ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion

ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion ORDER NOW FOR CUSTOMIZED AND ORIGINAL NURSING PAPERS Unformatted Attachment Preview A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology Mark Q. Sutton University of San Diego The text is for the sole use of students in my Anth 102, Interlocution to Cultural Anthropology, USD Fall 2020 It is not to be shared or distributed as it is still a work in progress Suggestions for improvement are always welcome 1 The purpose of Anthropology is to make the world safe for human differences. Ruth Benedict 2 Table of Contents Preface and Acknowledgements Chapter 1: Anthropology What is Anthropology? The Major Subfields of Anthropology Biological (or Physical) Anthropology Evolution Anthropological Linguistics Archaeology Cultural Anthropology Many Worlds Perspectives on Others Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism Words Matter Cultural Appropriation Anthropology as a Science Empirical Science Objective and Subjective Data The Western Scientific Method Non-empirical Science Why Study Anthropology? Chapter Summary Chapter 2: A Very Short History of Cultural Anthropology On the Development of Western Scientific Thought A Natural Evolution The Emergence of Anthropology as a Discipline Unilinear Cultural Evolution Historical Particularism Functional/Structuralism Other Theoretical Approaches Diffusionism Multilinear Cultural Evolution Cultural Ecology 3 Cultural Materialism Post-modernism Chapter Summary Chapter 3: Culture, Personality, and Worldview What is Culture? What is a Society? Functions of a Society Ethnic Groups and Subcultures Personality Perception and Cognition Elements of Personality What is “Normal”? Worldview Cosmology Chapter Summary Chapter 4: Doing Cultural Anthropology Anthropological Methods Fieldwork Participant Observation Preparation for Fieldwork Once in the Field After Fieldwork Differing Viewpoints Chapter Summary Chapter 5: Anthropological Linguistics Descriptive Linguistics Historical Linguistics Sociolinguistics Some Other Linguistic Elements Writing Chapter Summary 4 Chapter 6: Religion and Ritual Religion General Forms of Religious Belief Functions of Religion Religious Specialists Magic Ritual Rites of Passage Ritual Cannibalism Chapter Summary Chapter 7: Sex, Gender, and Identity Sex Sexual Preference Gender Gender Selection Identity Societal and Family Identity Personal Identity Chapter Summary Chapter 8: Social Organization Kinship Families and Households Figuring Relatives Figuring Descent Descent Groups The Major Kinship Systems Marriage The Functions of Marriage Some General Marriage Rules Types of Marriages Monogamy Polygamy Post-Marital Residence 5 Divorce Non-Kinship Based Social Organizations Sodalities Inequality Status and Rank Chapter Summary Chapter 9: ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion Political Organization Politics Power and Authority Warfare The Ideology of Warfare Levels of Political Complexity Bands Tribes Chiefdoms States Chapter Summary Chapter 10: Economic Organization Production Division of Labor Exchange Systems Value Exchange: Reciprocity Exchange: Redistribution Exchange: Barter Money Exchange: Market The “Secret Economy”; The Black Market Basic Subsistence Systems Domestication and the Development of Agriculture Hunting and Gathering Horticulture Pastoralism Intensive Agriculture 6 Chapter Summary Chapter 11: Expressive Culture Play Art Visual Art Verbal Art Musical Art Performance Art Chapter Summary Chapter 12: Change and Development Change Adaptation Invention and Innovation Diffusion Colonization Acculturation Ethnocide and Genocide Development Reactions to Imposed Change People Moving Chapter Summary Chapter 13: Applied Anthropology The Detached Approach The Project Specific Approach The Proactive Approach Chapter Summary References Glossary Index 7 Chapter 1 Anthropology WHAT IS ANTHROPOLOGY? Anthropology is, quite literally, the study of all aspects of humans and their societies throughout time and space, including their culture, language, biology, and evolution. Humans everywhere are virtually the same biologically (in spite of superficial but visible differences), but there are currently some 7,000 separate and distinct societies across the planet. Anthropology seeks to understand what makes these societies different, what they all have in common, and seeks to make contemporary people understand that we should embrace this great cultural diversity! Visualize that all societies on the planet are part of an orchestra. There are many sections of an orchestra; string, woodwind, brass, and percussion, each with a number and variety of instruments. Imagine each society as part of an instrument, a string on a violin or a key on a saxophone, each producing a variety of sounds. Each section, each instrument, each string or drum, each note, each tone, each octave, all combine to produce a symphony of music. That is human culture. As societies are diminished or lost, the music of the orchestra becomes less complex and loses its beauty. Eventually, the music may fade altogether and we would have a silent world. That would be a loss to everyone. Anthropology differs from other fields in that it studies all humans, everywhere, from the earliest times (millions of years ago) to today and from the Arctic to the Antarctic. No group is so small that it is not important, and no period of history or prehistory is without interest. This holistic approach has allowed anthropologists to disprove many generalizations based only on modern or Western societies, and to demonstrate some other generalizations that were not obvious once, such as the universality of complex kinship systems and dietary rules. Anthropology generally focuses on non-industrialized, traditional, or indigenous societies, many or most of which are small and largely “invisible” to Western society. Anthropology is cross cultural and comparative and seeks to understand and explain differences. ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion The goal in this is ultimately to explain humans as a whole so as to better understand where we came from, where we are, and where we are going. But, anthropology can also be viewed as a colonial enterprise, one in which Western interpretations are viewed as superior to those of indigenous groups and thus forced upon them. This is not a necessary conflict and anthropologists are striving to include indigenous views and interpretations into the own work. 8 THE MAJOR SUBFIELDS OF ANTHROPOLOGY The discipline of anthropology can be organized in several different ways. In the British system (Europe, Canada, and Australia), cultural anthropology is seen as a separate field called social anthropology. Archaeology is also a separate field with a focus on history, art, and architecture. In the American system, Anthropology is the overarching discipline and is generally divided into four major subfields (called the “four field approach”). These four major subfields are (1) biological anthropology, (2) linguistics, (3) archaeology, and (4) cultural anthropology. Depending on one’s interests or focus, each of these subfields could be divided into any number of other subfields. Many of the divisions in cultural anthropology are noted below. BIOLOGICAL (OR PHYSICAL) ANTHROPOLOGY The second major subdiscipline in anthropology is biological anthropology (or physical anthropology): the study of human biology through time, focusing specifically on biological evolution and human variation. Within biological anthropology are a number of specialties. Paleoanthropology is the multidisciplinary study of primate and human evolution, as well as the various aspects of geology and biology that serve as the background to such studies. The study of our closest living relatives, the nonhuman primates, is called primatology. Biological anthropologists also specialize in human osteology, the study of the human skeleton. Because many biological anthropologists have this training, they frequently use their skills in criminal cases or major catastrophes (such as wars and airplane crashes) in which human remains are badly decomposed, fragmentary, or skeletonized. Evolution The concept of evolution is widely misunderstood. Quite simply, evolution is change. All things change and so all things evolve. Biological anthropologists define evolution more specifically as the change in gene frequency in populations from generation to generation through the process of natural selection. Other disciplines might define evolution in different ways, but in essence, it is simply change. Many also believe that evolution has direction. It is commonly thought that as something evolves, it advances up some kind of evolutionary ladder, that it somehow “advances” toward a goal or an ideal of some sort, and that it embodies some sort of “progress.” These notions are false. While it is true that some things become more complex over time, not all things do; complexity itself is not necessarily an advantage. A simple amoeba living today is as “evolved” as any human being—not as complex to be sure, but certainly as evolved. It has a long 9 evolutionary history and its continued existence reflects biological success. In the same vein, all living human cultures are equally evolved, although to different environments. They are equally far from whatever culture may have existed among prehistoric human ancestors. As there is no direction in evolution, there is no such thing as “devolution,” there is no more or less “advanced,” and there is no external scale of progress. ANTHROPOLOGICAL LINGUISTICS Anthropological linguistics is the study of human languages (other animals might have language but that is not considered here), including their structure (e.g., grammar, syntax, meaning, cognition) and history, since language (and so groups) can be traced back in time.ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology Disussion Through language, people can transmit their culture from one generation to the next. This makes language the most important symbol in any society. Linguistics is considered in great detail in Chapter 5. ARCHAEOLOGY Archaeology is the study of the human past. Archaeologists want to learn the same things about past cultures that cultural anthropologists do about living ones. The major differences between archaeology and cultural anthropology are in the available data and the methods used to obtain those data. Archaeologists cannot directly observe human behavior or directly ask past people questions so they must rely on the material remains of past behaviors, as seen in their artifacts (tools), food remains, houses, human remains, settlement systems, and the like. Thus, it is difficult to obtain the entire picture of a past society. Archaeologists, however, are able to detect change over long periods of time, can identify broad trends, and can examine transitions, such as the change of some cultures from hunting and gathering to agriculture. In addition, an archaeologist can detect the traces of behavior that a cultural anthropologist might not usually see. This access to “hidden behavior” is another advantage of archaeology. There are a number of subdivisions of archaeology. For example, prehistoric archaeology generally deals with people prior to writing, historical archaeology is generally the archaeology on non-Native Americans in the Americas, Classical archaeology studies Greece, Rome, and other Mediterranean states, Egyptology studies ancient Egypt, bioarchaeology deals with the dead, and Cultural Resource Management (CRM) is the application of archaeology in development projects (see Chapter 13). There are many more. One could also note a difference between “archaeology” as being the data recovered in an investigation and “prehistory” as being the interpretation of (the story explaining) the archaeological data. The data will never change but their interpretation surely will as more data are acquired. 10 CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY Cultural anthropologists generally study extant (living) groups with the goal of learning about, and an understanding of, the full range of human behavior. As such, there is nothing that is off limits to what a cultural anthropologist wants to know. Cultural anthropologists typically live with the society they are studying, perhaps for years, so as to obtain a rich and detailed knowledge of that society. This knowledge is then compared to information obtained by others from other societies so that comparisons can be made and a greater understanding of human behavior realized. Other social sciences are generally different. For example, sociology tends to study industrialized societies and uses questionnaires and statistical analyses. However, there is no hard and fast rule about this division and cultural anthropologists can and do study groups, such as street gangs, in industrialized societies. Some sociologists also study traditional groups. ANTH 102 San Diego State University Intro to Anthropology DisussionThe study of a particular group at a particular time is called an ethnography, and the information obtained from that study is called ethnographic data. The time period in which the group is described becomes the “ethnographic present,” as the group was at that time. The comparative study of culture and societies—similarities and differences—is called ethnology. More than one ethnography is needed to do ethnology, and it is through ethnology that we can learn about culture in general, the primary goal of cultural anthropology. Many Worlds During the Cold War between the Democratic West and Communist East, the various nation-states (e.g., those with United Nations membership) were divided into political “worlds.” The First World was used to describe countries that were aligned with the United States. These countries were democratic and capitalistic and are now commonly called “the West.” The Second World was the communist states and is now sometimes called “the East.” The Third World was the underdeveloped and unaligned states. With the end of the Cold War, the terms First and Second worlds are no longer used. However, the term “Third World” is still in common usage but now refers to developing countries. The Fourth World consists of indigenous societies without their own nations living within contemporary nation-states (countries) (Neely and Hume 2020). There are some 370 million fourth world people in some 5,000 groups, speaking 4,000 languages, living in 90 countries. Well known examples include several hundred different Native American societies in North America and several hundred Aboriginal societies in Australia. Another fourth world group, one that directly impacts the politics and economics of the Middle East, are the Kurds. The Kurds live mostly in Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Iraq and are striving to establish their own county, a goal resisted militarily by Turkey. 11 The Fifth World consists of past societies known mostly through archaeology (Sutton 2017). In some cases, such as Ancient Egypt or the Ancient Maya, a fair amount is known about them (but with so much still to learn). In other cases, we know of the existence of some groups and perhaps even a little bit about . However, most past groups, perhaps tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands, are completely unknown even to the point of not even knowing of their existence. The issue with this is that we cannot know the full range of human behavior if we have no knowledge of so many groups. Perspectives on Others For the vast majority of human history, societies were small and most people only interacted with members of their own group. Societies were almost certainly wary of one another but this was a fairly minor problem since the lack of infrastructure, trade, and transportation provided little opportunity for interaction. As time passed, some societies became larger and more and more people had to interact with strangers, members of other societies. This interaction brought with it increasing tension, distrust, and perhaps even animosity of other groups and so problems increased. Today, most people have to interact with members of other societies, many of whom are just as biased. This brings a constant and increasing challenge of dealing with strangers and having to counter the inherent bias against other societies that has dominated most of human history. Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism Ethnocentrism is the view that one’s culture or group is somehow better than others. Americans tend to view non-Americans as being inferior, less sophisticated, or backward. Germans have the same view of non-Germans as do the Chinese of non-Chinese. This same concept also applies to other groups, such as sports teams, schools, and other organizations. Everybody thinks they are better than the others. Every society, in varying degrees, has this view; it is a normal part of the selfidentification process. While being a little ethnocentric is normal, too much can be very bad. Ethnocentric views have often been used to rationalize the mistreatment of peoples. In the history of the United States, many Americans considered Native Americans to be “savages” who were “in the way” of the expanding white “civilization,” articulated as “Manifest Destiny.” As a result, many Native people killed, moved, or incarcerated with government approval. Today, a number of Third World countries attempting to “develop” treat their indigenous people in the same way. However, we must remember that all people and societies have the right to exist, to have their own culture and practices, and to speak their own language. Indigenous people are not stupid or backward; just different. 12 Anthropologists attempt to mitigate ethnocentric views by taking a different approach: one must suspend judgment of other peoples’ practices in order to understand them in their own cultural terms, an approach called cultural relativism. In this view, all societies are valid and have the right to exist. Placing people or societies on a pedestal as being somehow superior is also a form of ethnocentrism, a reverse ethnocentrism. Just as the view of Native Americans as “primitive savages” is very wrong, the idea of “noble savages” is also wrong. We must recognize that all people are just regular people like everyone else. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, good points and bad. We want to learn and benefit from others, not just tolerate them. Interestingly, there is no word in English for this attitude, though perhaps “open minded” is close, and that in itself tells us something. Words Matter Westerners tend to look down on other people; an ethnocentric view. One can see this view operationalized in the words applied in reference to traditional groups. They are often called “primitive” or “savage,” terms that belittle people and so can influence one’s view of them. In some cases, such terms are intentionally used to dehumanize people and societies so as to justify their subjugation, cultural extermination (ethnocide), and/or their physical extermination (genocide). Treatments of many traditional groups were, and continue to be, justified in a similar manner. But other people or societies are not primitive, weird, bad, or stupid. Instead, they are different and interesting! This amazing cultural diversity is now available to see via the internet. Remarkably, we tend to “look down” on groups that hunt wild animals and wear animal skins, but we do the same thing and even pay extra for our coats and upholstery made from animal skins. Cultural Appropriation Cultural appropriation is the use of customs, traits, or imagery of a society by an outsider for some purpose, generally to the detriment of the original society. For example, Native American images and icons were commonly used by American sports teams as icons or mascots. Some have argued that the use of such mascots further exploits Native Americans and that since many other mascots are animals, the use of Indians as mascots equates them with animals. By 2015, most sports teams dropped the use of Indian mascots. However, the U.S. military continues to name many of its weapons afte … Purchase answer to see full attachment Get a 10 % discount on an order above $ 100 Use the following coupon code : NURSING10

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