Introduction to Anthropology

• Anthropology has four sub-disciplines: archaeology, linguistic anthropology, biological anthropology, and cultural anthropology.

Applied Anthropology

• Involves using anthropological theories, methods, and findings to solve practical problems.

Archaeology

• Focuses on the study of past materials, mainly through the excavation of material remains left behind by people.
• Interpreting these remains can provide insights into past lives and cultural practices.
• Even a small material remain can provide a lot of data, like air from the 1700s which would be able to tell the different plants from back then as well as many other factors that was different from modern day.
• Cultural Resource Management involves protecting and managing archaeological, archival, and architectural resources.

Linguistic Anthropology

• Explores human language and its relationship to culture.
• Complex language use is essential to humanity.
• Language can impact society.
• New terms and phrases reflect cultural changes.

Biological (Physical) Anthropology

• Studies human origins, evolution, and variation.
• Subfields include human paleontology, primatology, and forensics.

Cultural Anthropology

• Examines similarities and differences among living societies and cultural groups.
• Focuses on learned behavior rather than genetic transmission of traits.
• Ethnography is the description of a society or culture, usually based on fieldwork.
• Study social groups other than one's own as well as one's own deeper.

Characteristics of Culture

• Culture includes a set of beliefs, practices, and symbols, that are learned and shared.
• Culture binds people together and shapes their perspectives.
• Humans are born with the ability to learn the culture of any social group, directly and indirectly.
• Culture changes both internally and externally.
• Humans aren't bound by culture; they can conform to it, not conform to it, and change it.
• Culture is symbolic.
• Humans rely on culture, which has aided in our evolution - unlike animals.
• Human culture and biology are interrelated, where growth and development are impacted by culture.

Anthropology’s Unique Approach to Understanding Culture:

• Holistic perspective considers how different aspects of humanity interact and influence each other.
• Comparison identifies what humans share, how they differ, and how they change.
• Fieldwork involves conducting research in the field with the species or group of people being studied, often living among them.
• The scientific approach is often deductive and used in sub-disciplines like biological anthropology and archaeology
• The humanistic approach is often inductive and used in sub-disciplines like cultural anthropology and linguistic anthropology

History of the Concept of Culture and Cultural Anthropology

• Early travelers recorded observations about people and cultures, which provided early data but was not objective and sometimes created ideas of racial superiority.

Age of Discovery

• During the 1400-1700s, Europeans explored and exploited other regions.
• This led to the conquering of other places and the introduction of diseases to other societies via trade routes.

Age of Enlightenment

• Beginning in the 1700s, the scientific method began to be applied to collect empirical data.
• The idea was that people could discover truth through observation and experience.

The 19th Century

• Colonialism spurred the desire to understand traditional cultures before they disappeared.
• Charles Darwin developed his theories.
• Herbert Spencer tried to apply Darwin’s theories to societies, arguing that they evolved similarly.
• Darwin and Spencer inspired 19th-century cultural evolutionists.

19th-Century Cultural Evolutionists

• Were armchair anthropologists who judged other cultures from their own vantage point without fieldwork.
• Lewis Henry Morgan argued that all societies evolved through the same stages of development.
• Sir Edward Tylor developed an early definition of culture.

Ethnocentrism

• Involves believing that one's own culture is superior to others.
• It measures other cultures by how well they live up to the standards of one's own culture.
• The anthropological perspective aims to undermine ethnocentrism and the concept of "othering."

Franz Boas

• Regarded as the founder of American anthropology.
• Boas reoriented the field towards cultural relativism and hands-on fieldwork.
• He rejected ethnocentrism and cultural evolutionism.

Boas’s Legacy

• Involved his students making significant contributions to the field.
• The holistic approach combines the study of human biology, language, and culture to analyze human groups comprehensively.

Development of European Theories of Culture

• European theories of culture sought to discover cultural universals, or general principles governing cultural phenomena.
• Comparing cultures provides insight into shared and differing norms.
• Cultural traditions form to suit basic human needs.
• Functionalism examines how parts of society work together to support the whole, similar to organs in a human body.
• Bronislaw Malinowski advocated hands-on fieldwork and studied the Trobriand Islanders.

Ethical Issues in Truth Telling

• American anthropologists are directed to do no harm and prioritize the subjects of research.
• Bronislaw Malinowski's journals contained negative portrayals of his Trobriand Islands study subjects.
• Chagnon and Neel were accused of causing a measles epidemic and instigating violence among the Yanomami people in the Amazon.

Cultural Anthropology Today

• Strives to be objective.
• Upholds the standard to do no harm.

Doing Fieldwork

• Requires informed consent from all participants.
• Establishing rapport (a relationship) with the people being studied is crucial.

Ethnographic Fieldwork

• It Involves firsthand exploration and experiencing culture shock, which can be helpful.
• Anthropologists work with key informants to gain deeper cultural insights.

Fieldwork Techniques

• Participant and observation requires being involved with the people and also making objective observations
• Utilize questions, photos, filming, mapping, and family trees.
• Conducting interviews, reviewing records and archives, and writing ethnographies.

Field notes need to include:

• Date, time, and place of observation.
• Facts, numbers, and details of what happens.
• Sensory impressions: Sights, sounds, textures, smells, and tastes.
• Personal responses to the act of recording field notes.
• Specific words, phrases, summaries of conversations, and insider language.
• Questions about people or behaviors for future investigation.
• Page numbers to keep observations in order.

Quantitative Data

• Data that can be measured and compared

Qualitative Data

• Data that is gathered from stories, interviews, and observations.

How Anthropologists Write Ethnography

• The topics are determined by the informants, and the anthropologist reflects on these.
• The anthropologist must have authority and knowledge about the culture.

Emic and Etic Perspectives

• Emic perspective describes behavior and beliefs from the perspective of the people being studied.
• Etic perspective provides explanations for behavior and beliefs from the researcher's viewpoint.

Native Anthropology

• Involves studying one's own culture.
• Researchers must maintain social distance like an outsider.

Feminist Anthropology

• Involves fieldwork conducted by women.
• Addresses androcentric bias, which focuses on male activities or male perceptions of female activities.

Anthropology is divided into archaeology, linguistic, biological, and cultural aspects. Applied anthropology uses theories to solve practical problems. Linguistic anthropology explores language and its relation to culture.