History of Anthropology

Evolutionism

The 19th century anthropological theory that cultures evolved from savagery through barbarism to civilization.

Unilinear Cultural Evolution

A 19th century idea that all cultures passed through the same sequence of stages from simple to complex.

Degenerationism

A theory that so-called savage or primitive cultures had degenerated from more civilized cultures because they had fallen from God’s Grace.

Culture

the complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, customs, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.

Diffusionism

Aspects of culture are borrowed or diffused from one culture to another.

Historical Particularism

A school of anthropology prominent in the first part of the 20th century that insisted on the collection of ethnographic data (through direct fieldwork) before making cross-cultural generalizations.

Functionalism

The key question in anthropology is on the function of institutions in a society. The task is to understand how parts of contemporary cultures contribute to the well-being of individuals.

Structuralism

The structures of the social institutions were the key to understanding. Shifted the central question from the function of social and cultural structures to their meaning.

Structural Functionalism

A school of cultural anthropology that examines how parts of a culture function for the well-being of the society.

Mechanical Solidarity

** The idea that small-scale societies are integrated because its members believe and act similarly.

Organic Solidarity

** The idea that complex societies are integrated by the dependence of its members on each other.

Institution

** A pattern of beliefs and behaviours that are relatively stable over time.

Social Facts

** A pattern of beliefs and behaviours that are relatively stable over time.

Neoevolutionism

A 20th century school of cultural anthropology whereby similarities between cultures could be explained by parallel adaptations to similar natural environments.

Cultural Materialism

An anthropological theory that cultural systems are most influenced by such material things as natural resources, technology and human biology.

Symbolic Anthropology

A theoretical school in anthropology that views the goal of anthropology as the interpretation of symbols.

Interpretive Anthropology

A theoretical orientation holding that culture is a web of symbols and meaning, and the job of anthropology is to interpret those meanings.

Thick Description

The detailed description of behaviours in ethnographic context.

Feminist Anthropology

A theoretical approach that seeks to describe and explain cultural life from the perspective of women.

Political Economy

A perspective that, at its core, examines the abstract issues of conflict, ideology, and power.

Political Ecology

A perspective that examines how unequal relations in and among societies affect the use of the natural environment and its resources, especially in the context of wide ranging ecological settings, and subsequent economic, policy, and regulatory actions.

Postmodernist Anthropology

A school of anthropology that advocates the switch from cultural generalization and laws to description, interpretation, and the search for meaning.