ANTH 2 Exam #1 Question with verified answers
Anthropology - √√●The study of humans
●Until the late 60s, primarily focused on:
-Non-Western so-called "primitive" or "pre-
modern peoples" living in "exotic" places.
-Cultures, which were seemingly portrayed as "timeless" and outside of history
-Cultures composed of "underlying beliefs and values" & expressed in practices, rites, material
objects, behavioral patterns,
-Studied through systematic fieldwork and portrayed via ethnography
Ethnography - √√The scientific description of of the customs of individual peoples and cultures.
Quote to ponder: "The seeing eye is the organ of tradition"
Two meanings: The Practice of Fieldwork, The product (usually written (usually a book or
article) of fieldwork
Typically involves the presentation of data and its interpretation and analysis
Initiation Ritual (stages) - √√Delaney
Separation: Symbolically detached from social position or social group
Liminal (transitional): "betwixt and between" one position and another
Reaggregation: integration back into society or group with new position
Cultural Critters - √√What many anthropologists argue is that there is "no place outside of
culture where you can go study the 'naked ape' stripped of his or her culture. People are
molded by culture from the moment of birth, and probably even before that due to the cultural
prescriptions for pregnancy and birth and the expectations that people have about the child"
(Delaney, 10-11)
, Culture - √√●Edward Bennett Tylor (1871) "Culture or civilization, taken in its wide
ethnographic sense, 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."
●Ruth Benedict (1934) "A culture, like an individual, is a more or less consistent pattern of
thought and action".
●Clifford Geertz (1973): "Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs
of significance he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be
therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of
meaning".
●Lila Abu-Lughod (1991): "I will argue that 'culture' operates in anthropological discourse to
enforce separations that inevitably carry a sense of hierarchy. Therefore, anthropologists
should now pursue ... a variety of strategies for writing against culture".
●(Benidict): emerge from repetition
●Writing against culture: arguing a lot of times we essentialize culture: "they are all violent",
Abu-Lughod: Islam gets painted in a certain light-writing against it (more specific to gender-
oppression of women in middle east)
●Mamdani's culture talk: week 4: speaking against essentialism, specific to they way culture is
used in America as a justification to go to war, create subjects of entire groups of people by
using the word culture
Fieldwork - √√-Work done in the field (as by students) to gain practical experience and
knowledge through firsthand observation
-The gathering of anthropological or sociological data through the interviewing and observation
of subjects in the field
Cultural Relativism - √√Ruth Benedict
Beliefs and practices of others are best understood in the light of the particular cultures in
which they were found.
The basic principle: understanding other cultures requires suspending as far as possible,
negative assumptions and judgments based on one's own culture
Anthropology - √√●The study of humans
●Until the late 60s, primarily focused on:
-Non-Western so-called "primitive" or "pre-
modern peoples" living in "exotic" places.
-Cultures, which were seemingly portrayed as "timeless" and outside of history
-Cultures composed of "underlying beliefs and values" & expressed in practices, rites, material
objects, behavioral patterns,
-Studied through systematic fieldwork and portrayed via ethnography
Ethnography - √√The scientific description of of the customs of individual peoples and cultures.
Quote to ponder: "The seeing eye is the organ of tradition"
Two meanings: The Practice of Fieldwork, The product (usually written (usually a book or
article) of fieldwork
Typically involves the presentation of data and its interpretation and analysis
Initiation Ritual (stages) - √√Delaney
Separation: Symbolically detached from social position or social group
Liminal (transitional): "betwixt and between" one position and another
Reaggregation: integration back into society or group with new position
Cultural Critters - √√What many anthropologists argue is that there is "no place outside of
culture where you can go study the 'naked ape' stripped of his or her culture. People are
molded by culture from the moment of birth, and probably even before that due to the cultural
prescriptions for pregnancy and birth and the expectations that people have about the child"
(Delaney, 10-11)
, Culture - √√●Edward Bennett Tylor (1871) "Culture or civilization, taken in its wide
ethnographic sense, 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."
●Ruth Benedict (1934) "A culture, like an individual, is a more or less consistent pattern of
thought and action".
●Clifford Geertz (1973): "Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs
of significance he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be
therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of
meaning".
●Lila Abu-Lughod (1991): "I will argue that 'culture' operates in anthropological discourse to
enforce separations that inevitably carry a sense of hierarchy. Therefore, anthropologists
should now pursue ... a variety of strategies for writing against culture".
●(Benidict): emerge from repetition
●Writing against culture: arguing a lot of times we essentialize culture: "they are all violent",
Abu-Lughod: Islam gets painted in a certain light-writing against it (more specific to gender-
oppression of women in middle east)
●Mamdani's culture talk: week 4: speaking against essentialism, specific to they way culture is
used in America as a justification to go to war, create subjects of entire groups of people by
using the word culture
Fieldwork - √√-Work done in the field (as by students) to gain practical experience and
knowledge through firsthand observation
-The gathering of anthropological or sociological data through the interviewing and observation
of subjects in the field
Cultural Relativism - √√Ruth Benedict
Beliefs and practices of others are best understood in the light of the particular cultures in
which they were found.
The basic principle: understanding other cultures requires suspending as far as possible,
negative assumptions and judgments based on one's own culture
