Anthropology 1300 Final Exam
For anthropologists the most important aspect of any object is
how it emerges from and exists within a set of human social relationships
Which of the following is a dilemma facing an ethnographer of transgender people in the United States?
how one's research or advocacy can reinforce social inequalities and suffering
For anthropologists, political power refers to
how power is used to attain goals for the good of the community.
You and your sibling are fighting over who gets to use the family car. When your parent intervenes and seeks a solution that is agreeable to both of you, it is an example of
mediation
How words fit together to make meaningful units is called
morphology
A key feature of religious beliefs and behavior is that they are rooted in:
social behavior and social action
A biocultural perspective on gender variance would emphasize all of the following except
the relative allocation of sex-specific hormones, such as testosterone and estrogen, that influence whether a person is male or female.
The main difference between economists and economic anthropologists is that economists
try to understand and predict economic patterns
A major problem with the approach to race that defines race as reproductively isolated breeding populations is that: -every breeding population qualifies as a race -it is essentially trait-based -is does not allow for cultural factors to be included -all of the above
All of the above
A misconception about hormones in society is that -certain hormones are linked solely to a specific sex -they are important only for sexual functioning -sex-specific hormones cause particular behaviors -all of the above
All of the above
According to anthropologists, economies are shaped by which factors? -the decisions people make -social relationships -culture and mortality -all of the above
All of the above
All biological approaches to race are problematic because: -they rarely describe an actual individual or characterize whole groups of people -the sampling is too specific and focuses only on visible traits -one trait tends to be representative of other characteristics like intelligence and personal character -all of the above
All of the above
An anthropologist might consider doing "anthropology at a distance" because: -he or she has no research funding to go into the field -there is conflict or violence in the field site -there is a rich body of data about the field site produced by others -all of the above
All of the above
Anthropologists study food holistically, which means that they focus on: -the diversity of diets -complex interactions between nutrition and the environment -political and economic processes -all of the above
All of the above
Anthropologists today recognize that artists can -challenge people's thinking -reinforce cultural patterns -reflect traditions specific to their societies -all of the above
All of the above
Censuses interest anthropologists because they -reveal the government's role in classifying and categorizing people -change over time -indicate shifts in social categories -all of the above
All of the above
Cultural anthropologists do research by -building trusting relationships w/ people over long period of time -gathering data to produce statistical models -focusing on single dimensions of people's lives -all of the above
All of the above
During fieldwork cultural anthropologists: -learn the local language -record people's economic transactions -study how environmental changes affect agriculture -all of the above
All of the above
Ethnocentrism: -presents a major problem for anthropologists -means you think your culture is superior to others -is a common feature of culture -all of the above
All of the above
For anthropologists, what is important about the existence of differences between populations in the ability to digest milk? -the genetic aspects of the mutation that allows some populations to continue drinking milk into adulthood -the ways cultural beliefs and practices can support milk consumption -the social and political power of a milk industry -all of the above
All of the above
If you wanted to study ethnographically low LGBTQ identities are being normalized on your campus, you would likely be sensitive to: -how social differences intersect with these identities -how people make meaning of these identities and differentiate them -any ethical quandaries that emerge in the course of your research -all of the above
All of the above
In which of the following locations would you find an anthropologist doing fieldwork? -a factory -a mental institution -a New York City neighborhood -the Amazon rainforest -all of the above
All of the above
Seeking out and possessing consumer goods is a way that people: -can express their social status -can identify with a particular group -can express their gender identities -all of the above
All of the above
Totems help create social cohesiveness by: -stressing group identity -representing powerful symbols for people to focus on -acting as objects for group ritual activity -all of the above
All of the above
Which of the following groups were considered nonwhite racial groups? -Jews -Italians -Finns -All of the above
All of the above
Which of the following is a contributing factor to the development of creoles, pidgins, and other hybrid forms of language? -colonialism -globalization -commerce -migration -all of the above
All of the above
Which of the following is a theoretical approach to how economies create value used in society? -neoclassical economies -substantivism -Marxism -all of the above
All of the above
Which of the following is an element of violence? -the use of force to cause harm to someone or something -a highly visible assertion of power -it is an efficient way to transform a social environment -all of the above
All of the above
With the advent of industrial factories: -workers were less attached to the goods they were producing than they had been -workers were less attached to the other people who were buying the goods -workers were more attached to the wages they were earning than to the products they were making -all of the above
All of the above
Which of the following is the most significant aspect of the salvage paradigm?
Anthropologists need to collect information from societies before they die out
A clan that reckons descent through both their mother and father is called a
Cognatic clan
True or False: A key feature of the theory of primordialism is that ethnic groups are created by powerful interest groups in a society.
False
True or False: All humans are born with some culture.
False
True or False: Anthropologists do not consider unstructured, casual conversations data.
False
True or False: Anthropologists generally believe in one unified theory of culture.
False
True or False: There is a biological connection between the trait of skin tone and other "racial" traits, such as certain facial features and bodily shapes.
False
Diversity defined anthropologically is:
Focuses on multiplicity and variety
Individuals who diverge from the male-female norm and exhibit sexual organs and functions somewhere between, including both male and female, are called
Intersexed
Which of the following would be least likely as an explanation given by a cultural anthropologist for the existence of food insecurity among the poor?
It's related to the ignorance of the poor to effectively feed themselves
Stylized performances involving symbols that are associated with social, political, and religious activities are called
Rituals
The "natural" order represented in social hierarchies of any society is supported by:
Social institutions
Violence is ___________
Socially constructed
The earliest anthropologist to compare religious and spiritual beliefs around the world was E.B. Tylor. For him the heart of religious beliefs was the belief in
Spirits
A preformed, usually unfavorable, opinion about people who are different is
Stereotyping
Power that transcends individuals, operating in settings and orchestrating settings in which social and individual actions take place, is
Structural power
Which theory was used to explain how stateless societies maintained social order and equilibrium?
Structural-functionalism
True or False: Anthropologists are deeply skeptical of grandiose claims about biological destiny and the belief that nature explains all of out behavior.
True
True or False: Anthropologists of the 1800s are referred to as "armchair anthropologists" because they never traveled abroad and they gathered data from other people's reports.
True
True or False: Culture consists of the collective processes that make the artificial seem natural.
True
True or False: Genetically speaking, humans are a remarkably homogeneous species: there is far greater variation within human groups than there is between them.
True
True or False: Nature and nurture are not opposed but intertwined.
True
True or False: Anthropologists agree that, in addition to prejudice and discrimination, unearned privilege upholds social inequality.
True
Using life history interviews, researchers are able to
Understand how a person's age affects his or her role in the community.
Ethnopsychology is largely concerned with
Understanding how other societies make sense of selves, persons, and emotions
When descent is based in a single line it is referred to as
Unilineal descent
The comparative method
Uses data from many different societies
From an anthropological perspective, which of the following is not a new issue that arises with in vitro fertilization (IVF), surrogacy, adoption, and frequent divorce and remarriage in American society?
Who inherits the parent's land?
Does race have biological consequences?
Yes, because of racism
A language of mixed origin that developed from a complex blending of two parent languages is called
a creole
Which of the following is not one of the ways that objects change ever time?
an object always becomes less valuable and less significant as it ages and deteriorates over long periods of time
When you are consuming an object, the process of taking possession of it is called
appropriation
Anthropologists understand that in order to understand gender/sex inequalities one must study
both men and women
All societies differentiate between male and female, but one way Americans are unique in how we do it is that we link gender to
colors
People's fascination with having the newest Nike shoes or iPhone is an example of which of the following anthropological concepts?
commodity fetishism
A number of societies have the notion that men are ___________ and women are ___________.
created; born
Why do foragers turn to agriculture?
increased population density causes too much competition for resources
When people describe violence as meaningless they
interpret violence as something without reason
Which of the following is not true of economic anthropology?
it assumes that free market capitalism will take over the world
Why did Liberian rebel soldiers cross-dress during the civil war in the 1990s?
it distinguished them from the government's soldiers.
Anthropologists are interested in a situation like the way the new heart drug BiDil was created and approved because
it shows how cultural, political, and economic processes can work together to promote the idea that race is biologically based.
A voodoo doll is a good illustration of
magic that follows the law of similarity
Religious ideas are typically associated with beliefs about the supernatural, but what argument can be used to explain the beliefs and world views of physicists or geneticists, who may consider themselves nonbelievers?
most religions are really no more than a particular worldview
An anthropologists who studies how societies control sexuality would likely be most interested in the following situations
obstacles in access to birth control
The human diet is
omnivorous
From an anthropological point of view, people take the price tag off of gifts and wrap birthday presents because
people are ambivalent about expressing their connections with others using impersonal goods
Economies in which people seek high social rank, prestige, and power instead of money and material wealth are known as
prestige economies
The themes of reciprocity and gift exchange are critical to anthropologists because
reciprocity is deeply embedded in social relations
The collections of goods in a community and the subsequent redivision of those goods among members of a society is called
redistribution
Most visitors to the 1935 exhibition of African art at New York's Museum of Modern Art were confronted for the first time by traditional African carvings of human and animal figures that were
stylized and symbolic representations of their subjects
Which government agency's activities might you focus on if you wanted to understand structural power?
the census office
When cultural anthropologists examine families in different cultures, they use cultural analysis to understand all of the following except
the genetic differences among different members of the extended family
Geert'z approach to religion is a style of analysis that looks at the underlying symbolic and cultural interconnections within a society; this is often referred to as
the interpretive approach
A nutritional anthropologist who studies the nutrition transition would probably focus on all of the following except
the labor conditions of migrant workers
The Kung people of Africa are an example of what kind of society?
Acephalous
A cross-cultural perspective on eating insect larvae would reveal: -the artificiality of taste -the cultural constructions of insects as food -that eating insects can be adaptive -all of the above
All of the above
The subfield of anthropology that studies the material remains of past cultures, often focusing on the rise of cities, is called:
Archaeology
Anthropologist George Gmelch studied which sport where he found that players used a lot of magic?
Baseball
A paradigm that emphasizes humans that are made up of complex biological, cultural, and psychological processes is
Biocultural
Anthropologists believe that out behavior is influenced by: -nature -nurture -both
Both
When Americans recognize that people are born into a particular social position due to the economic situations of their families, they are recognizing the existence of
Class
The moral and intellectual principle that one should withhold judgement about seemingly strange or exotic beliefs and practices is:
Cultural relativism
Negative or unfair treatment of a person because of his or her group membership or identity is
Discrimination
The study of how people classify things in the world is called
Ethnoscience
When social norms dictate that someone from a particular clan must marry outside of that clan, anthropologist say that clan is
Exogamous
If you live in a household with your mom and dad, your grandfather, as well as your aunt and two cousins, you live in what kind of family?
Extended family
True or False: Cultural anthropology is one of the most quantitative of the social sciences.
False
True or False: Historical archaeologists excavate sites where written historical documentation exists that provides an accurate description of the way people actually lived.
False
Which of the following is the defining methodology to the discipline of anthropology?
Fieldwork
What are people who belong to conservative religious movements that advocate a return to traditional principles called?
Fundamentalists
What do anthropologists call the structural process of forgetting whole groups of relatives?
Genealogical amnesia
On the north coast of Papua New Guinea, a religious cult leader named Barjani was remembered through which object?
His hat
The earliest engagement anthropologists had with material culture happened where?
In museums where objects from around the world were originally seen as evidence of how primitive or civilized different societies were.
The people anthropologists gather data from are called
Informants
Because our values and beliefs include many elements of life such as clothes, food, and language means that culture is:
Integrated
The exchange of brass rods for the purchase of cattle or the payment of bride price is an example of the use of
Limited-purpose money
The affects and feelings we experience as humans
May not have an exact equivalent in another culture
Which of the following is not true of how food preferences relate to gender?
Men always love meat, no matter which culture they are from.
Why were American birth rates low from 1942 to 1946?
Most young married men were serving in the military
The flexibility of the brain is called
Neural plasticity
Intelligence is
Not marked by a single fixed gene
What is the family formed by a married couple and their children called?
Nuclear family
When anthropologists study the way people use language in real settings rather than as a set of grammatical rules, they are focusing on
Parole
This type of interaction may include playing basketball, cooking, dining, or having coffee with informants
Participant observation
For a big man in a non state society, what is the most powerful and valuable tool?
Persuasion
____________ refers to the structure of speech sounds
Phonology
When a woman marries more than one man she is practicing
Polyandry
Ethical issues facing ethnographers include all of the following except
Protecting informants' blood samples and other biological information.
The social, economic, and political processes of transforming populations into races and creating racial meanings is called
Racialization
What is a life cycle ritual that marks a person's or a group of person's transition from one social state to another?
Rite of passage
Cultural models help us make sense of the world because
They provide a pattern for one's own behavior and interpreting others' actions
Why would English colonial leaders portray Africans as uncivilized heathens?
To justify African slavery
The most enduring and ritualized aspects of culture are referred to as:
Traditions
Food security refers to
access to sufficient nutritious food to be healthy and active
Animal call systems
can only communicate in response to real-world stimuli
Words that came from the same ancestral language and originated from the same word are called
cognate words