ANTHROPOLOGY QUIZZES

Koko and Washo were two primates who had learned:

American Sign Language

Which of the following traits is unique to hominins and NOT found in other primates?

Bipedalism

The Origin of the Species was written by:

Charles Darwin

All humans are born with some culture.

False

Anthropologists have always approached a problem by specializing in one of the four subfields.

False

Behavioral ecology uses a comparative approach to evaluate differences among primates.

False

Countries find it relatively easy to decide what languages its citizens will speak.

False

Cultural anthropologists use just three methods.

False

In order to practice cultural relativism, one could never make a judgement on what is right and wrong.

False

In order to study culture one must travel to distant, far-off places.

False

In science, a theory is an educated guess and is not well-accepted among the scientific community.

False

It is easy to identify direct causal links between genes and behavior.

False

The appearance of culture was the event that signaled the arrival of modern humans.

False

How would you describe Edward Tylor's evolutionary theories?

He studied the history of human society from simple to complex technology and social institutions (from so-called savagery to civilization)

Which of the following is NOT one of the four major sub-fields of anthropology?

Paleontology

A critical reason for taking field notes is that there may be a long lag time between fieldwork and writing and publishing about it.

True

According to the textbook, culture is uniquely human.

True

Males and females in a given primate population may be co-dominant.

True

Neanderthals and modern humans share the same genus and species classification (Homo sapien).

True

Primates often live in groups in order to avoid predators.

True

A key principle of the holistic perspective developed by Franz Boaz is:

a goal of synthesizing the entire context of human experience.

The Greek philosopher Aristotle proposed that all life was arranged in:

a great chain of being.

Chronometric dating techniques used by archaeologists help establish:

a more specific age for a fossil or something organic.

An evolutionary perspective on variations in physical traits reflects

adaptive changes

One of the methods that archaeologists can use to determine potentially useful areas to excavate involves the use of:

aerial surveys, surface surveys, regional surveys, GIS systems

Social behavior patterns observed in one species that look like behavior patterns in another, but which do not arise from shared ancestry, are known as:

analogous behaviors

The subfield of anthropology that studies the material remains of past cultures is called:

archaeology

One of the central ideas of Darwin's theory of evolution was the idea that:

change in organisms was related to their adaptability to a particular environment.

The communication systems of nonhuman species consists of a finite (limited) number of signals for finite specific meanings. Such systems are said to be:

closed

A primary characteristic that allows paleoanthropologists to place a particular finding into the genus Homo is:

cranial capacity

The study of how people classify things in the world is called:

ethnoscience

The refinement of Darwin's theory has shown that:

evolution can only be measured or seen across generations within a population

Uniformitarianism is the idea that change occurs:

gradually and through the result of processes that are still observable today.

The branch of linguistics that attempts to classify and construct a family tree of languages and to reconstruct extinct languages is known as:

historical linguistics

The perspective that aims to identify and understand cultures in their entirety is called:

holistic

The defining feature of historical particularism is:

individual societies develop particular cultural traits and undergo a unique process of change.

The success of simple life forms such as bacteria challenges one of the early ideas about evolution because:

it demonstrates the oversimplification that comes from thinking humans are more highly evolved

If you studied speech patterns such as those analyzed in Robin Lakoff's study of gendered speech, you might find that "talking like a lady"

marginalizes women's voices in work contexts

In some species of primates, females and their relatives and young are socially organized around:

matrifocal units

For much of its early history, physical anthropology was associated with what methodology?

measurement and classification of skulls according to racial characteristics

How words fit together to make meaningful units is called

morphology

Anthropologist Sherry Ortner distinguished three kinds of culturally powerful symbols that include all of the following except:

narrative symbols

Darwin's idea about the major process of evolution is called:

natural selection

If you discovered an ancient hominin with megadontia and a dental grinding structure similar to Paranthropus you might suggest that the diet of this hominin was:

predominantly plant based

Ethnocentrism

presents a major problem for anthropologists, means you think your culture is superior to others, is a common feature of culture.

Sickle-cell anemia, a blood cell mutation, takes a toll on those afflicted, but is an example of a mutation that may also be useful because it:

provides resistance to malaria in the tropics.

A dominance hierarchy exists when members of the same group have:

ranking relative to others that establishes access to resources.

Paleoanthropologists believe that the predominant diet of our earliest omnivorous ancestors consisted mostly of:

roots, tubers, and fruits.

The presence of a raised area in the middle of the cranium found in H. erectus is known as a:

sagittal keel

The Law of Superposition says that:

sedimentary layers are deposited in a time sequence with the oldest on the bottom and the youngest on the top.

In anthropology, holism refers to:

seeking to understand how all aspects of our species are related.

Primates rely extensively on all the characteristics listed below except:

sense of smell

Edward Sapir, who had been a student of Franz Boas's, saw himself as both a cultural anthropologist and a professionally trained linguist. He urged cultural anthropologists to pay close attention to language during field research because:

the "real world" is to a large extent unconsciously built from the language habits of a particular social group; language is a guide to "social reality"; we understand the material world through the language we speak

One compelling argument that favors the adaptation of bipedalism and the ability to run long distances is that early hominins, unlike many of the animals they sought as prey, had:

the ability to sweat

A qualitative approach to studying social life in your university would emphasize all of the except:

the construction of statistical models to explain activities in the community.

An evolutionary perspective would be most likely to explain colonialism as:

the natural abilities of more civilized people to control less civilized people.

When cultural anthropologists go into the field:

they go with a set of questions they want to ask and have answered; they often change the focus of their question to fit what they are seeing; they often go with the flow of everyday life, even if it seems off-topic at the time

One of the important ways that genetic material is moved between different populations, such as through gene flow, is:

through the choice of a sexual partner

The primary result of natural selection is:

to maintain a species' adaptation to its niche

Research committed to making social change and improving the lives of marginalized people is called:

Action research

Which hominin was the first stone tool maker (according to the lecture)?

Homo habilis

Why was the discovery of penicillin in 1928 useful in our understanding of evolution?

It demonstrated that bacteria could quickly develop the ability to resist antibiotics.

Besides fossilized skeletal remains, what other evidence indicates bipedalism in Australopithecus afarensis?

Laetoli Footprints

What is the tool tradition associated with Homo habilis?

Oldowan

The argument that modern H. sapiens appeared as a new species in Africa about 200,000 years ago is called the:

Recent African Origin model

The theorist most connected with post-structuralism is:

Renato Rosaldo

This assumes a close relationship between language and culture and claims that language defines people's experiences:

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

Linguists refer to mixed languages with a simplified grammar that people rarely learn as a mother tongue as:

a pidgin language

The key scenario differs from other kinds of symbols because it:

implies how people should act

Among cultural anthropologists, fieldwork involves:

learning the local language, becoming involved in people's lives, spending a significant amount of time in the field.

Reconnaissance work in archaeology is also known as:

Phase I

Studying another culture from its own point of view without imposing our own cultural values is known as:

Cultural Relativism

The subfield of anthropology that studies human diversity, beliefs, and practice is called:

Cultural anthropology

The nineteenth-century British anthropologist credited with the development of the concept of culture through evolutionary perspective was:

E.B. Taylor

Who is responsible for the theory of social evolution?

E.B. Tylor

Who was responsible for the theory of social evolution?

E.B. Tylor

Old World monkeys are exclusively terrestrial dwellers.

False

People rarely hold conflicting values.

False

Which skeletal feature is paleoanthropologists' best indicator of bipedalism in a fossil?

Location of the Foramen Magnum

This school of anthropological thought stresses the interrelationship among the natural conditions in the environment and society:

Neoevolutionism

The ability to touch the thumb with the tips of the other fingers on the same hand is called:

Opposability

In archaeology, this is a division of prehistory based on gross changes in subsistences patterns, climate changes, housing and burial styles, etc.

Period

Which of the following is NOT a part of a human's taxonomic classification?

Plattyrhine

Which of the following is NOT evidence of early hominin bipedalism in the fossil record (as discussed in the presentation)?

Strong clavicle

The physical characteristics of any organism that can be seen are known as the phenotype.

True

An ethical approach to anthropological research would emphasize:

a commitment to do no harm, the rejection of clandestine research, and responsibilities to the host country and the people you are studying.

In which of the following locations would you likely find an anthropologist doing fieldwork?

a factory, a mental institution, a New York City neighborhood, the Amazon rain forest.

Shaking hands when you meet someone is an example of a:

Folkway

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 studied by anthropologists?

Dinosaur bones

Cultural anthropology is one of the most quantitative of the social sciences.

False

Anthropologists think that the first hominin capable of speaking in sounds, not signals, was:

Homo erectus

The name most closely associated with the system traditionally used to classify living things is:

Linnaeus

Alfred Russell Wallace is known for:

hitting upon the idea of natural selection at about the same time as Darwin.

The U.S. government's prohibition of Native American children speaking their indigenous languages in Indian schools has contributed most profoundly to:

language death

If you wanted to understand very early, non-living human beings, you would likely engage in:

paleoanthropology

Reading your textbook is an example of:

Symbolic Learning

Archaeologists are making a mistake when they clean samples of potsherds for analysis.

True

All the characteristics listed below are common behavior patterns found in all primates except

father-son bond

Culture can be transmitted virtually through the internet in addition to face-to-face interaction.

True

During fieldwork, cultural anthropologists

learn local language, record people's economic transactions, study how environmental changes affect agriculture.

The ability to document changes in pottery styles in non-living societies happens through:

seriation