Sociocultural Anthropology

Cultural relativism

Anyone's beliefs and activities should be understood in terms of one's own culture

One must suspend judgment on other people's practices in order to understand them in their own cultural terms

Not always easy/possible

Social constructivism

What one believes, thinks, knows is determined by one's own society

Knowledge is learned from other members of our culture

Patterns of subsistence

foraging

horticulture

agriculture

pastoralism

industrialism

Foraging

(hunting & gathering)

Wild foods, nomadism, net hunting, bow and arrow, insects and plant food

!Kung

Horticulture

Smaller scale farming, slash and burn domesticated plants

Matrilocal cultures, tribes

Pastoralism

Herding domesticated animals, cattle and interacting with the animals as food as money

Agriculture

large-scale farming of domesticated plants; often includes technological advances like irrigation

Industrialism

Large scale technological advanced production of processed foods that are bought and sold in a market

"Food taboos"

From foraging to industrialism there is increased sedentism surplus and population density

Neolocal

Methods

Participant observation

History of anthropology

Product of Western civilization

Started in Europe

Colonialism of indigenous peoples who lacked technology, the ones who were colonizing- had the technology

Mating

Lots of meanings, temporary bonds, long term romantic exclusivity, humans and plants do it

Marriage Definition (A) Haviland 1996

A transaction resulting in a contract with the right to sexual access to each other

Woman eligible to have children

Marriage Definition (B) Haviland 2008

culturally sanctioned union that establishes rights and obligations between the people, them and their kids, and their in-laws.

Obligations include

sex

labor

property

kids

exchange

status

Kinship

A system of social ties deriving from the recognition of genealogical relations

Universally organized

Universally accorded social importance

Colonialism

the policy or practice of acquiring full or partial political control over another country, occupying it with settlers, and exploiting it economically.

The extension of a nation's sovereignty over territory beyond its border by the establishment of either settler or exploitation colonies in which indigenous populations are directly rules, displaced, exterminated

Means generally dominating the resources labor an markets of the colonial territory and may impose new ways of life on the territory

Ethnocentrism

Looking at the world's other cultures

from the perspective of one's own culture

Causes maps to be different from each other

Colonialism based on this belief

Society

An organized group(s) of interdependent people who share a common territory, language and culture. They act together for collective survival and well being

Exists in many species not just people

Culture

A society's shared and socially transmitted ideas, values and perceptions used to make sense of experience and generate behavior

Not limited to humans

Non-genetic transfer to info. among members of social groups

"Stuff you learn from others"

Colonialism

Ethnograhy

The systematic description of a culture based on firsthand observation

Learning through their everyday life

Ethnographer

a person who studies via ethnography

Indigenous

the people who lived in a region before a region was colonized - usually by Europeans

Consanguineals

relatives by birth/genetics (blood relatives)

Affinals/affines

relatives by marriage

Conspecific

members of the same species

Lineal relatives

ancestors and descendants (my mom's mom, my daughter...)

Collaterals

relatives descended from a common ancestor but from a different line

Descent

Structures of descent: lineages, clan, phratry, moieties

Unilineal

only through either father's or mother's line

(Iroquois system)

Patrilineal or Matrilineal

Matrilineal

Descent through mothers line

Patrilineal

Descent is traced through the father's line

Ambilineal

Decent through either line, mother or father

Bilateral

Descent traced through both lines

Lineages

common ancestry - patrilocal, matrilocal, ambilinea, bilateral

Clan

several lineages common ancestor, large groups associated with mythical ancestors

Nuclear family

mom, dad, kids, step kids

Extended family

grandparents, aunts, uncles, other relatives who all live nearby or in one household

multiple nuclear families and or more than two generations clustered together on a daily basis

Endogamy

marriage within a particular group or category to which one belongs

Exogamy

marriage outside of one's group

Monogamy

Two people only

Polygamy

More than two people

Polyandry

1 woman multiple men - rare highlands of Nepal - done because of resource restraints

Polygyny

1 man multiple wives - sister wives - pretty common

Patrilocal residence

Serial monogamy

a person is partnered with a succession of individual partners over time - divorce and remarriage

Promiscuity

multiple partners of any sex configuration

Levirate

a custom by which widow marries the brother of her dead husband

Sororate

a custom by which a widower marries his dead wife's sister

Dowry

when the wife's family gives her inheritance at the time of her marriage - woman compete for desirable healthy husbands with this

Brideprice

when the groom and his family give goods to the brides family in exchange for the right to marry her - often in female-exogamous societies - her family looses the economic contribution she had been making

Brideservice

when prior to marriage, the groom lives with and works for the bride's family for a given period of time (years)

Matrilocal

a married couple lives in the wife's mom's house - happens when women are dominant in subsistence - where political org. are uncentralized and where cooperation among women is important

Patrilocal

a married couple lives with he husbands fathers place of residence - happens where men play a dominant role - to keep the property in the family

Ambilocal

choose either husbands father or wife's mother for residence - where resources are limited but labor of more than one nuclear family is required to get the scarce resources

Neolocal

reside in a location apart from either the husband's or the wife's relatives - america - associated with industrialism

Participant observation

learning a peoples culture through social participation and observation within the community - interviews conducted and discussion with individual members over a period of time

Band

Simplest form of human society

No more than 100 ppl

least form of political organization

No written laws everything communicated oral

Foraging- hunt & gather

No fixed leadership

Egalitarian

Fluid membership

Aka, !Kung, Eskimo Inuit groups, Hazda

"small, mobile, and fluid social

formations with weak leadership that do not generate

surpluses, pay no taxes and support no standing army"

Aka

Band

Eskimo lineal system

Film - shows they are endangered by Christianity money and drugs

Hunter gatherers

Egalitarian

Pygmies

!Kung

Band

Dry desert environment

Egalitarian

leader - "headman"

Less than 100 ppl

Food-foraging

economic system requires them to be mobile

rotation of seasonal territories

Hazda

Band

Tanzania

around 1,000 ppl

Inuit

Foragers

Film Atanarjuat about the Inuit peoples in the Arctic circle

Some Inuit ppls are in bands in the Arctic regions

Tribe

More permanent than a band

Families linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties with a common culture and dialect

Recognized leader, clear gender based roles

Sedentary but move seasonally

Decisions made by consensus

Band vs tribe

T - larger

T - social categories, clear leaders, more permanent

T can be subdivided into bands

B - nomadic one in 1 place for few days

B wild hunter gathered foods

T domesticated plants (yanomamo, hunting fishing)

Nuer

Tribe

usually sedentary but move seasonally to accommodate livestock - Nuer follow water

Pastoralists

Domestic cattle herders

Very tall bc greater SA means they can cool themselves down, better

Yanomamo

They have fictive kinship from OUR perspective

Cross cultural marriages preferred

Tribe

Relatively sedentary but can move to accom. for horticulture

Patrilineal decent

Patrilocal marriage

Name taboos - don't reveal real genealogies

Warfare

feasts

Peacemaking, alliances

Child betrothal

wife capture

Polygyny

Chiefdom

Based on kinship

Monopolized by senior members of select families

Elites form a political ideological aristocracy

chief is appointed based on ascribed, NOT achieved

An autonomous political unit comprising a number of villages or communities under the permanent control of a paramount chief.

Hawaii

Popular

Least complex

Fewest terms all relatives of same gender and sex are referred to by the same term

Absence of unilineal descent

Aka

State

Community under a single form of government

May be sovereign

most formal

Highly stratified with social classes

Bureaucracy

Maya, Inca, Nacirema

Industrialization

Inca

state

Nacirema

Nation-state

a sovereign state whose citizens or subjects are relatively homogeneous in factors such as language or common descent

Sociopolitical organization

Because of this there are very few true band societies left

Egalitarian vs hierarchial

E everyone is equal, !Kung, Aka

H - people are ranked

Chiefdom

Ascribed status

the social status a person is assigned at birth or assumed involuntarily later in life. It is a position that is neither earned nor chosen but assigned

Achieved status

an achieved status is a social position a person takes on voluntarily that reflects both personal ability and merit.

Classes (chiefdom elite or commoner)

Inherited social classes

Someone can change by extraordinary behavior

a single lineage/family of the elite class becomes the ruling elite of the chiefdom

Tend to have farmed land - surplus go to the chief

Potlatch

(among North American Indian peoples of the northwest coast) an opulent ceremonial feast at which possessions are given away or destroyed to display wealth or enhance prestige

Chief

Authority over multiple communities

Usually inherited

Social classes

Hierarchy/stratification

Tribute/tax

Among chiefdom where chief redistributes the surplus given from foraging to his benefit

Cultural evolutionism

Ways in which culture changes over time

ISSUES

is there a consistent pattern of change?

Derogatory to small cultures who want to live that way and not change

Uncentralized political systems

Subsistence level economies - foraging

Small populations

little social stratification

Autonomous groups

Mobile

Formal leader rare

Centralized political systems

Intensive agriculture or industrialization

Complicated technology

labor specialization

Large diverse population

Less mobility

Control of resources

Coercive forces

Frequent male leaders

Political authority concentrated - chiefdoms, state