Anthropology Test 1
Which of the following statements best represents a functionalist explanation of a cultural practice?
All humans need to eat a certain amount of food each day, and culture has a set of customs that work to ensure that this biological need is met.
Which of the following is an example of the ethnographic technique called participant observation?
An anthropologist gets to know the local people, takes part in daily life, and writes a report describing the community.
How are animal call systems different from human language?
Animal calls are set, instinctive responses to particular stimuli and are based on only a few sounds.
Which of the following statements about anthropology today are true?
Anthropologists today tend toward increased specialization.
Which of the following statements describes a case revealing the integrated nature of culture?
As more American women attended college and obtained jobs in the workplace, beliefs about marriage and divorce changed.
Which of the following examples best illustrates the relationship between human biological needs and culture?
Biology requires that humans eat a certain amount each day, but culture teaches us what we want to eat, when we want it, and how to eat it.
Which of the following anthropologists fundamentally shaped American anthropology through his studies of European immigrants to the United States and through his studies of the cultures, histories, and languages of Native Americans, including the Kwakiutl?
Boas
Who is considered to be the father of ethnography (i.e. the inventor of fieldwork)?
Bronislaw Malinowski
Although an individual resident of a southern city in the United States may not like to eat grits and cornbread, these foods are considered a part of southern culture. What does this reveal about culture?
Culture is a shared attribute.
Which of the following statements best describes culture?
Culture teaches us how to satisfy our biological needs.
What does it mean when one says that culture is integrated?
Cultures are interrelated systems of thought, beliefs, and behavior.
Which statement best describes the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis?
Different languages produce different ways of thinking.
Why were hunter-gatherers spared from most epidemic infectious diseases that affected agrarian and urban societies?
Epidemic diseases thrive in dense populations, and hunter-gatherers lived in small groups. Hunter-gathers remained isolated and thus protected from diseases affecting other groups. The mobility of hunter-gatherers helped keep them out of reach of epidemic diseases that thrive in more permanent settlements.
Ethnography has changed since Morgan and Malinowski did the early fieldwork. Which statement best describes key changes in how ethnography or fieldwork is done?
Ethnography has become more specialized, and anthropologists go to the field to investigate a particular problem or issue.
Who is known as the father of American four-field anthropology?
Franz Boas
In a corporate setting, one of the anthropologist's main jobs is to
Help workers and managers understand each other
Animals such as wolves learn behavior patterns, such as hunting techniques. What makes human cultural learning different from that?
Human culture is based on ideas shared through symbols.
Which of the following are steps applied anthropologists can take to help improve health conditions among indigenous peoples?
Implement solutions in partnership with agencies handling public health programs. Identify the most pressing health problems that indigenous communities face. Gather information on solutions to the most pressing health problems.
Which of the following is true of the world system and colonialism?
In many areas, they worsened the health of indigenous people by spreading diseases, warfare, servitude, and other stressors.
Which of the following best describes how a government policy that promotes prenatal health care and large families could become maladaptive?
It could encourage overpopulation.
Which of the following best explains why the shift from academic to applied anthropology has benefited the profession?
It has forced anthropologists to consider the wider social value and implications of their research.
According to Sir Edward Tylor's century-old definition of culture, what is the critical defining feature of culture?
It includes patterns of behavior acquired by people as members of society.
Which of the following statements are true of anthropology?
It offers a cross-cultural perspective. It is the study of all societies. It is the study of the human species around the world and through time.
____ is the study of body language and gestures to understand nonverbal communication.
Kinesics
Which statement is true regarding language?
Language is a form of communication that must be learned.
Which anthropologist stressed that culture originated when human ancestors developed the ability to use symbols, to make tools and clothing, and to create meaning in art and language?
Leslie White
Who was the earliest anthropologist to stress that culture is symbolic?
Leslie White
Which early ethnographer was known for his extensive fieldwork in the Trobriand Islands and especially emphasized living among the people one studies?
Malinowski
Which of the following best defines the goal of modern applied anthropology?
Modern applied anthropology is a helping profession, designed to assist local people.
Which of the following are most likely to happen if urban slums continue to expand?
Noise, air, and water pollution will increase. Crime rates will rise.
Which of the following examples best describes how culture influences the ways in which humans interact with the natural environment?
Science, invention, and discovery are parts of culture and enable humans to control many natural limitations.
Whose definition of culture includes "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, arts, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities acquired by man as a member of society"?
Sir Edward Taylor
William Labov did a study of how r was pronounced in New York City department stores. Which of the following statements best describes his findings?
Social class differences were revealed by whether or not the r was pronounced after vowels in words such as "fourth" and "floor."
Which statement best represents the relationship between anthropological research and survey research?
Survey research relies on questionnaires to gather data, whereas ethnographic research research relies on long-term firsthand observations.
Svetlana has had flu-like symptoms since being bitten by a mosquito. Roberto works long hours at a minimum-wage warehouse job and is always tired and lethargic. Which of the following best describes Svetlana and Roberto's conditions?
Svetlana has disease, and Roberto has illness.
Which statement best describes the principal ethical guideline stated in the Code of Ethics of the American Anthropological Association?
The anthropologist's first obligation is to the people in the study community.
Which of the following statements about hypotheses are accurate?
They are proposed explanations. Their validity is confirmed by testing.
Which of the following statements about the Boasians are true?
They stressed the importance of diffusion among cultures. They were historical particularists.
Which of the following are reasons that studying anthropology would benefit someone planning to pursue a career in international business?
Understanding culture provides useful knowledge in international business. Anthropologists study diverse lifestyles, which provides useful knowledge in international business.
Which of the following are features of anthropology that are of value to business?
a focus on diversity ethnography as ways of gathering data cross-cultural expertise
What is a phoneme?
a minimal sound contrast that differentiates meaning in a language
What is a morpheme?
a minimal unit of meaning
Today it is common for ethnographers to study
a specific problem.
Practicing, or applied, anthropology uses anthropological data, perspectives, theory, and methods to
address contemporary social problems.
Li, an ethnographer, observes some North Americans "crossing their fingers" by bending their middle fingers around their index fingers. When Li asks them to explain this behavior, they say that it means that they are lying. What do ethnographers call this type of "insider" explanation?
an emic explanation
Which of the following are studied by archaeological anthropologists?
animal bones tools garbage
What is the name of the first evolutionary stage representing what Tylor called the simplest and earliest type of religion?
animism
Which sequence correctly lists Tylor's evolutionary stages of religion in order from the earliest to the latest?
animism, polytheism, monotheism, science
Associations require that when one thing changes,
another changes.
What is a symbol?
anything verbal or nonverbal that stands for something else
An observed relationship between two or more variables is a(n)
association
Language first developed in humans
at an unknown time
Which of the following are among the four subfields of general anthropology?
biological anthropology sociocultural anthropology anthropological archaeology
language
can be spoken or written and is based on learned meanings and symbols.
Using anthropological expertise in the planning of development projects in order to ensure cultural compatibility is
cost effective
The subfield of anthropology that describes, analyzes, interprets, and explains social and cultural similarities and differences is ______ anthropology.
cultural
Marvin Harris put forth a theory arguing that a culture's infrastructure determines the shape of its social structure and its ideology. What is the term used to describe Harris's theory?
cultural materialism
English is considered a Germanic language and belongs to the same language family as German and Dutch. English, German, and Dutch all came from one original ancient parent language. What is the general term for a group of languages that share a common ancestor?
daughter languages
What is the term for a set of related languages that have descended from the same parent language over a period of hundreds or thousands of years?
daughter languages
If you need to study a spoken language that has never been written, and you need to identify all the sounds, meanings, and grammatical rules for that language, which type of linguistics would be most helpful?
descriptive linguistics
The branch of applied anthropology that focuses on social issues in, and the cultural dimension of, economic development is known as ______ anthropology.
development
Boasians focused on the spread of cultural traits and borrowing between cultures rather than stressing specific independent inventions, such as the bow and arrow. What term is used to describe this borrowing or spreading of cultural traits?
diffusion
Hip-hop music has spread through popular culture and the media from urban America to China and Japan. Which mechanism of cultural change does this phenomenon represent?
diffusion
In the United States today we wear pajamas (which originated in ancient Persia), use mirrors (which originated in ancient Egypt), and eat with forks (which originated in ancient Rome). What mechanism of cultural change does this represent?
diffusion
A scientifically identified health threat caused by a known pathogen is known as ______, whereas a condition of poor health perceived or felt by an individual is known as ______.
disease; illness
What is the most advanced degree that is usually needed to secure gainful employment in academic, museum, or applied anthropology?
doctorate
Anthropologists work to understand how local people interpret cultural events in their own communities. This "insider" perspective is known as the
emic perspective
A child begins to learn cultural rules and habits, such as how to take turns speaking, how far apart to stand, and when to make eye contact, through a process known as
enculturation
Which of the following is the term anthropologists use to describe the process by which a child learns culture?
enculturation
The activity within cultural anthropology that gathers data to provide an account of a particular group, community, society, or culture is called
ethnography
Because of cultural traditions, North American girls, in comparison to Brazilian girls,
excel in running and swimming.
True or false: A human child is born with culture.
false
Educational anthropologists believe children should be viewed in a context that includes
family peers
Peter is a sailing instructor and frequently uses such terms as jib, tack, tiller, and sheet. His nonsailing friends cannot understand him when he uses such terms. Peter is using
focal vocabulary.
Specialized sets of words and terms that are particularly important to certain groups are known as
focal vocabulary.
Which anthropological theory set aside the question of evolutionary and historical origins of social practices and focused instead on the social purposes served by these social customs or institutions?
functionalism
What is the term used to describe today's worldwide connectedness brought about by modern communication systems, travel, international trade, and migration?
globalization
Which of the following is an example of a symbol?
golden arches to identify a hamburger chain
To maximize social and economic benefits, development projects must
harness traditional organizations. be flexible. be culturally compatible. respond to locally perceived needs. involve men and women in planning and implementation.
Modern applied anthropology usually is seen as a(n) ______ profession designed to assist local people.
helping
______linguistics study how languages over time, and how groups of languages called language families share a common ancient ancestor language.
historical
The study of the whole of the human condition is known as
holism
The field of anthropology and education includes research in
homes neighborhoods classrooms
Which term refers to the group that leads to humans but not to African great apes and encompasses all of the human species that have ever existed?
hominins
Which type of linguistic research would historical linguists most likely conduct?
how the English language has changed over the past 1,000 years
Biological anthropology is the study of ______ in time and space.
human biological diversity
A suggested but unverified explanation is known as a
hypothesis.
What is phonology?
identifying which sounds are important in a language
Marvin Harris proposed a theory in which all cultures can be analyzed as having three layers. Which list correctly names the three layers Harris described in his theory?
infrastructure, structure, superstructure
Kinesics
is the study of body language and gestures to understand nonverbal communication.
Instead of doing a random sample of all the residents in a community to choose individuals to formally interview, anthropologists select a few individuals who are extremely knowledgeable to interview. What is the term used to describe these few select individuals?
key informant or key consultant
When cultural anthropologists do fieldwork in a community, they may rely on just a few chosen people who can provide special knowledge and details about community life. What is the term (or terms) used for the people chosen?
key informants or key consultants
Humans often use gestures such as enthusiastic "fist pumps" or hanging our heads in shame. What is the term that linguistic anthropologists use to describe this type of communication?
kinesics
______ can be spoken or written and is based on learned meanings and symbols.
language
Comparing cultural anthropology to sociology, statistics traditionally has been
less important in cultural anthropology.
Problems caused by increases in urban populations and the concentration of people in slums will be most severe in
less-developed countries (LDCs).
Anthropological linguists generally accept the principle that all languages and dialects are equally effective as systems of communication. What is the term used to describe this principle?
linguistic relativity
People tend to evaluate certain dialects as less sophisticated or as more prestigious. In contrast anthropological linguists view all dialects as equally logical and effective means of communication, and they do not rank speech patterns as better or worse. This approach to the study of language by anthropological linguists is known as
linguistic relativity.
Ethnographers routinely consider which of the following as data sources?
local people's answers to questions direct measurement of such things as rainfall, temperature, or crop yield government records or archives
Which of the following areas have benefited from the work of applied anthropologists?
marketing business public health
Which of the following is an example of international culture?
marriage
A(n) _________ anthropologist examines such questions as which diseases and health conditions affect particular populations and how illness is socially constructed, diagnosed, managed, and treated in various societies.
medical
Which of the following is the comparative, biocultural study of disease, health problems, and health care systems, and is both academic and applied?
medical anthropology
Anthropology's comparative, biocultural perspective recognizes that cultural forces
mold human biology.
Approximately what percentage of anthropology PhDs today seek nonacademic employment?
more than half
In the word "toaster" there are two units of meaning: "toast" and "-er." What is the general term, used in descriptive linguistics, for these units of meaning?
morpheme
People in Germany tend to be on-time to meetings, whereas those in Brazil generally run late. This is an example of ______ culture.
national
Excluded from the list of natural limitations that culture has allowed humans to overcome is
natural disasters
The second strand of Malinowski's functionalism was known as ________ functionalism and stated that humans had a set of universal biological requirements.
needs
Malinowski argued that all cultures must fulfill a set of basic biological requirements for human survival. What is the term used to describe this concept?
needs functionalism
According to sociolinguistics,
no language is a homogeneous system.
One technique commonly used by ethnographers is __________, which means that they take part in community life, participating in the events they are observing, describing, and analyzing.
participant observation
Which of the following do anthropologists consider when studying human diversity in time and space?
particular traits and patterns generalized traits universal traits
If you hear the words "cat" and "hat" you can hear a single sound difference at the beginning of each of those words, which is important because it makes the two words have different meanings. What is the general term that descriptive linguists use to describe an important sound difference that affects word meanings?
phoneme
Analyzing the sounds that are important in a language is the part of descriptive linguistics called
phonology
What aspects of language are studied in descriptive linguistics?
phonology or sounds, morphology or word form, and syntax or word order
Which of the following are specialties within biological anthropology?
primatology paleoanthropology human genetics
What do animal call systems lack that human languages have?
productivity and displacement
Some anthropologists become involved in electoral campaigns, political administrations, and testifying at government hearings. This is called
public anthropology
Which of the following are aspects of linguistic anthropology?
reconstructing ancient languages making inferences about universal features of language studying linguistic differences to discover cultural variations in perception and thought
Which of the following would be examples of topics studied in sociolinguistics?
relationships between social and linguistic variation linguistic features that correlate with socioeconomic class linguistic variation corresponding to regional dialects
Which sequence correctly lists Morgan's major stages of cultural evolution?
savagery, barbarism, civilization
Some linguists study how factors such as region, social class, ethnicity, or gender influence language. What is the name for this field of linguistics?
sociolinguistics
Which field of linguistics analyzes the ways that language is used in different social contexts?
sociolinguistics
Traditionally, the main distinction between sociologists and anthropologists has been that
sociologists studied industrial societies, whereas anthropologists studied nonindustrial societies.
Which anthropological theory suggests that social customs and cultural practices work together as a system much like the organs and physiology of the human body work together?
structural functionalism
Radcliffe-Brown believed that the function of any practice is the role it plays in maintaining the system of which it is a part. This theory is known as
structural functionalism.
The study of society through sampling and statistical analysis is ______, and the study of firsthand culture and living people is ______.
survey research; ethnographic research
The origin of anthropology as a scientific pursuit can be traced to
the 19th century.
Some linguists have proposed that the grammar of different languages causes different ways of thinking in particular cultures. What name do linguistics use to refer to this idea?
the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
Children learn to avoid fire by being told that it is dangerous, while animals learn to avoid fire by discovering that it burns them. The difference between the two is that human cultural learning depends on
the capacity to use symbols.
Anthropological archaeologists reconstruct, describe, and interpret human behavior and cultural patterns mainly
through material remains.
The primary ethical obligation of the anthropologist is
to do no harm to the people in the host community.
What are the stated goals of public anthropology?
to engage with public issues. oppose policies that promote injustice. reframe discussions of key social issues in the media and by public officials.
Which of the following best explains why businesses would hire an anthropologist?
to gain a better understanding of their customers
Which of the following is one role of the urban applied anthropologist?
to help people deal with urban institutions, such as legal and social services
True or false: Adaptive cultural traits can become maladaptive traits.
true
True or false: Anthropologists are highly qualified to suggest, plan, and implement social policy affecting people.
true
True or false: Applied anthropologists can help improve health conditions among indigenous peoples.
true
True or false: Chimpanzees and gorillas are the closest relatives to the human species.
true
Noam Chomsky proposed that the structure of the human brain causes all human languages to be structured similarly. What is the term used to describe this concept?
universal grammar
On colonial sugar plantations in the Caribbean, enslaved people from various African nations who originally spoke many different languages developed new languages called creole languages. These languages, such as Gullah, Haitian creole, and New Orleans creole, share certain rules of syntax and language structure. Chomsky theorizes that these similarities in language structure occur because of the nature of the human brain, and calls this recurring pattern for organizing language
universal grammar.
When studying human diversity in time and space, anthropologists distinguish among the ______, which are features found in every culture, the ______, which are common to several but not all groups, and the ______, which are unique to certain cultural traditions.
universal; general; particular
Assisting recent migrants in dealing with various institutions in their new city environments, such as legal and social services, is one of the roles of the ______ anthropologist.
urban
An anthropologist employed by a hospital or large corporation can
view the organization's problems from a unique perspective. help personnel at various levels in the hierarchy understand each other. observe and converse with all types of employees.
Which of the following do development anthropologists do?
work on development policies to enhance quality of life for local people carry out development policies designed by others plan and guide development policies
Which of the following are proper roles for applied anthropologists?
working with local people to design culturally appropriate and socially sensitive change identifying needs for change that local people perceive protecting local people from harmful policies and projects that may threaten them
Globalization is defined as
worldwide connectedness, involving production, communication, and technology.