- Sociology - both study social relations
- Political Science - both interested in power relations
- Economics - both study material conditions of peoples lives
- History
- Psychology - both study relationships between people and society
Key Distinguishing Features:
- A focus on the concept of culture
- A comparative perspective
- A holistic perspective - look at culture as an integrated whole (cannot understand any aspect of any culture, without understanding all the aspects of a culture - must consider the whole culture)
- Anthropological curiosity: deals with cultural and biological diversity, within and between populations
Four Subfields of Anthropology:
- Cultural anthropology
- Linguistic anthropology
- Archaeology
- Biological anthropology
- Applied anthropology (5th added)
Cultural Anthropology:
- The study of human culture
o Comparative study of living and recent cultures (past hundred years)
- Ethnology
o Building theories about cultural behaviours and forms
- Ethnography
o Observing and documenting peoples ways of life
Linguistic Anthropology:
- Interconnections among language, culture and society
- Languages of Indigenous peoples
- Endangered languages (salvage ethnography)
- Historical linguistics - language change over time
Archaeology:
- The study of material culture
- Historic and prehistoric societies
- Methods applied to living cultures
o Ex: Arizona garbage project 1973
■ They would ask people to keep record of what they threw away and compared it to what they found in their garbage
Biological Anthropology:
- The study of human origins and contemporary biological diversity
- Paleoanthropolgy
o Human evolution
o Primatology - study of nonhuman primates
- Human variation (racial differences)
- Health and disease issues
Applied Anthropology:
- The application of the techniques and theories of anthropology to solving real-world problems
o Forensic anthropology
- Cultural resource management (CRM)
- Contract archaeology
- Language preservation
- Consulting and applied research
o Government agencies
o Non-governmental organizations (NGO's)
o First nations land claim settlements
- Applied medical anthropology
- Corporate and consumer anthropology
What is Culture?:
- Culture is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society - Edward Taylor
- Culture can be broadly divided into:
- Symbolic culture - ideas and knowledge people have about themselves, others and the world and the way that people express these ideas
- Social culture - rules and practices that regulate membership and participation in social groups and networks
- Material culture - stuff
** Definition: culture is the values, beliefs, technological knowledge, and rules of conduct acquired by learning
Characteristics of Culture:
- Culture is shared
- Culture is learned
- Culture is adaptive
- Culture is integrated
- Culture is based on symbols
- Culture organized the way people think about the world
Culture is Shared:
- One person cannot have their own culture, at least 2 people
- Cultural knowledge
- Cultural norms
- Subcultures - group of people whose members and others think of themselves as somehow significantly different than everybody else
Culture is Learned:
- Socially transmitted (think about language)
- Enculturation - process of learning ones culture through informal observation and formal instruction
- Taboos - norms specifying behaviours that are prohibited in a culture
Culture is Adaptive:
- Behaviours and beliefs respond to environmental constraints and opportunities
Culture is Integrated:
Practices and beliefs form a relatively coherent and consistent system
Culture is Symbolic:
- Symbol: a word, image, or object that stands for cultural ideas or sentiments
- Language
- Religion
- Art
Culture Organized the Way People Think About the World:
- Naturalized concepts: ideas and behaviours so deeply embedded in a culture that they are regarded as universally normal or natural
- Ethnocentrism: a set of misunderstandings and prejudices base on the idea that ones own belief system provides the only accurate and moral view of the world
- Cultural hegemony: the use of cultural beliefs to justify and support social hierarchy and political domination
- Counterculture: an alternative cultural model within a society that expresses different views about the way that society should be organized
- Worldview: culture-based, often ethnocentric, way that people see the world and other peoples
Culture Change:
- Internal:
o Invention
o Innovation
o Adaptation
- External:
o Diffusion
o Acculturation
o Assimilation
- Culture contact: direct interaction between peoples of different cultures through migration, trade, invasion, or conquest (external)
- Cultural evolution: theory which maintains that societies develop through a series of stages based on their technological development and according to which they can be grouped into categories
- Marxist theory: theory that analyzes society and culture in terms of class divisions and class conflicts (internal)
Culture Change (external):
- Diffusion: spread of ideas, material objects, and cultural practices from one society to another through direct and indirect culture contact (external)
- Acculturation: process by which a group adjusts to the influence of a dominant culture, while at the same time maintaining its original cultural identity
- Assimilation: wholesale acceptance of the entire value and meaning system and abandonment of ones own values. Often occurs under pressure from the domination of a more powerful group over a subjugated one
- Global Culture: a constellation of technologies, practices, attitudes, values, and symbols that spread internationally
- Globalization: the process by which the exchange of products, investment, and people across national and regional boundaries increases
- Liberalization policies: policies that attempt to eliminate national government controls on investment, imports, currency rates, and many other practices that ere considered to constrain trade