CULTURE AND ETHNOCENTRISM

OBEYESEKERE (GEERTZ READING)

- Believed that human rationality does not vary between cultures = Hawaiins way of thinking is the same as the European rationality and it was only normal for them to respond to the return of Cook in the way they did as he killed one of their priests

EXAMPLES OF ETHNOCENTRISM

- Contempt/disdain - Xenophobia - culturally based fear of outsiders and fear of strangers taking jobs or ethnic religious prejudice - Ranking - systematic view of groups- ordering of other ethnos - caste systems, races - Ethnicity - culture and language (german white and jewish white) - Exaggeration - look at others and pick out qualities that defines the group and exaggerates them - Racism - whites as superior to blacks - Race - social category of biological characteristics - skin tone - Superiority

ESSENTIALISM

- Defines group of people, naturally occurring trait or set of traits - Biological

UNIVERSAL DECENCY

- How do we deal with dilemma if we don't treat people equally

GALEN CRAZ

-Against sitting on the chair - cultural item snatching the body - Role of material objects in life - active force in the world

RELATIVISM

-At what point is there a basic human right - gender equality - Knowledge, truth and morality exist in relation to culture, society or historical context

NACIREMA (HORACE MINER READING)

-Sees those who sees the world differently strange - Different cultures have different responses to certain actions - World becomes symbolic of the idea - deep rooting meaning and association -Description of American culture in a unique way - written to manipulate people to think its about an uncivilized tribe - Practices are driven by the culture someone is situated in including our own practices - From an outsiders perspective things that we would find normal and stereotypical is strange = see differently - Ordinary day to day things with different labels alters our perspective of it e.g. medicine men = doctors

ETHNOCENTRISM

-The tendency for each society to place its own culture patterns at the center of things -Practice of comparing other cultural practices with those of one's own and finding other cultural practices to be inferior -Maintenance of social order and the promotion of social change -Don't see anything outside of your own culture - no other way than our way --> those who don't follow our beliefs, values, traditions are mentally inferior - "aliens"

SAHLINS (GEERTZ READING)

Hawaiins - has a different way of thinking compared to us because they are an indigenous tribe = perceived Cook as god Lono - Due to beliefs in mythology as they came from a pre- modern society - Obeyesekere perspective is ethnocentric - applying a European rationality to non Euros