropologists were too specific to our field to be helpful to colonial administrators.

Cultural Anthropology in Britain

making a concern with social structure and social order of paramount

concern

Cultural Anthropology in America

more interest in meaning, symbolism, ritual

Society

humanly created organization or system of

interrelationships that connects individuals in a

common culture. Every society has its culture, but culture and society aren’t the same. Culture and society cannot exist without each other

Social institutions

how people are linked to one another, such as families, political organization, businesses,

Anthropologists across Europe focused on

understanding the form and function of these social institutions and developed theories of functionalism to explain how social institutions contribute to the organization of society and the maintenance of social order

Evans-Pritchard

worked in a few different parts of British Africa to figure out a particular culture’s way of life and their political system

• His books on the Nuer people of the Sudan were directly a result of the fact that the British were having a hard time controlling the Nuer.

Evans-Pritchard Azande people

in central Africa. a person died under stilits and they said it was witchcraft because what are the odds the person was standing there at the exact moment. Azande society misfortune is caused by witchcraft

evil eye

that when a person feels extremely jealous or angry with you then they can actually harm you by having such strong feelings.

Boas influence in the US

anthropology in the United States became a holistic discipline integrating four sub-fields with different approaches to understanding human diversity.

decolonizing anthropology

Trying to correct the legacies that colonialism left in the development of the field by broadening who does anthropology and how we research human diversity, both biologically and culturally.

How societies are structured and how they remained stable over time in England

structural-functionalist mechanisms where social institutions work together to manage social order and maintain equilibrium

qualitative data

primary form of cultural anthropology, consists of non-statistical information such as personal life stories and customary beliefs and practices

Quantitative data

consists of statistical or measurable information, such as demographic composition, the types and quantities of crops grown, or the ratio of spouses born within or outside a community

Fieldwork

is living with a study group (or subjects or hosts) for a year or more to see what culture looks like for it

Ethnography

a written account (a report that summarizes all our findings) of a particular community, society, or culture. It’s a method that requires fieldwork. also refers to the end result of our fieldwork.

ETIC

Observer’s Perspective An analytical framework used by outside analysts in studying a culture (e.g., things we can count and measure. Attempts to be impartial, objective, or neutral)

EMIC

Participant’s Perspective Insider’s perceptions and categories, and their explanations for why they do what they do (how they explain things). How members of the group think.

EMIC Pros

• Helps focus on holism and relativism

• Practical and ethical