Cultural Anthropology

Antropología Cultural

Studies human society and culture by describing and explaining cultural similarities and differences. Kottak identifies ethnography, based on fieldwork, and ethnology, based on cross-cultural comparison, as its two main activities. Example: studying family relationships in Ecuador and comparing them with those in another society.

Arqueología

Reconstructs, describes, and interprets human behavior and cultural patterns through material remains. These include artifacts, buildings, plant and animal remains, and discarded materials. Example: pottery made from nonlocal materials can suggest trade between communities.

Métodos de la Arqueología

Systematic recovery, recording, and analysis of material remains. Methods include careful excavation through successive layers and analysis of artifacts, buildings, settlements, and plant and animal remains. Example: examining domesticated plant remains to investigate agriculture.

Métodos de la Antropología Cultural

Methods for gathering and interpreting information about human cultures, including fieldwork, participant observation, conversations, and interviews. Ethnography examines particular communities, while ethnology compares findings across cultures. Example: participating in community meals and interviewing families about their customs.

Cultura y sus características

Culture consists of learned and shared traditions, beliefs, values, symbols, and practices that guide people's lives. It is learned, shared, symbolic, patterned, adaptive, and changing. Kottak emphasizes that culture is transmitted through learning rather than biological inheritance. Example: children learn language and table manners from others.

Observación participante

A research method involving participation in everyday activities while systematically observing and recording them. It helps researchers understand behavior and its meanings within a community. Example: helping prepare a celebration while observing responsibilities and relationships.

Etnografía

The fieldwork-based study and description of a particular group, society, or culture. Researchers collect, organize, analyze, and interpret information about people's lives. Example: Kottak's study of community life and change in Arembepe, Brazil.

Mercancía

A good exchanged primarily for economic value, typically through buying and selling. Lavenda and Schultz describe commodity exchanges as impersonal transactions that do not require an ongoing relationship between participants. Example: buying a shirt from a store.

Regalo o Don

Something exchanged within a social relationship that creates or maintains connections and obligations. Drawing on Mauss, Lavenda and Schultz explain that gift exchange involves an expectation of a return gift. Example: receiving help from a relative and later supporting that relative.

Inalienabilidad (regalo)

An enduring connection between an object and a person or group, even after the object changes hands. Its meaning and identity remain linked to its giver or origin. Example: a grandmother's necklace continues to represent her and the family's history after being given to a grandchild.

Economía de la Reciprocidad

An economic system organized through exchanges and expectations of giving and returning. Exchanges of goods, labor, and services create and sustain social relationships. Reciprocity can be generalized, balanced, or negative. Example: Maisin relatives exchange gifts, labor, and advice without keeping an exact account of every contribution.

Identidad social

How people understand themselves and are recognized by others through membership in social groups. These groups can involve nationality, ethnicity, religion, gender, class, or occupation. Example: identifying as Ecuadorian, Indigenous, and a university student.

Status

A socially recognized position a person occupies within a society or group. It can influence rights, obligations, and access to resources. Status may be ascribed, assigned with limited choice, or achieved through actions and accomplishments. Example: being a daughter is ascribed, while becoming a university graduate is achieved.

Interseccionalidad

Examines how social categories and systems of power interact to shape experiences. Race, gender, class, disability, and other dimensions operate together rather than independently. Example: an Indigenous woman with limited income facing barriers shaped jointly by racism, sexism, and class inequality.

Etnocentrismo

Judging other cultures through the standards and values of one's own culture. It can lead people to treat familiar practices as superior and unfamiliar practices as inferior. Example: calling eating with one's hands uncivilized because one normally uses utensils.

Eurocentrismo

A perspective that treats European history, experiences, and knowledge as central or universally authoritative. It can marginalize other societies' histories and knowledge. Example: treating European ways of life as the universal standard of progress.

Relativismo Cultural

Understanding beliefs and practices within their own cultural and historical contexts instead of automatically judging them through one's own standards. Understanding a practice does not require approving it. Example: investigating the meaning of a food prohibition before dismissing it as irrational.

Colonialidad del poder (Quijano)

The continuation of patterns of domination established through colonialism, even after formal colonial rule ends. It connects racial hierarchies, capitalism, unequal labor arrangements, and Eurocentrism. Example: racialized populations remaining concentrated in poorly paid work after independence.

Ritual

A culturally recognized sequence of formalized actions with symbolic meaning. Rituals can express beliefs, strengthen relationships, or mark important events, and they may be religious or secular. Example: a graduation ceremony.

Rito de pasaje

A ritual marking a transition from one social status or stage of life to another. Its classic stages are separation, liminality, and incorporation. Liminality means being between the previous status and the new one. Example: an initiation ceremony recognizing participants as adults.

Símbolo

Something that represents a culturally learned meaning beyond its physical form. Symbols can be words, objects, gestures, images, or actions. Example: a national flag representing belonging and collective history.

Animismo

Belief in spiritual beings or souls associated with humans and, in some traditions, animals, plants, places, or natural phenomena. These beliefs can shape relationships with the environment. Example: making an offering to a river spirit.

Politeísmo

Belief in multiple gods or deities. Different deities may have distinct powers, responsibilities, and personalities. Example: ancient Greek beliefs involving Athena, Poseidon, and Zeus.