Cultural Anthropology Notes
Four Fields of American Anthropology
Biological / Physical Anthropology
Ecological Anthropology
Archaeology
Cultural / Sociological Anthropology
Linguistics
What is Culture?
Definition by E.B. Tylor in Primitive Culture (1871):
"Culture is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, arts, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society."
Anthropologists and Culture
Culture is collected through participant observation.
Doing what others do to understand how and why they do it, and how it feels.
Writing about culture in an ethnography.
Performing cross-cultural comparisons through ethnology.
Enculturation
The process by which children and people new to a society learn a culture’s stated and unstated rules, and their place in that society.
Learning can be active (e.g., education) or informal and passive (as part of daily life).
Acculturation
The process by which cultures change through exchange with others.
Adoptions usually include modifications to fit the new cultural context. Examples:
No base stealing in Japanese baseball because theft is dishonorable.
American sushi has non-traditional ingredients.
Anthropological Views of Culture
19th Century Progressivism
Cultures are on a scale of increasing complexity and can advance toward higher forms.
Early 20th Century Historical Particularism
Each culture has its own genius that was appropriate to its history and values.
Middle 20th Century Functionalism
Culture is ecological and a means of non-biological adaptation to the environment.
Focus on the functioning of social structures.
Late 20th Century Practice Theory
Culture is the product of what people do and believe.
19th Century Progressivism
Cultures are on a scale of increasing complexity, advancing toward higher forms.
Key Figures: Lewis Henry Morgan (1818-1881) and E.B. Tylor (1832-1917).
Three evolutionary stages:
Savagery
Barbarism
Civilization
"Progress" was measured by:
Technological differentiation
Form of kinship
Levels of political organization
Lewis Henry Morgan’s Hierarchy of Technology (1877)
Civilization: began with phonetic alphabet and writing.
Upper Barbarism: began with smelting iron and iron tools.
Middle Barbarism:
Old World: domestication of plants and animals.
New World: development of irrigation cultivation.
Lower Barbarism: began with pottery making.
Upper Savagery: began with bow and arrow.
Middle Savagery: began with discovery of fishing technology and the use of fire.
Lower Savagery: began with earliest humanity—fruits and nuts subsistence.
19th Century Social Hierarchy
Argued that the own patriarchal, monotheistic, scientific civilization was the best form of society.
Early 20th Century Historical Particularism
Each culture has its own genius appropriate to its history and values.
Opposition to progressivism, which sees societies on a one-track scale from savagery to civilization.
Cultural Relativism: society must be viewed in terms of its own unique situation.
Perceptions of simplicity or backwardness result from the imperfect knowledge of the observer.
Middle 20th Century Functionalism
Culture is a means of non-biological adaptation, taking an ecological perspective.
People shape their culture to allow society to operate efficiently.
Key Figure: Bronislaw Malinowski and Trobriand Islanders.
Examples:
Religion and ritual function to reduce fear and uncertainty.
Trade in symbolic artifacts serves to bind people from different places.
Late 20th Century Practice Theory
Culture is produced by what we do and believe.
Example: Bourdieu’s Map of French Distinction maps the economic standing and preference of French people from all walks of life. Shared areas represent practices defining class and social group differences.
Kinship
Social relations as determined by biology and culture.
Descent
Resource sharing
Residence patterns
Marriage partners
Household size
Social organization
Gender roles
Consanguineal Kin vs. Affine Kin
Consanguine (“blood”) Kin: Related by descent or shared descent (e.g., mother, grandfather, sibling, cousin).
Affine (“border”) Kin: Acquired through social negotiation, usually marriage (e.g., spouse, step-mother, godfather, fictive kin).
Descent Types
Bilineal: Descent from both mother and father’s lineages.
Unilineal
Matrilineal: Descent from mother’s lineage.
Patrilineal: Descent from father’s lineage.
Ambilineal: Choose either father’s or mother’s lineage, but not both.
Kinship Charts
Males are denoted by triangles, females by circles.
The subject is the “ego,” sometimes marked with a square.
Marriage is denoted by an equal sign (=).
Bilineal Descent
Draw resources from both mother’s and father’s lineage.
Persons may take the surname or clan affiliations of either or both parents.
Live with either parents or in a new place (neolocal). Resources are spread widely, but social responsibilities are doubled. Neolocal residence limits sharing.
Matrilineal Descent
Draw resources from your mother’s lineage and clan.
Tend to live matrilocally or avunculocally.
Mother’s brother, rather than father, has parenting responsibilities.
Example: The Nair of Southern India
Matrilineal and avunculocal.
Live with mother, her sisters and their children, grandmother, and mother’s brothers (tharavad).
Father lives with his sisters and mother in a different house.
Eldest female relative responsible for behavior and daily care.
Mother’s brothers provide schooling and arrange marriage.
Historically military families; matrilineal structure accommodated long absences and potential divorce or death of soldiers.
Example: The Iroquois of North America
Matrilineal and matrilocal.
Husband lives in his wife’s longhouse headed by an elder female relative.
Women own, work, and control the corn fields.
Patrilineal Descent
Inherit and share resources with father’s lineage.
Newlyweds tend to live patrilocally, with the husband’s father.
Reduces resource sharing and inheritance but minimizes social obligations.
Marriage
Social relationship which includes shared resources and sexual access.
Endogamous rules: Encourage partner selection from within the group, creating alliances within the group.
Exogamous rules: Favor marriages out of the group, creating alliances with people outside your group.
Economic Aspects of Marriage
Dowry: Wife’s family pays.
Bride Price: Husband’s family pays.
Types of Marriage
Monogamy & serial monogamy: Marriages between two people, binding two families.
Polygyny: Marriage between a man and several women.
Binds multiple families, increases potential offspring, and concentrates female labor.
Polyandry: Marriage of a woman and multiple husbands.
Closes bond between two families, decreases the number of potential offspring, and concentrates male labor.
Common in societies where land is scarce and requires lots of labor.
Example: Nandi of Kenya
Patrilineal society where women need sons for care in old age.
If a woman fails to have a son, she may divorce and take a wife.
The divorced woman gains the rights of a husband but cannot have sex with her wife.
The wife takes lovers, and any children are considered the woman's.
Household
The unit of production, consumption, reproduction & shelter.
Types of Households
Extended Households
Large labor pool that exploits common, low-value resources.
Resource sharing reduces risks and benefits, producing social equality.
Need for labor encourages population growth.
Found worldwide.
Nuclear Households
Small labor pool that exploits high-quality, but patchy resources.
Small number of gatherers increases risks and benefits, producing social inequality.
Low birth rate decreases population growth.
Found only in Arctic and industrialized societies.
Example: The Masai
Herding people who practice patrilineal descent and patrilocal residence.