Anthropology Lecture Notes
Anthropology Lecture One (16 Feb)
Collective societal norms and linguistics. Harmony. Cultural shared repertoire. Symbols are
common. Consensus on the impact of words and their multiplicity of meaning.
Anthro helps us understand things such as Proximus- spacial distancing. Different ideas of
proximity etc. Anthropology helps us unpack what it is to be human within our world and its
structures that exist before us.
Tuts are at 8am on Mondays, Upper Campus. Use Harvard referencing. (author, date)
How the discipline came into being and where it might go. A critical analysis.
A critical background to how knowledge about societies and others has been made over time.
Eurocentric American background in researching or analysing the “other”.
Anthropology Lecture Two (23 Feb)
Recap of last week:
• We spoke about the historical conditions at play when anthropology as a discipline
came into the world
• We thought about the relationship between anthropology and travel writing: an early
version of representing ‘others’ with whom one had come into contact/ encountered
• We thought about the ways in which forms of categorization that arose within Europe
affected how people saw and were seen and represented
Looking at the relationship between anthropology and travel writing. How anthropology
formed over time through travel writers making contact with others and writing about them.
Today we will talk about armchair anthropologists- those who base their research and
writings on readings of others reports.
We see how categorisation began to matter and be applied to people in the 19th century.
How anthropology does research and makes new knowledge: methods and approaches
This week’s core questions:
1. What constitutes good research in anthropology? (and how has that changed over
time?)
2. What do anthropologists do and what is distinctive about social anthropology?
3. What are the challenges and ethical dilemmas of ethnographic fieldwork?
What does it mean for a researcher to research a group of people from within? How do they
feel and how to make it an equal relationship?
, Today primarily drew on the work of Erikson (2001). This text is in your
recommended reading list.
Why we’re reading/ thinking with Erikson:
1. to explore the history of anthropology as a discipline (beyond what we covered
last week)
2. with a core focus on anthropology’s methods and forms of theorizing the social
world, over time
What is a method/methodology?
• Last week we spoke about how there are different disciplines in higher education, and
each has its own distinctive history, topic of interest and method
• A key difference between university and school is that universities don’t just teach
knowledge, they generate it: they are spaces of research where new knowledge is
made.
Methods or research methods are the tools that disciplines use to make that new
knowledge: the accepted way of finding things out. Methods are formed by theory and the
knowledge that is generated by methods in turn informs new theory. Research is iterative.
Social science is informed by social theory- a linked set of concepts about the world
around us. Theories are built up tp develop…
Social science is informed by social theory: We can usefully start to understand
theory as a ‘story’, a narrative, an account, a detailed mental picture or as a linked set
of concepts about the world around us (Stewart, 2018:4).
Theories are built up out of concepts to develop complex descriptions and powerful
explanations for the world.
Different disciplines ( eg sociology, political science, anthropology) may rely on
different theoretical models to understand similar questions.
There are 3 tasks in social science
To describe the social world – what’s going on?
To understand/ interpret people’s meanings – how do others understand what’s
going on?
To explain the social world - how does it work?
A history of anthropology
1. ‘Proto-anthropology’-
,• Tunisian intellectual Ibn Khaldun (1332 -1406) – observations on law, education,
politics, the economy
• European ‘ancestors’- David Hume (1711-1776), experience as only source of valid
knowledge (empirical = based on experience); Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712 – 1778)
– ‘savages’ as utopian ideal
1. Victorian anthropology- rise of the actual discipline
Armchair anthropologists - the methods and forms of data collection they did were
based on using other people’s texts. The travel writings formed most of the basis of
anthropologies data in the beginning. Passing on the same info/travel pieces to create
categories and knowledge. E.g., Tylor said that culture included knowledge’s, beliefs,
arts. Morals and customs- anthropology looks at how theses fit into diff. societies and
compares them. The golden bough- Frazer never actually observed locals himself but
talked about their ‘myths’
• ‘armchair’ anthropologists – Tylor (1832 – 1917)- culture as “that complex whole
which includes knowledge, beliefs, art, morals, custom”; Frazer (1854 – 1941) – the
golden bough (but “heaven forbid!” one actually consorts with the locals…)
• Key theoretical problem: accounting for cultural and assumed biological difference
Key method: using available written resources (i.e., the early writings, expeditions we
discussed last week were the SOURCE OF DATA)
• One of the key theories at this moment was ‘social Darwinism’
Social Darwinism. Is the application of the evolutionary concept of natural selection
to human society. (Wrongly in terms of types. Looks at people across the world and
comparing ‘stages’ of evolution) The term itself emerged in the 1880s and gained
widespread currency during the 1940s. (the holocaust) Basically using ‘science’ to
justify dominating other cultures deemed lesser than because, from a Eurocentric
viewpoint, they had not reached the ‘apex’ of evolution and needed to be ‘lifted up’ to
them same level as the ‘civilised Europeans/Americans/whites etc’
Out of the armchair & off the verandah
Bronislaw Malinowski
1874-1942
-Live with the people, learn their language, share their lives and appreciate their
values.
- “the prototype for modern anthropological field research” (49 mins into the film)
• “Living for long periods with remote peoples; learning and speaking their language;
sharing their lives and appreciating their values” (50 mins into the film)
• “the final goal is to grasp the native’s point of view, to realize his vision of his
world.”
Questions to watch with:
, How does the film frame people?
What kind of clues are we given as to how to connect with people in the film?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjCMOpnx6r8
Anthro Lecture three (24 February)
Recap
• Anthropological methods and theories have changed over time
• ‘Armchair anthropology’ gave way to the rise of participant observation in the 1940s
Theories also shifted in the 40s onward– from social Darwinism to structural
functionalism
PARTICIPANT OBSERVATION
A KEY METHOD OF ANTHROPOLOGY. LIVING AS PART OF AND
OBSERVING THOSE YOU WANT TO WRITE ON
Challenges and dilemmas of ethnographic fieldwork.
Concepts of time in anthropological writing
Set in Southern Africa, the film stars Namibian San farmer Nǃxau ǂToma as Xi, a hunter-
gatherer of the Kalahari Desert whose tribe discovers a glass bottle dropped from an airplane,
and believe it to be a gift from their gods.
This idea of othering, exotifying and making the African people seem primitive.
Ethnocentrism- evaluation of other cultures according to preconceptions originating in
the standards and customs of one’s own culture. Colonialism was predicated on the
idea that the colonised were lesser because they could not read or write- were
‘uncivilised.’ It works both ways! Judging others for their accents. If you can’t speak
English well, you’re less intelligent. It’s thinking your culture is better than another.
Cultural relativism- a person’s beliefs, values, and practices should be understood
based on that person’s own culture, rather than be judged against the criteria of
another. You need to step back and judge within the terms of THAT culture rather
than yours. You need to understand how that culture functions before you judge. You
need to immerse yourself within them. Only then can you make a culturally relevant
analysis.
Anthropology Lecture One (16 Feb)
Collective societal norms and linguistics. Harmony. Cultural shared repertoire. Symbols are
common. Consensus on the impact of words and their multiplicity of meaning.
Anthro helps us understand things such as Proximus- spacial distancing. Different ideas of
proximity etc. Anthropology helps us unpack what it is to be human within our world and its
structures that exist before us.
Tuts are at 8am on Mondays, Upper Campus. Use Harvard referencing. (author, date)
How the discipline came into being and where it might go. A critical analysis.
A critical background to how knowledge about societies and others has been made over time.
Eurocentric American background in researching or analysing the “other”.
Anthropology Lecture Two (23 Feb)
Recap of last week:
• We spoke about the historical conditions at play when anthropology as a discipline
came into the world
• We thought about the relationship between anthropology and travel writing: an early
version of representing ‘others’ with whom one had come into contact/ encountered
• We thought about the ways in which forms of categorization that arose within Europe
affected how people saw and were seen and represented
Looking at the relationship between anthropology and travel writing. How anthropology
formed over time through travel writers making contact with others and writing about them.
Today we will talk about armchair anthropologists- those who base their research and
writings on readings of others reports.
We see how categorisation began to matter and be applied to people in the 19th century.
How anthropology does research and makes new knowledge: methods and approaches
This week’s core questions:
1. What constitutes good research in anthropology? (and how has that changed over
time?)
2. What do anthropologists do and what is distinctive about social anthropology?
3. What are the challenges and ethical dilemmas of ethnographic fieldwork?
What does it mean for a researcher to research a group of people from within? How do they
feel and how to make it an equal relationship?
, Today primarily drew on the work of Erikson (2001). This text is in your
recommended reading list.
Why we’re reading/ thinking with Erikson:
1. to explore the history of anthropology as a discipline (beyond what we covered
last week)
2. with a core focus on anthropology’s methods and forms of theorizing the social
world, over time
What is a method/methodology?
• Last week we spoke about how there are different disciplines in higher education, and
each has its own distinctive history, topic of interest and method
• A key difference between university and school is that universities don’t just teach
knowledge, they generate it: they are spaces of research where new knowledge is
made.
Methods or research methods are the tools that disciplines use to make that new
knowledge: the accepted way of finding things out. Methods are formed by theory and the
knowledge that is generated by methods in turn informs new theory. Research is iterative.
Social science is informed by social theory- a linked set of concepts about the world
around us. Theories are built up tp develop…
Social science is informed by social theory: We can usefully start to understand
theory as a ‘story’, a narrative, an account, a detailed mental picture or as a linked set
of concepts about the world around us (Stewart, 2018:4).
Theories are built up out of concepts to develop complex descriptions and powerful
explanations for the world.
Different disciplines ( eg sociology, political science, anthropology) may rely on
different theoretical models to understand similar questions.
There are 3 tasks in social science
To describe the social world – what’s going on?
To understand/ interpret people’s meanings – how do others understand what’s
going on?
To explain the social world - how does it work?
A history of anthropology
1. ‘Proto-anthropology’-
,• Tunisian intellectual Ibn Khaldun (1332 -1406) – observations on law, education,
politics, the economy
• European ‘ancestors’- David Hume (1711-1776), experience as only source of valid
knowledge (empirical = based on experience); Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712 – 1778)
– ‘savages’ as utopian ideal
1. Victorian anthropology- rise of the actual discipline
Armchair anthropologists - the methods and forms of data collection they did were
based on using other people’s texts. The travel writings formed most of the basis of
anthropologies data in the beginning. Passing on the same info/travel pieces to create
categories and knowledge. E.g., Tylor said that culture included knowledge’s, beliefs,
arts. Morals and customs- anthropology looks at how theses fit into diff. societies and
compares them. The golden bough- Frazer never actually observed locals himself but
talked about their ‘myths’
• ‘armchair’ anthropologists – Tylor (1832 – 1917)- culture as “that complex whole
which includes knowledge, beliefs, art, morals, custom”; Frazer (1854 – 1941) – the
golden bough (but “heaven forbid!” one actually consorts with the locals…)
• Key theoretical problem: accounting for cultural and assumed biological difference
Key method: using available written resources (i.e., the early writings, expeditions we
discussed last week were the SOURCE OF DATA)
• One of the key theories at this moment was ‘social Darwinism’
Social Darwinism. Is the application of the evolutionary concept of natural selection
to human society. (Wrongly in terms of types. Looks at people across the world and
comparing ‘stages’ of evolution) The term itself emerged in the 1880s and gained
widespread currency during the 1940s. (the holocaust) Basically using ‘science’ to
justify dominating other cultures deemed lesser than because, from a Eurocentric
viewpoint, they had not reached the ‘apex’ of evolution and needed to be ‘lifted up’ to
them same level as the ‘civilised Europeans/Americans/whites etc’
Out of the armchair & off the verandah
Bronislaw Malinowski
1874-1942
-Live with the people, learn their language, share their lives and appreciate their
values.
- “the prototype for modern anthropological field research” (49 mins into the film)
• “Living for long periods with remote peoples; learning and speaking their language;
sharing their lives and appreciating their values” (50 mins into the film)
• “the final goal is to grasp the native’s point of view, to realize his vision of his
world.”
Questions to watch with:
, How does the film frame people?
What kind of clues are we given as to how to connect with people in the film?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjCMOpnx6r8
Anthro Lecture three (24 February)
Recap
• Anthropological methods and theories have changed over time
• ‘Armchair anthropology’ gave way to the rise of participant observation in the 1940s
Theories also shifted in the 40s onward– from social Darwinism to structural
functionalism
PARTICIPANT OBSERVATION
A KEY METHOD OF ANTHROPOLOGY. LIVING AS PART OF AND
OBSERVING THOSE YOU WANT TO WRITE ON
Challenges and dilemmas of ethnographic fieldwork.
Concepts of time in anthropological writing
Set in Southern Africa, the film stars Namibian San farmer Nǃxau ǂToma as Xi, a hunter-
gatherer of the Kalahari Desert whose tribe discovers a glass bottle dropped from an airplane,
and believe it to be a gift from their gods.
This idea of othering, exotifying and making the African people seem primitive.
Ethnocentrism- evaluation of other cultures according to preconceptions originating in
the standards and customs of one’s own culture. Colonialism was predicated on the
idea that the colonised were lesser because they could not read or write- were
‘uncivilised.’ It works both ways! Judging others for their accents. If you can’t speak
English well, you’re less intelligent. It’s thinking your culture is better than another.
Cultural relativism- a person’s beliefs, values, and practices should be understood
based on that person’s own culture, rather than be judged against the criteria of
another. You need to step back and judge within the terms of THAT culture rather
than yours. You need to understand how that culture functions before you judge. You
need to immerse yourself within them. Only then can you make a culturally relevant
analysis.
