Anthropology
Deconstruction
... based on your interpretation, you take the theory apart and put it back together with your own ideas and extended theories of thought
Thick Description
...Anthropologists attempt to analyze each layer of meaning. idea is that 'how do we know what we know?' what's truth in anthropology? How do we ascertain a truth?
Polysemy
...In linguistics , the condition of a text or word having multiple meanings
Liberal Human Subject
...Rational, self-interested (in pursuit of your own hearts desires, selfish interests taken all together benefit us all) and maximizing (maximum utility; whatever it is you want, you want enough of it. You want to maximize the utility of your choices). This leads to Neo-liberal econ/politics. This doesn't mean more politically free or democratice, those people are just out to provide their own services. Result of the entailments of the enlightment.
Modernism
...Reflects the epistemological notion that the world is knowable.
Semiotics
...Symbolic anthropologists believe we construct our cultural reality, focusing on the analysis of meaning.
Omniscient Narrator
...This is a common form of third-person narration in which the teller of the tale, who often appears to speak with the voice of the author himself, assumes an omniscient (all-knowing) perspective on the story being told
Critical Theory
...a school of thought that stresses the reflective assessment and critique of society and culture by applying knowledge from the social sciences and the humanities.
Social Constructionism
...a sociological theory of knowledge that considers how social phenomena or objects of consciousness develop in social contexts.
Postmodernism
...a view that social and cultural reality, as well as social science itself, is a human construction.
Practice/Praxis
...behavior towards an end, and is very often spoken about in terms of using one's own agency to get something done. Often used by Neo-Marxist.
Globalization
...theory represents a synthesis between the materialism and attempted empiricism of the neofunctionalists and neo-Marxists.
Political Economy
...was the original term used for studying production, buying, and selling, and their relations with law, custom, and government, as well as with the distribution of national income and wealth.
Upper Paleolithic
Blade-tool-making traditions of early AMHs.
Diffusion
Borrowing of cultural traits between societies.
What factor is NOT related to the development of larger brains among H.erectus populations?
Broad-spectrum revolution.
With glacial retreat, foragers pursued a more generalized economy, focusing less on large animals. This was the beginning of what Kent Flannery (1969) has called the...
Broad-spectrum revolution.
What does NOT distinguish states from earlier forms of society?
Burials. (What does? Control over a specific regional territory, productive farming (supporting dense populations), social stratification, the development of a record-keeping system).
Displacement
Describing things and events that are not present; basic to language.
The American Anthropological Association's Code of Ethics is...
Designed to ensure that anthropologists are aware of their obligations to the field of anthropology, to host communities that allow them to conduct their research, and to society in general.
T/F Christianity has a sacred language?
False
T/F English is based on the Celtic group of languages?
False
T/F Karl Marx believed that social and cultural differences were consequences of economic disparities caused by socialism?
False
T/F Race in all nations is deterined by the blood line of the parents, not by skin tone?
False
T/F Stereotyping is the use of specific characteristics as a race or age to make generalizations?
False (Profiling)
Science
Field of study that seeks reliable explanations, with reference to the material and physical world.
Development anthropology
Field that examines the sociocultural dimensions of economic development.
What is an example of cultural resource management?
The emergency excavation and cataloguing of a site that is about to be destroyed by a new highway.
What is one of the most valuable and distinctive tools of the applied anthropologist?
The ethnographic research method.
Polyvocality/Multivocality
The fact that a single symbol can represent many things (Victor Turner)
What makes bonobos exceptional among primates?
The frequency with which they have sex, a behaviour associated with conflict avoidance.
Independent invention
The independent development of a cultural feature in different societies.
What is the most likely explanation for why early Homo left Africa and spread into Eurasia?
The need to find meat.
Why are there such a large number of European archaic H.sapiens finds?
There is a long history of Paleolithic archaeology in Europe relative to other regions in the world.
What is true about the human racial categories?
They are culturally arbitrary, even though most people assume them to be based in biology.
What is false about cultural traits, patterns, and inventions?
They can be maladaptive.
Example of Multiculturalism
Hawaii
Ethnic Identities
Involve tangible practices such as common language, relationship to a particular place, common cultural practices (rooted in characteristics rather than physical appearance. Based on cultural markers.)
Multivariate
Involving multiple factors, causes, or variables.
In anthropology, methodological cultural relativism is...
Is not a moral position, but a methodological one.
What is the relevance of primatology to anthropology?
It helps anthropologists make inferences about the social organization of early hominins and untangle issues of human nature and the origins of culture.
About informed consent, this is false:
It is applicable only to research being conducted in the United States.
What characterizes anthropology among disciplines that study humans?
It is holistic and comparative.
About practicing or applied anthropology, this is false.
It is less relevant for archaeology since archaeology typically concerns the material culture of societies that no longer exist.
What is not true about the collapse of Copan?
It was precipitated by an Olmec invasion. (TRUE: it led to its abandonment around 830CE, it was linked to soil exhaustion, it was linked to overpopulation and malnutrition, and it was linked to erosion.
What is NOT true about the earliest writing?
It was syllabic (TRUE: it developed as a form of record keeping, it spread from Mesopotamia to Egypt, it played no role in the development of Mesoamerican writing systems, it was scrawled on wet clay with a stylus).
Why do archaeologists use relative dating?
To create an ordered chronology for materials uncovered during excavation.
Example of cultural relativism
To eat dogs or have them as pets
Why would companies designing and marketing products hire an anthropologist?
To gain a better understanding of their customers in an increasingly multicultural world.
In Chapter 4, what is the main point of describing the University of Colorado and NASA archaeological research project in Costa Rica?
To illustrate how scientists work as a team, often with technologically sophisticated tools, to make sense of the human past.
In Chapter 1, what is the point of describing the ways humans cope with low oxygen pressure at high altitudes?
To illustrate human capacities for cultural and biological adaptation, variation, and change.
Food production spread out from the Middle East through trade, diffusion of domesticated species, and actual migration of farmers, to northern Africa, Europe, India, and Pakistan. However, archaeological evidence suggests that...
In southern Egypt cattle may have been domesticated locally rather than imported from the Fertile Crescent.
What did NOT accompany primary state formation in southern Mesopotamia?
Increasing isolation of communities (DID: an expanding population, increasing specialization, a growing central leadership, and increasing trade).
There were at least seven different regions where agriculture developed. Therefore, agriculture is an example of which mechanisms of cultural change?
Independent invention.
Caste
Individuals are assigned a position at birth, and mobility is restricted.
Ethnocentrism
Judging other cultures using one's own cultural standards.
Core values
Key, basic, or central values that integrate a culture.
Protolanguage
Language ancestral to several daughter languages.
Official Language
Language sanctioned by a ruling body and defined and protected by powerful interests, tend to change slowly
Diglossia
Language with "high" (formal) and "low" (informal, familial) dialects.
Daughter languages
Languages sharing a common parent language (Latin).
Subgroups
Languages within a taxonomy of related languages that are most closely related
What is correct about the food-producing traditions of Mesopotamia and Mesoamerica?
Large domesticated animals played an important role in Mesopotamia but were absent from Mesoamerica.
Complex societies
Large, populous societies (e.g., nations) with stratification and a government.
Bergmann's rule
Larger bodies found in colder areas and smaller bodies in warmer ones.
Aztec
Last independent Valley of Mexico state (1325 through 1520c.e.-Spanish Conquest).
Culture
Traditions and customs transmitted through learning.
Homologies
Traits inherited from a common ancestor.
Cultural transmission
Transmission through learning, basic to language.
Dendrochronology
Tree-ring dating; a form of absolute dating.
"Writing Against Culture"
Lila Abu-Lughod argued that the writing of ethnography is inherently an expression of Western power because the concept of culture necessarily contains an element of hierarchy, and ethnographic writing is based on the textual construction of the "other".
Arboreal
Living in the trees.
Which variable does NOT enter into Carneiro's multivariate theory of state formation?
Long distance trade. (DOES: warfare, population growth, environmental circumscription, resource concentration).
What does Thomson's nose rule state?
Long noses are adaptive in cold environments.
Longitudinal research
Long-term study, usually based on repeated visits.
Archeulian
Lower Paleolithic tool tradition associated with H.erectus.
IPR
Intellectual property rights (an indigenous group's collective knowledge and it's applications).
example of ethnic fair
Intergalactic Rainbow Gathering
Pleistocene
Main epoch (1.8m.y.a.-11,000B.P) of evolution of Homo.
Glacials
Major advances of continental ice sheets in Europe and North America.
What case does Chapter 3 use to illustrate some of the dangers of the old applied anthropology?
Malinoski's view that anthropologists should focus on Westernization and aid colonial regimes in their expansion.
Sexual dimorphism
Marked differences in male and female anatomy and temperament.
Sexual dimorphism refers to...
Marked differences in male and female anatomy and temperament.
Empire
Mature state that is large, multiethnic, militaristic, and expansive.
Anthropometry
Measurement of human body parts and dimensions.
What is a growing field that considers the biocultural context and implications of disease and illness?
Medical anthropology.
Hominid
Member of hominid family; any fossil or living human, chimp, or gorilla.
PAR
Participatory Action Research
What is not true about life in the Valle of Oaxaca prior to cultivation?
People lived in sedentary villages (TRUE: people ate mesquite, cactus, tree pods, deer, and rabbit; the population shifted seasonally between bands and microbands; the people periodically harvested the wild grass, teosinte; the inhabitants were foragers.
Cultural consultants
People who teach an ethnographer about their culture.
What is the term for adaptive biological changes that take place during an individual's lifetime?
Phenotypical adaptation.
Franz Boas described changes in skull form among the children of Europeans who migrated to North America. His findings (cannot be explained by genetics) underscore the fact that...
Phenotypical similarities and differences don't necessarily have a genetic basis.
Where did Brian Howell do his fieldwork?
Philippines
Lila Abu-Lughod
Postmodernism and Its Critics 'A Tale of Two Pregnancies' Told about feelings and experiences rather than about the culture. 'Anthropologists cannot tell us about another culture. They can only tell us about their own experiences.'
Allan Hanson
Postmodernism and Its Critics 'The Making of the Maori: Cultural Invention and Its Logic' 'Tradition is now understood quite literally to be an invention designed to serve contemporary purposes' 'Certain fields should be taught by particular people' 'Anthropology is continually invented and reinvented' Argued that elements of Maori "traditional" culture are actually late nineteenth C. European narratives that have been incorporated into current day Maori understandings of "traditional" Maori culture for contemporary purposes.
Renato Rosaldo
Postmodernism and Its Critics. 'Grief and a Headhunter's Rage' The agency to control ones own Subjectivity. Distrust in objectivity. Objective social science? Will be claimed to be an impossibility.
Challenges to writing ethnography posed by postmodern insights
Postmodernist associations with linguistic theory and Neo-Marxism; materialism; methods of production
Stratification
Presence of social divisions-strata-with unequal wealth and power.
Language
Primary means of human communication, spoken and written.
Allen's rule
Protruding body parts are bigger in warmer areas.
Ritual
Quincinera
It is important to understand the human racial categories are based on perceptions of phenotypic features, and not on genotypes because...
Racial categories are socially defined, not biologically determined.
Chiefdom
Ranked society with two-or-three level settlement hierarchy.
Equity (increased)
Reduction in absolute poverty, with a more even distribution of wealth.
What trait is NOT associated with primates?
Reliance on smell as the main sense.
Fossils
Remains of ancient life.
The findings at Nabta Playa, located in the eastern Sahara and southern Egypt...
Represent an elaborate and previously unsuspected ceremonialism, as well as social complexity during the African Neolithic.
According to behavioural ecologists, what is inclusive fitness?
Reproductive success measured by the representation of genes one shares with other, related individuals.
Etic
Research strategy emphasizing the ethnographer's explanations and categories.
Emic
Research strategy focusing on local explanations and meanings.
Human rights
Rights based on justice and morality beyond and superior to particular countries, cultures, and religions.
Cultural rights
Rights vested in religious and ethnic minorities and indigenous societies.
Death of Anthropology
Rosaldo's analysis of anthropological interpretations of mourning is actually a general attack of traditional anthropological method.
Black English Venacular (BEV)
Rule-governed dialect spoken by some African Americans.
Physical anthropology
Same as biological anthropology
Underdifferentiation
Seeing less-developed countries as all the same; ignoring cultural diversity.
Focal vocabulary
Set of words describing particular domains (foci) of experience.
Sedentism
Settled (sedentary) life.
Despite the continued debate surrounding H.rudolfensis and H.habilis, there is a sure conclusion that...
Several different kinds of hominins lived in Africa before and after the advent of Homo.
Convergent evolution
Similar selective forces produce similar adaptive traits.
Gibbons
Smal, arboreal, Asiatic apes.
Phoneme
Smallest sound and contrast that distinguishes meaning.
What was the vital step for the development of metallurgy and the wider the rapid distribution of metals evident after 5,000BP?
Smelting.
Victor Turner
Symbolic and Interpretative Anthropology -stages of ritual: separation, training, ritual/test, reintegration -methods of data collection: what you can observe, what people tell you, what anthropologists infer from this data
What are the two major components of field work in archaeological anthropology?
Systematic survey and excavation.
Honorifics
Terms of respect; used to honour people
What point does Chapter 4 emphasize when quoting paleoanthropologist Christopher Stringer stating that 'absence of evidence does not necessarily prove evidence of absence'?
That the failure to find a fossil species in a particular place does not necessarily mean that it did not live there.
Using Carbon14 dates and considering the time it would have taken the first Americans to travel by land from the souther part of the Canadian ice-free corridor to Tierra del Fuego at the southern tip of South America, researchers have recently concluded that...
The Clovis people were not the first settlers of the Americans.
Globalization
The accelerating interdependence of nations in the world system today.
Agency
The actions of individuals, alone and in groups, that create and transform culture.
Medical anthropology
The comparative, biocultural study of disease, health problems, and health-care systems.
Cultural anthropology
The comparative, cross-cultural, study of human society and culture.
T/F A human universal in all societies is restrictions on sexual behavior?
True
T/F Christianity challenges culture?
True
T/F Church language-terms and phrases commonly used during worship services or bible studies is an example of "social register" in language studies?
True
T/F Culture is more of what people do than what they have?
True
T/F Ethnic diversity is part of God's creation?
True
T/F Every person is shaped, formed, and patterned by a community?
True
T/F Individualism is an American national character trait?
True
T/F Liberation theology emphasizes the role of the church in confronting inequality by working within the current systems of government?
True
T/F Mapping is diagramming geographical space or human use of space?
True
T/F Multiculturalism is closely associated with moral relativity?
True
T/F Pidgin is often a simplified colonial language?
True
T/F Sociologists are more likely than anthropologists to use quantitative research?
True
T/F Spanish and Romanian languages are in the same language family?
True
T/F Ten percent of culture is embedded in language?
True
T/F The pragmatic tendency of Americans leads to an expression of the value of efficiency and lessen the importance of effectiveness?
True
T/F language is basically oral?
True
T/F word is a symbol for something else?
True
Tropics
Zone between 23 degrees north (Tropic of Cancer) and 23 degrees south (Tropic of Capricorn) of the equator.
Tropics
a belt extending about 23 degrees north and south of the equator, between the Tropic of Cancer, and the Tropic of Capricorn
Bridewealth
a customary gift before, at, or after marriage from the husband and his kin to the wife and her kin
Ethnographic Present
a description of a culture as it was prior to contact.
Lexicon
a dictionary containing all its morphemes and their meanings
Autoethnography
a form of self-reflection and writing that explores the researcher's personal experience and connects this autobiographical story to wider cultural, political, and social meanings and understandings
Progeny Price
a gift from the husband and his kin to the wife and her kin before, at, or after marriage
Family
a group of people who are considered to be related in some way
Ethnic Group
a group that shares certain beliefs, values, habits, customs, and norms because of their common background
Scientific Medicine
a health care system based on scientific knowledge and procedures, encompassing such fields as pathology, microbiology, biochemisty, surgery, diagnostic technology, and applications
Semantics
a language's meaning system
Law
a legal code, including trial and enforcement
National Culture
a level of culture that embodies those beliefs, learned behavior patterns, values, and institutions that are shared by citizens of the same nation
International Culture
a level of culture that extends beyond and across national boundaries
Sample
a manageable study group
Dowry
a marital exchange in which the wife's group provides substantial gifts to the husband's family
Pantribal Sodality
a non-kin based group that exists throughout a tribe, spanning several villages
Shaman
a part-time religious practitioner who mediates between ordinary people and supernatural beings and forces
Descent Group
a permanent social unit whose members claim common ancestry
Sexual Orientation
a person's habitual sexual attraction to, and activities with persons of the opposite sex (heterosexuality), the same sex (homosexuality), or both sexes (bisexuality)
Imperialism
a policy od extending the rule of a nation or empire over foreign nations and of taking and holding foreign colonies
Communism
a political movement and doctrine seeking to overthrow capitalism
Patriarchy
a political system rules by men in which women have inferior social and political status, including basic human rights
Economy
a population's system of production, distribution, and consumption of resources
Life History
a recollection of a lifetime of experiences
Equity, Increased
a reduction in absolute poverty and a faired distribution of wealth
communism
a social system in which property is owned by the community and in which people work of the same common good
Plural Society
a society combining ethnic contrasts, ecological specialization, and the economic interdependence of these groups
Phoneme
a sound contrast that makes a difference
Hegemony
a stratified social order in which subordinates comply with domination by internalizing its values and accepting its naturalness
Domestic-Public Dichotomy
a strong differentation between the home and the outside world
Postmodernism
a style and movement in architecture that succeeded modernism
Random Sample
a survey type in which all members of the population have an equal statistical chance of being chosen for inclusion
Science
a systematic field of study or body of knowledge that aims, through experiment, oberservation, and deduction, to produce reliable explanations of phenomena, with reference to the material and physical world
Genealogical Method
a well-established ethnographic technique
World-System Theory
argument for the historic and contemporary social, political, and economic significance of an identifiable global system, based on wealth and power differentials, that extends beyong individual countries
Variables
attributes that vary among members of a sample or population
Hypodescent
automatically placing the children of a union between members of different groups in the minority group
example of gender socialization
baby girls wear pink, baby boys wear blue
Band
basic unit of social organization among foragers that includes fewer than one hundred people
Ritual
behavior that is formal, stylized, repetitive, and stereotyped, performed earnestly as a social act
Polytheism
belief in several deities who control aspects of nature
Animism
belief in souls or doubles
Religion
beliefs and rituals concerned with supernatural beings, powers, and forces
Health Care Systems
beliefs, customs, and specialists concerned with ensuring health and preventing and curing illness; a cultural universal
Diffusion
borrowing of traits between cultures
Gender
describes what it means to be male or female in a culture (cultural) ie: "lady vs. broad" "boy vs. man" "miss vs. missus" pink for girls, blue for boys
cultural anthropology
description, interpretation, and analysis of similarities and differences in human culture
Prejudice
devaluing a group because of its assumed behavior, values, capabilities, or attributes
Subcultures
different symbol-based patterns and traditions associated with particular groups in the same complex society
Racism
discrimination against a race
Core
dominant structural position in the world system
Multiple forms of capital
economic, social, cultural, and symbolic
Chapter 2's description of the similarities and differences between humans and apes, our closest relatives...
emphasizes culture's evolutionary basis, stressing the interaction between biology and culture.
Liberation Theology
emphasizes the role of the church in directly confronting the structural roots of inequality and oppression
Globalization
encompasses a series of processes, including diffusion, migration, and acculturation, working to promote change in a world in which nations and people are increasingly and mutuall dependent
Social Races
groups assumed to have a biological basis but actually defined in a culturally arbitrary, rather than a scientific, manner
Intervention Philosophy
guiding principle of colonialism, conquest, missionization, or development; an ideological justification for outsiders to guide native peoples in specific directions
binary word pair
love and hate, hot and cold, light and dark
Karl Marx
made class the foundation of social theory, arguing that differential access to economic resources was the most basic inequality of society. He argued that capitalism creates economic disparities which create social and cultural differences
Redistribution
major exchange mode of chiefdoms, many archaic states, and some states with managed economies
How do current Christian advertisements tend to picture ideas of masculinity and femininity
male leads the family in all things spiritual, he is the deciding factor in big decisions women must obey the husband and be submissive prov. 31
Sexual Dimorphism
marked differences in male and female biology besides the contrasts in breasts and genitals
Endogamy
marriage between people of the same social group
Plural Marriage
marriage of a man to two or more women or marriage of a woman to two or more men at the same time
Exogamy
mating or marriage outside one's kin group
Unilineal Descent
matrilineal or patrilineal descent
Radical Relativism
philosophical theory proclaiming that there is no absolute truth, only a truth to a particular individual, culture/time or both. Basically, an individual can do/say whatever they think is right.
Underdifferentiation
planning fallacy of viewing less developed countries as an undifferentiated group; ignoring cultural diversity and adopting a uniform approach for very different types of project beneficiaries
Cultural Consultant
refers to individuals the ethnographer gets to know in the field, the people who teach him or her about their culture, who provide the emic perspective
Cultural Colonialism
refers to internal domination by one group and its culture or ideology over others
Discrimination
refers to policies and practices that harm a group and its members
Holism
refers to the study of the whole of the human condition: past, present, and future; biology, society, language, and culture
3 Global Needs
relationship/community, love, and spirituality (an inerrant need for God)
Olympian Religions
religions that develop with state organization that have full-time religious specialists
Neoliberalism
revival of Adam Smith's classic economic liberalism, the idea that governments should not regulate private enterprise and that free market forces should rule
Mana
sacred impersonal force in Melanesian and Polynesian religions
Descriptive Linguistics
scientific study of a spoken language
Incest
sexual relations with a close relative
Etic Approach
shifts the focus from local observations, categories, explanations, and interpretations to those of the anthropologist
Symbols
signs that have no necessary or natural connection to the things they stand for, or signify
Peasant
small-scale agriculturalist living in a state, with rent fund obligations
Achieved Status
social status that comes thrrough talents, actions, efforts, activities, and accomplishments, rather than ascription
Ascribed Status
social status that people have little or no choice about occupying
"Positioning"
sociocultural relativism means that one must take a position based on a context
Genocide
the deliberate elimination of a group through mass murder
Urban Anthropology
the anthropological study of life in and around world cities, including urban social problems, differences between urban and other environments, and adaptation to city life
Applied Anthropology
the application of anthropoligical data, perspectives, theory, and methods to identity, assess, and solve contemporary social problems
Applied Anthropology
the application of anthropological data, perspectives, theory, and methods to identify, assess, and solve contemporary social problems
Syntax
the arrangement and order of words in phrases in sentences
Racial Classification
the attempt to assign humans to discrete categories based on common ancestry
Multiculturalism
the belief that several different cultures can coexist peacefully and equitably in a single country
Development Anthropology
the branch of applied anthropology that focuses on social issues in, and the cultural dimension of, economic development
Liminality
the critically important marginal or in-between phase of a rite of passage
Hidden Transcript
the critique of power by the oppressed that goes on offstage in private where the power holders can't see it
Food production
the cultivation of plants and domestication of animals
culture
total way of life of a group of people that is learned, adaptive, shared, and integrated.
Culture
traditions and customs, transmitted through learning, that form and guide the beliefs and behavior of the people exposed to them
Creole
type of language that develops when two different languages combine. ie: Haitian Creole
Differential Access
unequal access to resources
Gender Stratification
unequal distribution of rewards, reflecting their different positions in a social hierarchy
Lineage
unilineal descent group based on demonstrated descent
Clan
unilineal descent group based on stipulated descent
Patrilineal Descent
unilineal descent rule in which people join the father's group automatically at birth and stay member's throughout life
Matrilineal Descent
unilineal descent rule in which people join the mother's group automatically at birth and stay members throughout life
Medical Anthropology
unites biological and cultural anthropologists in the study of disease, health problems, health care systems, and theories about illness in different cultures and ethnic groups
Vertical Mobility
upward or downward change in a person's social status
coercive power
use of force (legitimate or illegitimate) by an individual or group. ie: bully demanding lunch money
ethnocentrism
use of on's culture to measure another's putting one's own culture at the center of interpretation devaluing the other
Magic
use of supernatural techniques to accomplish specific aims
Polygyny
variety of plural marriage in which a man has more than one wife
Polyandry
variety of plural marriage in which a woman has more than one husband
Primordialism
view that ethnic identity, like race, is a naturally occurring and immutable feature of human life, stresses that all people belong to a group
Four field anthropology...
was largely shaped by early American anthropologists' interests in Native Americans.
Mode of Production
way of organizing production - a set of social relations through which labor is deployed to wrest energy from nature by means of tools, skills, and knowledge
Periphery
weakest structural position in the world system
Capital
wealth or resources invested in business, with the intent of prodcuing a profit
Role
what is expected of a person depending upon status
Ethnocide
when a dominant group tries to destroy the cultures of certain ethnic groups
Interview Schedule
when an ethnographer talks face to face with people, asks the questions, and writes down the answers
Style Shifts
when speech is varied in different contexts
Monotheism
worship of an eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent supreme being
example of sexuality
homosexual vs. heterosexual
Biological Anthropology
human biological diversity in time and space
Ethnicity
identification with, and feeling part of, an ethnic group and exclusion from certain other's groups because of this affliation
Multiple Subjectivities
in play within globalization
Age Set
group uniting all men or women born during a certain time span
Fiscal
pertaining to finances and taxation
Working Class (Prolerariat)
those who must sell their labor to survive
Descent
to assign social identity on the basis of ancestry
Linguistic Productivity
to use the rules of a language to produce entirely new expressions that are comprehensible to other native speakers
The study of nonhuman primates is of special interest to which sub-discipline of anthropology?
Biological anthropology.
Essentializing/Totalizing
arguing that a certain trait is true of every member of a culture
Agency
the active role that individuals play in interpreting, using, making and remaking culture
Informed Consent
the agreement to take part in research, after having been so informed
Matrilocality
Customary residence with the wife's relatives after marriage, so that children grow up in their mother's community
Melanin
"Natural sunscreen" produced by skin cells responsible for pigmentation.
Neolithic
"New Stone Age"; grind and polish stone tools and early domestication.
Interpretive anthropology
(Geertz) The study of a culture of a system of meaning.
Superorganic
(Kroeber) The special domain of culture, beyond the organic and inorganic realms.
Subgroups
(Linguistic) closely related languages.
Morphology
(Linguistic) study of morphemes and word construction.
Bodily symbolism
(Mary Douglas) the personal/physical body symbolizes the social body (society)
Pollution
(Mary Douglas) MATTER OUT OF PLACE. Particularly potent sites of symbolic production.
Stages of ritual transformation
(Victor Turner) separation, training, ritual/test, reintegration
Properties of ritual symbolism
(Victor Turner) External form and observable characteristics; interpretations offered by specialists and by laymen; significant contexts largely worked out by the anthropologist.
World Systems theory
(Wallerstein and Gunder Frank VS. Appadauri) Wallerstein published 'The Modern World-System', in which he traced the development of global capitalism from its origins in the early seventeenth century, emphasizing its deleterious effects on noncapitalist cultures around the world. Gunder Frank argued that the nations of Latin America were not poor because they failed to industrialize. The processes of the expansion of capitalism had drawn wealth out of Latin America.
Sexual Dimorphism
(sex) refers to biological maleness or femaleness, usually given at birth (biological)
AMHs
Anatomically modern humans (i.e. Cro-Magnon, Skhul, Qafzeh, Herto.)
Natufians
Widespread Middle Eastern foraging culture (12,500-10,500B.P)
Toesinte
Wild ancestor of maize; grows wild in southwestern Mexico.
What do the trends that all primates share (five fingers, opposable thumbs, stereoscopic vision) indicate?
A common ancestral arboreal heritage
Illness
A condition of poor health perceived or felt by an individual.
Scientific medicine
A health-care system based on scientific knowledge and procedures.
Semantics
A language's meaning system.
Haplogroup
A lineage marked by one or more specific genetic mutations.
Random sample
A sample in which all population members have an equal chance of inclusion.
Disease
A scientifically identified health threat caused by a known pathogen.
Theory
A set of ideas formulated to explain something.
Sample
A smaller study group chosen to represent a larger population.
Hypothesis
A suggested but as yet unverified explanation.
Opposable thumb
A thumb that can touch all the other fingers.
Acculturation
An exchange of cultural features between groups in firsthand contact.
Association
An observed relationship between two or more variables.
Urban anthropology
Anthropological study of cities and urban life.
What factors are related to the development of larger brains among H.erectus populations?
Acheulian tool making, greater reliance on hunting, more complex social environments, and bipedalism.
Phenotypical adaptation
Adaptive biological changes during an individual lifetime.
Analogies
Adaptive traits due to convergent evolution.
Informed consent
Agreement to take part in research, after being fully informed about it.
Bronze
Alloy of copper and arsenic or tin.
The 'psychic unity' of humans, a doctrine that most anthropologists accept, states that...
Although individuals differ in their emotional and intellectual tendencies and capacities, all human populations have equivalent capacities for culture.
Food production
An economy based on plant cultivation and/or animal domestication.
Ann Stoler
Anthropology and Gender
David Valentine
Anthropology and Gender -"I Went To Bed With My Own Kind Once" about the fact that sex and gender has messy classifications, transsexual/transgender is an umbrella term
Sally Slocum
Anthropology and Gender -claimed that because anthropology is mostly done by males, not much research has been done on women or from a woman's perspective (anthropology has a male bias during her time). -claimed that women were equally as important as men in society -made fun of how men claimed to be the high and mighty center of society by doing the same about women and thus showing how ridiculous it is to claim that one gender is the entire driving force of society (it takes two!)
Eleanor Leacock
Anthropology and Gender -feminist Marxist (Marxist because in Marxism there is a close link between production and power) -claimed that the more production an individual did, the more power they should have (example: hunter gatherer societies. The gender that brings in more calories tends to be the one with higher power)
General anthropology
Anthropology as a whole: cultural, archaeological, biological, and linguistic anthropology.
The measurement of human body parts and dimensions is...
Anthropometry.
What best describes the breadth of applied anthropology?
Any use of the knowledge and/or techniques of the four subfields to identify, assess, and solve practical problems.
The use of anthropological data, perspectives, theory, and methods to identify, assess, and solve contemporary social problems is known as...
Applied anthropology.
Functionalism
Approach focusing on the role (function) of sociocultural practices in social systems.
Neandertals
Archaic H.sapiens group inhabiting Europe and the Middle East from 130,000 to 28,000B.P
The recently discovered Dmanisi fossils (1.77-1.7mya)...
Are the most ancient undisputed human fossils found outside of Africa.
Mesopotamia
Area were earliest states developed, between Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Syntax
Arrangement of words in phrases and sentences.
Racial classification
Assigning organisms to categories (purportedly) based on common ancestry.
Variables
Attributes that differ from one person or case to the next.
Thomson's nose rule
Average nose length increases in cold areas.
Michel Foucault
Background to Postmodernism -discusses the historical development of the discourse concerning sexuality -he claims that beginning sometime in the 17th century, the discourse about sexuality began to change from general and open to specific and confined. (nowadays we have so many ways to define someone's sexual orientation or gender, we feel like we have to categorize it)
Antonia Gramsci
Background to Postmodernism -hegemony: everyone believing the same thing. (example: in our society it is believed and expected that a family should consist of a man, a woman, and their children, even though there are actually many types of family structures)
Pierre Bourdieu
Background to Postmodernism -neo-Marxist -he argued that more economic class determine one's social standing or power -came up with habitus -he explores the relationship between objectivism: (the idea that the actions of individuals and groups can be understood as the result of external relations and forces that infringe on them) and subjectivism: (the notion that the actions of individuals are the result of their interpretations and understanding of the world around them)
Blade tool
Basic Upper Paleolithic tool, hammered off a prepared core.
Why were the Natufians able to live in year-round villages prior to the emergence of domestication?
Because they could exploit their rich local environment with broad-spectrum foraging.
Health-care systems
Beliefs, customs, and specialists concerned with preventing and curing illness.
Manoic
Cassava; tuber domesticated in the South American lowlands.
The scientific method...
Characterizes any anthropological endeavour that formulates research questions and gathers or uses systematic data to test hypothesis.
Referring to a ranked society in which villages are NOT autonomous.
Chiefdom.
What were precursors to states, with privileged and effective leaders-chiefs-but lacking the sharp class divisions that characterize states?
Chiefdoms.
Name an ethnic group in Sacramento
Chinese
Taxonomy
Classification scheme; assignment to categories (taxa; singular, taxon).
Example of an Achieved Status
College soccer player
Biocultural
Combining biological and cultural approaches to a given problem.
Call systems
Communication systems of nonhuman primates.
Settlement hierarchy
Communities with varying size, function, and building types.
What is the term for the evolutionary process by which organisms as unrelated as birds and butterflies to develop similar characteristics because of adaptations of similar environments?
Convergent evolution.
Early cultivation in the Middle East began as an attempt to:
Copy, in a less favourable environment, the dense stands of wheat and barley that grew wild in the Hilly Flanks.
Maize
Corn; first domesticated in tropical southwestern Mexico around 8000B.P.
What should NOT be one of the goals of an applied anthropological approach to urban programs?
Creating a single universal policy to be applied to all urban communities.
Productivity
Creating new expressions that are comprehensible to other speakers.
National culture
Cultural features shared by citizens of the same nation.
International culture
Cultural traditions that extend beyond national boundaries.
Generality
Culture pattern or trait that exists in some but not all societies.
Molecular anthropology
DNA comparisons used to determine evolutionary links and distances.
Cultural resource management
Deciding what needs saving when entire archaeological sites cannot be saved.
Subcultures
Different cultural traditions associated with subgroups in the same nation.
In explaining how anthropologists have theorized the relationship between 'system' and 'person', chapter 2 states that culture is contested. What does this mean?
Different groups in society struggle with one another over whose ideas, values, goods, and beliefs will prevail.
Excavation
Digging through layers at a site.
Particularity
Distinctive or unique culture trait, patter, or integration.
Halafian
Early (7500-6500B.P) widespread Mesopotamian pottery style.
Clovis
Early American tool tradition; projectile point attached to hunting spear.
Archaic Homo sapiens
Early H.sapiens (300,000 to 28,000B.P); includes Neandertals.
Cuneiform
Early Mesopotamian wedge-shaped writing, using stylus on clay.
Holistic
Encompassing past, present, and future; biology, society, language and culture.
Relative dating
Establishing a time frame in relation to other strata or materials.
Absolute dating
Establishing dates in numbers or ranges of numbers.
Example of Ethnocentrism
European Imperialism
What is not true about egalitarian societies?
Everybody has equal status (TRUE: they often are found among foragers, there are no social classes, there is no hereditary inequality, a person't status is based on his or her age, gender, and individual qualities, talents and achievements).
Key Cultural Consultant
Expert on a particular aspect of local life.
Interglacials
Extended warm periods between glacials.
Metallurgy
Extraction and processing of metals to make tools.
Ethnography
Fieldwork in a particular cultural setting.
Zapotec state
First Mesoamerican state, in the Valley of Oaxaca.
Teotihuacan
First Valley of Mexico state (100-700c.e); earliest Mesoamerican empire.
Broad-spectrum revolution
Foraging varied plant and animal foods at end of Ice Ae; prelude to Neolithic.
Interview Schedule
Form (guide) used to structure a formal, but personal, interview.
Questionnaire
Forms used by sociologists to obtain comparable information from respondents.
What is not one of the ways in which individuals acquire their culture?
Genetic transmission.
Philippe Bourgois
Globalization, Power, and Agency -Neo-Marxist -Wrote in a tone of hegemonic discourse. -participant observation fieldwork with crack dealers!
Arjun Appadurai
Globalization, Power, and Agency -Post-Structuralist -came up with the "scapes": components of culture that interact to create global cultural dynamics (ideoscapes, mediascapes, technoscapes, ethnoscapes, financescapes)
Theodore Bestor
Globalization, Power, and Agency Word shows strong influence from Marx and Gramsci as well as from anthropologists such as Sydney Mintz who have been interested in tracing the histories and global impact of the movement of particular commodities.
What is the term for the processes that are making nations and people increasingly interlinked and mutually dependent?
Globalization.
Cline
Gradual shift in gene (allele) frequencies between neighbouring populations.
Terrestrial
Ground-dwelling.
What does the principle of superposition state?
In an undisturbed sequence of strata, the oldest layer is on the bottom.
What term refers most generally to beliefs, customs, specialists, and techniques aimed at ensuring health and curing illness?
Health-care system.
Smelting
High-temperature extraction of metal from ore.
Example of Xenophobia
Holocaust. Klu Klux Klan
What species is associated with Zhoukoudian, a site in China that has yielded the most specimens of this species?
Homo Erectus.
What is used for putting organisms in the same taxon (zoological category)?
Homologies.
Hominins
Homonids excluding the African apes; all the human species that ever have existed.
This about culture is NOT true...
Human groups differ in their capacities for culture.
Humanity lacks races (i.e. breeds of dogs or roses) because...
Human populations have not been isolated enough from one another to develop such discrete groups.
Over time, how has human reliance on cultural means of adaptation changed?
Humans have become increasingly more dependent on them.
What term is defined as a suggested but yet unverified explanation for observed things and events?
Hypothesis.
Unilinear evolutionism
Idea (19th century) of a single line or path of cultural development- a series of stages through which all societies must evolve.
Historical particularism
Idea (Boas) that histories are not comparable; diverse paths can lead to the same cultural result.
Cultural materialism
Idea (Harris) that cultural infrastructure determines structure and superstructure.
Out of Africa theory
Idea that AMGs originated in and spread only from Africa.
Multiregional evolution
Idea that H.erectus evolved into H.sapiens in all regions inhabited by humans, not just in Africa.
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
Idea that different languages produce different patterns of thought.
Cultural relativism
Idea that to know another culture requires full understanding of its members' beliefs and motivations.
Example of Hispanic cultural marker
Mexican cuisine
What trait did NOT contribute to the increasing adaptability of H.erectus?
Microlithic stone tools (traits that DO contribute: varied tool kit that facilitated cooperative hunting, an essentially modern postcranial skeleton that permits long-distance stalking and endurance during a hunt, an average brain size that was double that of the australopithecines, and a period of childhood dependency that exceeded that of the australopithecines).
Fossil pollen, phytoliths, and starch grains are examples of...
Microscopic evidence that archaeologists are using increasingly to study the past.
Mesoamerica
Middle America, including Mexico, Guatemala, and Belize.
Mousterian
Middle Paleolithic tool tradition associated with Neandertals.
Mesolithic
Middle Stone Age, featuring microliths and broad-spectrum economies.
Modernity/Post-modernity
Modernity: a period of history during which an assumption of how the world works was taken as true, especially ideas from the Enlightenment (ideas such as faith in positivism, notion of progress, notions of agency and individuality, notions of social contract, and negative and positive rights)
What is a trend in hominin evolution since the australopithecines?
Molar size has decreased (factors that aren't: sexual dimorphism has disappeared, population numbers have remained stable, bipedalism has appeared, the geographic range of the hominins has decreased).
Anthropoids
Monkeys, apes, and humans.
What is most likely a reason for the dark skin colour shared by tropical Africans and southern Indians?
Natural selection.
Life history
Of a key consultant; a personal portrait of someone's life in a culture.
Paleolithic
Old Stone Age, including Lower (early), Middle, and Upper (late).
Rough patches of skin on the buttocks and non-prehensile tails are the characteristic traits of...
Old World monkeys.
Curer
One who diagnoses and treats illness.
State
Society with central government, administrative specialization, and social classes.
Ranked society
Society with hereditary inequality but lacking stratification.
Egalitarian society
Society with rudimentary status distinctions.
Universal
Something that exists in every culture.
Symbol
Something that stands for something else.
What is true about the emergence of states in Africa?
Southward Bantu migrations resulted in the emergence of the Mwenemutapa empire.
Primary states
States arising through competition among chiefdoms.
What traits are associated with primates?
Stereoscopic vision, social groupings, grasping adaptations, brain complexity.
Phonology
Study of a language's phonemics and phonetics.
Paleontology
Study of ancient life through the fossil record.
Palynology
Study of ancient plants, and environments through pollen samples.
Bone biology
Study of bone as a biological tissue.
Kinesics
Study of communication through body movements and facial expressions
Paleopathology
Study of disease and injury in skeletons from archaeological sites.
Stratigraphy
Study of earth sediments deposited in demarcated layers (strata).
Paleoanthropology
Study of hominid, hominin, and human life through the fossil record.
Historical linguistics
Study of languages over time.
Ethnosemantics
Study of lexical (vocabulary) categories and contrasts.
Taphonomy
Study of processes affecting remains of dead animals.
Systematic survey
Study of settlement patterns over a large area.
Phonwmics
Study of sound contrasts (phonemes) in a language.
Phonetics
Study of speech sounds- what people actually say.
Anthropology and education
Study of students, in the context of their family, peers, and encultration.
Diachronic
Studying societies across time.
Synchronic
Studying societies at one time.
Mary Douglas
Symbolic and Interpretative Anthropology -body symbolism! -interested in discovering universals of symbolism and claims that "the most potent symbols are found in the realm of the mundane" -came up with the idea of "bodily pollution": matter out of place.
Clifford Geertz
Symbolic and Interpretative Anthropology -his definition of culture is: a shared code of meaning that is acted out publicly -Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight
Code Switching
The practice of keeping particular form of speech separate in one's life, using one in one setting and another in another
Why do most domesticated grains (such as wheat and barley) have a tougher axis and more brittle husk than wild grains?
The practices of harvesting and processing grain gradually selected for those features.
Prosimians
The primate suborder that includes lemurs, lorises, and tarsiers.
Encultration
The process by which culture is learned and transmitted across generations.
What do molecular anthropologists study?
The relationships among ancient and contemporary populations and among species using DNA comparisons.
In the alluvial desert plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, a new economy based on irrigation and trade fuelled the growth of an entirely new form of society:
The state, a social and political unit featuring a central government, extreme contrasts of wealth, and social classes.
Primatology
The study of apes, monkeys, and prosimians.
Archaeological anthropology
The study of human behaviour through material remains.
Biological anthropology
The study of human biological variation in time and space.
Linguistic anthropology
The study of language and linguistic diversity in time, space, and society.
Sociolinguistics
The study of language in society.
Survey research
The study of society through sampling, statistical analysis, and impersonal data collection.
Ethnology
The study of sociocultural differences and similarities
Symbolic Anthropology
The study of symbols in their social and cultural context.
Anthropology
The study of the human species and its immediate ancestors.
What is one of the most surprising aspects of the recent discovery of H.floresiensis?
The suggestion of sophisticated cultural abilities typically associated with anatomically modern humans rather than with a hominin with a chimplike brain.
If chimps and gorillas are classified as hominids, what do some scientists call the group that leads to humans but not to chimps and gorillas?
The tribe hominini.
Political economy
The web of interrelated economic and power relations in society.
What is a critical element of cultural traditions?
Their transmission through learning rather than through biological inheritance.
Overinnovation
Trying to achieve too much change.
Bipedal
Two-footed; upright locomotion (of hominins).
What has played an evolutionary role in determining skin colour?
Ultraviolet radiation.
Brachiation
Under-the-branch swinging.
Remote sensing
Use of aerial photos, and satellite i mages to locate sites on the ground.
Applied anthropology
Using anthropology to solve contemporary problems.
Genealogical method
Using diagrams and symbols to record kin connections.
Style shifts
Varying one's speech in different social contexts.
Hilly Flanks
Woodland zone just north of Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
What are goals of applied anthropological approaches to urban programs?
Working with the community (to ensure that the change is made correctly), Identifying key social groups in the urban context, Translating the needs and desires of the community (to funding agencies), and eliciting wishes from the target community.
Configurationalism
View of culture as integrated and patterned.
Rickets
Vitamin D deficiency marked by bone deformation.
Lexicon
Vocabulary; all the morphemes in a language and their meanings.
Scientists disagree most about what?
When, where, and how early anatomically modern humans achieved behavioural modernity.
What does the debate of Neandertals' relation to anatomically modern humans focus on?
Whether Neandertals are directly in anatomically modern humans' evolutionary line, or whether they constitute an extinct offshoot.
Example of moral relativism
abortion?
Reflexivity
acknowledging your own subjectivity and the part you play in your work. (what is your effect on the people you're studying?)
Wealth
all a person's material assets, including income, land, and other types of property
The fact that anthropology focuses on both culture and biology ...
allows it to address how culture influences biological traits and vice versa.
Ethnographies of the Particular
an analysis of a particular culture
Correlation
an association between two or more variables such that when one changes, the other also changes
Illness
an emic condition of poor health felt by individual
Race
an ethnic group that is assumed to have a biological basis
Disease
an etic or scientifically identified health threat caused by a bacterium, virus, fungus, parasite, or other pathogen
Nation
an independent, centrally organized political unit, or a government
Patrilineal-Patrilocal Complex
an interrelated constellation of patrilineality, patrilocality, warfare, and male supremacy
Phenotype
an organism's evident traits - it's physiology and anatomy, including skin color, hair form, facial features, and eye color
Anthropology and Education
anthropological research in classrooms, homes, and neighborhoods, viewing students as total cultural creatures whose enculturation and attitudes toward education belong to a larger context that includes family, peers, and society
Ethnographic Fieldwork
anthropologists direct experience within a culture (integration into daily life)
Status
any position that determines where someone fits in society
Balanced Reciprocity
applies to exchanges between people who are more distantly related than are members of the same band or household
Diglossia
applies to high and low variants of the same language
anthropological perspective
approach to social research that seeks to understand culture from the point of view of the people within that culture
Ethnicity
category based on a sense of group affiliation derived from a distinct heritage or worldview of a "people"
Stratification
characteristic of a system with socioeconomic strata
Overinnovation
characteristic of development projects that require major changes in people's daily lives, especially ones that interfere with customary subsistence pursuits
Sociopolitical Typology
classification scheme based on the scale and complexity of social organization and the effectiveness of political regulation
Caste Systems
closed, hereditary system of stratification, often dictated by religion
Communal Religions
communal cults in which people organize community rituals such as harvest ceremonies and rites of passage
Potlatch
competitive feast among Indians on the North Pacific Coast of North America
State
complex sociopolitical system that administers territory and populace with substantial contrasts in occupation, wealth, prestige, and power
Intellectual Property Rights
concept that says that a particular group may determine how indigenous knowledge and its products may be used and distributed and the level of compensation required
Postmodernity
condition of a world in flux, with people on the move, in which established groups, boundaries, identities, contrast, and standards are reaching out and breaking down
Patrilineal-Patrilocal Complex
consisting of patrilineality, patrilocality, warfare, and male supremacy
Domestic-Public Dichotomy
contrast between women's role in the home and men's role in public life, with a corresponding social devaluation of women's work and worth
Race
cultural category that divides the human race into subspecies based on supposed biological differences (ie: "Milk People")
Cultural Relativism
cultural practices and beliefs are best understood in relation to the entire context. Right and wrong is relative
Rites of Passage
culturally defined activities associated with the transition from one place or stage of life to another
historical particularism
cultures have taken different paths based on particular historical and environmental contexts
Levirate
custom by which a widow marries the brother of her deceased husband
Sororate
custom by which a widower marries the sister of the diseased wife
Patrilocality
customary residence with the husband's relatives after marriage, so that children grow up in their father's community
Leveling Mechanism
customs and social actions that operate to reduce differences in wealth and thus to bring standouts in line with community norms
Example of an Ascribed Status
daughter
Cultural Resource Management
decides what sites need saving, and to preserve significant information about the past when sites cannot be saved
Gender Stratification
describes an unequal distribution of rewards between men and women, reflecting their different positions in a social hierarchy
Postmodern
describes the blurring and breakdown of established canons, categories, distinctions, and boundaries
Assimilation
describes the process of change that a minority ethnic group may experience when it moves to a country where another culture dominates
Prestige
esteem, respect, or approval for acts, deeds, or qualities considered exemplary
Nationalities
ethnic groups that one had, or wish to have or regain, autonomous political status
Hegemony
everyone believing the same thing. (example: in our society it is believed and expected that a family should consist of a man, a woman, and their children, even though there are actually many types of family structures)
Ethnology
examines, interprets, analyzes, and compares the results of ethnography
Extended Family Household
extended household including three or more generations
Generalities
features that are common to sevaral but not all human groups
Universal
features that are found in every culture
Particularities
features that are unique to certain cultural traditions
Big Man
figure often found among tribal horticulturalists and pastoralists, who occupies no office but creates his reputation through entrepreneurship and generosity to others
Stereotypes
fixed ideas about what the members of a group are like
Chiefdom
form of sociopolitical organization intermediate between the tribe and the state; kin-based with differential access ro resources and a permanent political structure
Tribe
form of sociopolitical organization usually based on horticulture or pastoralism
Cultural Rights
include a group's ability to preserve its culture, to raise its children in the ways of its forebears, to continue its language, and not to be deprived of its economic base by the nation in which it's located
Human Rights
include the right to speak freely, to hold religious beliefs without persecution, and not to be murdered, injured , or enslaved or imprisoned without charge
Rather than attempting to classify humans into racial categories, biologists and anthropologists are...
increasingly focusing their attention on explaining why specific biological variations occur.
Communitas
intense community spirit, a feeling of great social solidarity, equality, and togetherness; characterisic of people experiencing liminality together
Define Xenophobia
intense, irrational dislike for people from other cultures or countries
Emic Approach
investigates how local people think
Sociolinguistics
investigates relationships between social and linguistic variation
Survey Research
involves sampling, impersonal data collection, and statistical analysis
Core Values
key, basic, central values
Means of Production
land, labor, technology and capital - major productive resources
"Discourse of Power"
language and politics; Foucault
Daughter Languages
languages that descend from the same parent language and that have been changing separately for hundreds or thousands of years
Complex Societies
large and populous societies with social stratification and central governments
Village Head
leadership position in a village that has limited authority; leads by example and persuasion
Indigenized
modified to fit the local culture
Nomadism, Pastoral
movement throughtout the year by the whole pastoral group with their animals
Revitalization Movements
movements that occur in times of change, in which religious leaders emerge and undertake to alter or revitalize a society
Liminal State
no longer what you used to be, not yet what you will become. In a world that is in between.
Horticulture
nonindustrial system of plant cultivation in which plots lie fallo for varying lengths of time
Agriculture
nonindustrial system of plant cultivication characterization by continuous and intensive use of land and labour
Family of Procreation
nuclear family established when one marries and has children
Family of Orientation
nuclear family in which one is born and grows up
Bourgeoisie
one of Karl Marx's opposed classes; owners of the means of production
Reciprocity
one of the three principles of exchange that governs exchange between social equals
Transhumance
one of two variants of pastoralism; part of the population moves seasonally with the herds while the other part remains in home villages
Syntax
order in which morphemes appear
Extradomestic
outside the home; within or pertaining to the public domain
Gender Stereotypes
oversimplified but strongly held ideas about the characteristics of males and females
Refugees
people who have been forced or who have chosen to flee a country, to escape persecution or war
Pastoralists
people who use a food-producing strategy of adaptation based on care of herds of domesticated animals
Key Cultural Consultants
people who, by accident, experience, talent, or training, can provide the most complete or useful information about particular aspects of life
Office
permanent political position
Patriarchy
political system ruled by men in which women have inferior social and political status, including basic human rights
Sapir Whorf Hypothesis
posits that language shapes people's perceptions, thoughts, and views of reality
Cargo Cults
postcolonial, acculturative, religious movements common in Melanesia that attempt to explain European domination and wealth and to achieve similar success magically by mimicking European behavior
Neolocality
postmarital residence pattern in which a couple establishes a new place of residence rather than living with or near either set of parents
Generalized Reciprocity
principle that characterizes exchanges between closely related individuals
Gender Socialization
process of learning how to act according to gender norms of society (ie: caretakers and average people interact with babies differently when they are wearing gender specific colors)
Adaptation
processes by which organisms cope with environmental forces and stresses, such as those posed by climate
Market Principle
profit-oriented principle of exchange that dominates in states, particularly industrial states
Taboo
prohibition backed by supernatural sanctions
Ethnography
provides an account of a particular community, society, or culture
Archaelogical Anthropology
reconstructs, describes, and interprets human behavior and cultural patterns through material remains
Be acting as a natural sunscreen, melanin confers a selective advantage on darker-skinned people living in the tropics. In this part of the world, darker skin...
reduces the susceptibility to folate destruction and thus helps prevent folate deficiencies such as neural tube defects (in the case of pregnant women).
Postcolonial
referring to interactions between European nations and the societies they colonized
Sexual Orientation
refers to a person's habitual sexual attraction to, and sexual activities with, persons of the opposite sex (heterosexuality), the same sex (homosexuality), or a lack of attraction to either sex (asexuality)
Nation-State
refers to an autonomous political entity, a country
Phenotype
refers to an organism's evident traits
Sexual Dimorphism
refers to differences in male and female biology besides the contrasts in breasts and genitals
moral relativism
something is only right or wrong according to context specific criteria
Text
something that is creatively read, interpreted, and assigned meaning by each person who receives it
Curer
specialized role acquired through a culturally appropriate process of selection, training, certification, and acquisition of a professional image
Focal Vocabulary
specialized sets of terms and distinctions that are particularly important to certain groups
Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
states that different languages produce different ways of thinking
Open-Class System
stratification system that facilitates social mobility, with individual achievement and personal merit determining social rank
Semiperiphery
structural position in the world system intermediate beteen core and periphery
Linguistic Anthropology
studies language in its social and cultural context, across space and over time
Morphology
studies the forms in which sounds combine to form morphemes - words and their meaningful parts
Phonemics
studies the significant sound contrasts of a given language
Minority Groups
subordinate with inferior power and less secure access to resources
Majority Groups
superordinate, dominant, or controlling group
Code Switching
switching between two or more languages, or language varieties, in the context of a single conversation.
Participant Observation
taking part in the events one is observing, describing, and analysing
Power
the ability to exercise one's will over others
power
the ability to influence or control people's behavior. categories: coercive, persuasive, hegemonic f
Displacement
the ability to talk about things that are not present
General Anthropology
the academic discipline of anthropology, which includes the subfields sociocultural, archaelogical, biological, and linguistic anthropology
Westernization
the acculturative influence of Western expansion on other cultures
Acculturation
the exchange of cultural features that results when groups have continuous firsthand contact
Industrial Revolution
the historical transformation of traditional into modern societies through industrialization of the economy
Social Contract
the idea that if we all give up some freedom to the government, they can deal with the laws and regulations and we will have more freedom and free time to pursue our interests
Biocultural
the inclusion and combination of both bilogical and cultural perspectives and approaches to comment on or solve a particular issue or problem
Longitudinal Research
the long-term study of a community, region, society, culture, or other unit, usually based on repeated visits
Historical Linguistics
the longer-term change of contemporary variation in speech
Subordinate
the lower, or underpriviledged, group in a stratified system
Hegemonic Reading
the meaning of a text as defined by its creators or other elites
Conflict Resolution
the means by which disputes are socially regulated and settled
Slavery
the most extreme, coercive, abusive, and unhumane form of legalized inequality
Call Systems
the natural communication systems of other primates
Diaspora
the offspring of an area who have spread to many lands
Public Transcript
the open, public interactions between dominators and oppressed - the outer shell of power relations
Indigenous Peoples
the original inhabitants of particular territories; often descendants of tribespeople who live on as culturally distinct colonized peoples, amny of whom aspire to autonomy
Protolanguage
the original language from which a daughter language diverges
Colonialism
the political, social, economic, and cultural domination of a territory and its people by a foreign power for an extended time
Enculturation
the process by which a child learns his or her culture
Independent Invention
the process by which humans innovate, creatively finding solutions to problems
Natural Selection
the process by which the forms most fit to survive and reproduce in a given environment do so in greater numbers than others in the same population do
Essentialism
the process of viewing an identity as established, real, and frozen, so as to hide the historical processes and politics within which that identity developed
Cultural Imperialism
the rapid spread or advance of one culture at the expense of others, or its imposition on other cultures, which it modifies, replaces, or destroys - usually because of differential economic or political influence
Antimodernism
the rejection of the modern in favor of what is perceived as an earlier, purer, and better way of life
Black English Vernacular
the relatively uniform dialect spoken by the majority of black youth in most parts of the US today
authority
the right to exercise power
Capitalist World Economy
the single world system, which emerged in the 16th century, committed to production for sale, with the object of maximizing profits rather than supplying domestic needs
Phonetics
the study of all possible structures and sounds in the human language
Kinesics
the study of communication through body movements, stances, gestures, and facial expressions
Cultural Anthropology
the study of human society and culture, the subfield that describes, analyzes, interprets, and explains social and cultural similarities and differences
Phonology
the study of speech sounds
Phonetics
the study of speech sounds in general
Anthropology
the study of the human species and its immediate ancestors
Habitus
the system of durable and transposable dispositions through which we perceive, judge, and act in the world. (Pierre Bourdieu)
Gender Roles
the tasks and activities a culture assigns to the sexes
Gender Roles
the tasks and activities that a culture assigns to each sex
Ethnocentrism
the tendancy to view one's own culture as superior and to apply one's own cultural values in judging the behavior and beliefs of people raised in other cultures
Superordinate
the upper, or priviledged, group in a stratified system
Multiculturalism
the view of cultural diversity in a country as something good and desirable
Cultural Relativism
the viewpoint that behavior in one culture should not be judged by the standards of another culture
