Shared Flashcard Set

Details

Cultural Anthropology
For test #1
68
Anthropology
Undergraduate 1
02/11/2007

Additional Anthropology Flashcards

 


 

Cards

Term
Physical anthropology
Definition
(biological) The subfield of anthropology that studies both human biological evolution and contemporary racial variations among peoples of the world. (Includes paleontology, primatology, and human physical variations).
Term
Holism
Definition
A perspective in Anthropology that attmepts to study a culture by looking at all parts of the system and how those parts are interrelated.
Term
Industrialization
Definition
A process resulting in the economic change from home production of goods to large-scale mechanized factory production.
Term
Ethnology
Definition
The comparative study of cultural similarities and differences.
Term
Agriculture
Definition
A form of food production that requires intensive working of the land with plows and draft animals and the use of techniques of soil and water control.
Term
Pastoralism
Definition
A food getting strategy based on animal husbandry found in regions of the world that are not good for agriculture.
Term
Horticulture
Definition
A form of small-scale crop cultivation characterized by the use of simple technology and the absence of irrigation.
Term
Hunting and Gathering
Definition
A food getting strategy involving the collection of naturally occurring plants and animals.
Term
Cultural Ecology
Definition
Assumes that people who live in similar environments will develop similar technologies, social structures, and political institutions.
Term
Cultural Materialism
Definition
contemporary idea that cultural systems are most influenced by such material things as natural resources and technologies.
Term
Neoevolutionism
Definition
School of anthropology that tired to refine the earlier evolutionary theories of Tylor and Morgan.
Term
Interpretive Anthropology
Definition
Contemporary idea that the most important factors in cultural systems are subjective things like values, ideas, and world views.
Term
Functionalism
Definition
A theory that social stratification exists because it benefits the society as a whole
Term
Historical Particularism (American Historicism)
Definition
Boas: School that insisted on finding data through direct field work before making cross-culture generalizations.
Term
Civiliaztion
Definition
Any society that has cities.
Term
Unilinear Evolution
Definition
Tylor and Morgan: attempted to put cultures in specific evolutionary phases.
Term
Human Relations Area Files (HRAF)
Definition
The world's largest anthropological data retrieval system used to test cross-culture theories.
Term
Fieldwork
Definition
where the anthropologist is immersed in the daily life of a culture to collect data and test theories
Term
Slash and burn method
Definition
form of horticulture where wild land cleared, and burned over, then farmed, and then it is allowed to go back to its wild state.
Term
Naive Realism (cultural naivete)
Definition
The idea that reality is the same for everyone everywhere.
Term
Tacit Culture
Definition
The part of culture that people are usually unaware of and do not communicate verbally.
Term
Culture
Definition
design for life; developed by a people; what people have, do, and think; Culture sets limits, is learned, is all including, is shared, is a system, and is transmitted in symbols.
Term
Human Physical Variation
Definition
studies races and differences in people
Term
Human paleontology
Definition
study of human fossils and origin of humans
Term
subculture
Definition
subdivision of a national culture that shares some feature with the larger society, but has some differences in important aspects.
Term
Small-scale society
Definition
societies with relatively small populations, minimal technologies, and little division of labor.
Term
Enculturation
Definition
process by which human infants learn their culture
Term
cultural universals
Definition
those general cultural traits found in all societies of the world
Term
cultural diffusion
Definition
the spreading of a cultural trait from one society to another
Term
cultural relativism
Definition
the idea that cultural traits are best understood when viewed within the cultural context of which they are a part.
Term
Ethnocentrism
Definition
when you view other cultures in terms of your own; the opposite of cultural relativism
Term
Emic approach
Definition
Inside view. uses the concepts and categories that are meaningful to the culture being studied.
Term
Etic approach
Definition
Outside view. uses the concepts and categories of the anthropologist's culture
Term
Ethnography
Definition
description of a culture by means of direct fieldwork
Term
cultural anthropology.
Definition
study of cultural similarities and differences where and in whatever form they may be found.
Term
Archaeolgy
Definition
the study of prehistoric and historic cultures through the excavation of material remains
Term
Primatology
Definition
the study of nonhuman primates in their natural environments for the purpose of gaining insights into the human evolutionary process
Term
Participant Observation
Definition
studying the culture by being part of it. Advantages are thick description, level of trust, and evidence. Disadvantages are you could affect their behavior, objectivity, attachment and generalization. Participant observation is triangulation
Term
Literature
Definition
Not universal
Term
witches
Definition
societies with loose or weak political system often believe in witches. (no police but witches keep people in line.)
Term
Culture as adaptation
Definition
explanatory; etic; need to survive; pig story
Term
Culture as the interpretation of experience
Definition
the way we understand our experience; emic; witch oracle story
Term
Six Key points of culture
Definition
-sets limits
-is learned, not genetic
-is holistic, not just what we know and realize
-is transmitted via symbols
-is shared
- is a system - everything is in context and is linked
Term
culture shock
Definition
the disorientation experienced when you try to operate in a radically different cultural environment
Term
adaptive nature of culture
Definition
culture is the major way that people adapt or relate to their individual environment to survive
Term
innovations
Definition
changes caused by the recombination of already existing items in a culture.
Term
pluralistic society
Definition
societies that have many different cultural or subcultural groups
Term
binary oppositions
Definition
Levi-Strauss: based on opposites; this is a way of thinking in all cultures
Term
Post modernism
Definition
advocates the switch from cultural generalization and laws to description, interpretation, and meaning.
Term
multi-linear evolution
Definition
Steward: specific cultures can evolve independent of others even if they follow the same evolutionary process.
Term
structural functionalism
Definition
Radcliffe/Brown: how parts of a culture function to benefit the society.
Term
Evolution theory stages
Definition
Tylor: savagery
barbarism
civilization

Morgan: simple technology
advanced technology
most advanced technology
Term
Chain model for culture
Definition
Environment -> economics -> social organization -> ideology

Each one above sets limits on the next but does not determine.
Term
Triangulation
Definition
Using more than one method to point to one answer and increase the probability of that answer being right. One method's strengths will make up for other method's weakness.
Term
Ethnolinguistics
Definition
study of relationship between language and culture
Term
Historical linguistics
Definition
how language changes over time
Term
paleoanthropology
Definition
study of human evolution through fossil remains
Term
Ethnoscientist
Definition
they try to study from the people's point of view
Term
Population Biology
Definition
study of relationship between population and envronment
Term
phases of rites of passage
Definition
1, separation - death
2. liminal - taboo
3. incorporation = end
Term
Ecofacts
Definition
artifacts that are natural like seeds and bones
Term
descriptive linguistics
Definition
studies how languages are structured
Term
organic analogy
Definition
functionalist idea: cultural systems all are part of a whole cultural unit like a biological organism with its different parts (heart, lungs, etc) to maintain the health of it.
Term
glottochronography
Definition
historic linguistic technique to find out when 2 languages diverged by analyzing similarities and differences.
Term
sociolinguistics
Definition
studies how language and culture are related and how language is used in different social contexts
Term
universal evolution
Definition
White: developed laws that apply to culture as a whole and say all societies go through similar stages of development
Term
universal functions
Definition
functionalist idea that every part of culture has a certain function or use.
Term
epidemiology
Definition
study of occurrence, distribution, and control of disease in populations
Supporting users have an ad free experience!