ANTHRCUL 101 - Exam 1

Ethnocentrism Weak Definition

Judging other cultures using ones own cultural standards

Ethnocentrism Strong Definition

Assumption one’s own way of doing things is “correct”, other ways of life are inferior

Cultural Relativism

Idea that cultures should be judged by removing one’s own cultural standards

Methodological Cultural Relativism

Using cultural relativism as technique for bracketing one’s own preconceptions to learn about unfamiliar worlds.

Familiarizing Anthrocultural Observation

Make strange familiar

Defamiliarizing Cultural Relativism

Make familiar strange

Franz Boas Particularism Ideals

People are the products of their environments

Seven Elements of Culture

Learned, Symbolic, Dynamic, Integrated, Everyone does it, Shared, Overcoming Ethnocentralism essential to cultural understanding

Cultural/Symbolic Life of Corn Flakes

First to stop masturbation, now breakfast food

Holism

Effort to synthesize distinct approaches/findings into single comprehensive interpretation (Human biology, prehistory, language, social life) (Faintly creased paper for origami)

Fieldnotes

Interviews, geological mapping, longitudinal status

Building Rapport

Practice of building trust, collaboration, lines of communication

Jamlia Lyiscott

Called intellectual as black woman - microaggression, implying less smart because black

Huron River Stages

Ancient Hunters, Archaic Foragers, Agriculture and Ceramics, European Contact

Diffusionists

Cultural characteristics result from either internal historical dynamism or spread (diffusion) of cultural attributes from other cultures.

Globalization

Widening scale of cross-cultural interactions due to rapid movement of money, people, goods, images, and ideas within nations and across national boundaries. (McDonalds everywhere)

Migrant

Leaving home to work for period of time

Immigrant

Leaving home with no expectation to return

Refugees

Migration due to political oppression/war

Exlies

Expelled from home country

Hybridization

Persistent cultural mixing that has no predetermined direction or endpoint.

Global Imperialism

Promotion of one culture over others.

Emic descriptions / interpretations

Focused on “insiders” perspectives of cultural beliefs and practices when documenting meanings

Etic descriptions / interpretations

Draw on “outsider” standards when describing cultural behavior

Race

Group of people who share physical and cultural traits

Ethnicity

Group identity based on notions of shared/similar history, culture, and kinship

Racism

Policies and practices subordinating races believed to be inferior

Significance of 1660 slave codes

Determined differences between races - justifying factor in slavery for the first time

Significance of Bacon’s Rebellion

Poor whites and black slaves united, led to laws separating races

Indian Removal Act

President Andrew Jackson, displacement of 70,000+ natives, justification different from slavery: Africans = Labor, Natives = hindering white expansion

Scientific Racism

Use of science to rationalize/reproduce racial inequality - linked to policies, infrastructure, etc.

Eugenics

Controlled breeding to increase occurrence of desirable characteristics in a population

Hypodescent

Children whose parents are of different races assume racial identity of parent with subordinate status.

Microaggressions

Everyday, subtle, intentional/unintentional actions/behaviors that communicate bias

Second-Order Information

What’s not actually said but what is communicated/meant

Governance

Conduct of conduct

Power

Ability to exercise one’s will over others

Authority

Socially approved use of power

Sojourner Syndrome

Multiple roles and social identities of African American Women