UCLA ANTHRO 1 MIDTERM EXAM 2025/2026 QUESTIONS
WITH ANSWERS GRADED A+
✔✔cultural materialism - ✔✔rooted in marxian tradition/ Karl Marx. material conditions
of existence (tech/ econ) determine social relations that ar reflected and reinforced by
these beliefs
✔✔structuralism - ✔✔associated with Claude Levi Strauss. culture reflects human need
to organize their world through categories. In vs out group, but doesn't explain structure
changes, creates very strict groups
✔✔symbolic anthropology - ✔✔post structuralism, study of how people communicate
through symbols. Examine symbols in their social/ cultural context, ie language: sounds
stand for object, ie "ball" unconscious in use, no obvious connection between meaning
and symbol
✔✔interpretive anthropology - ✔✔form of symbolic anthropology (its child), approaches
culture as a text: analyze symbols and meanings in cultural/ historical contexts. studies
how people interpret their own lives, emphasis on text and interpretation
✔✔cultural production - ✔✔culture is staged/ dramatized, accomplished unevenly: high
status
✔✔life cycle - ✔✔division of life into meaningful segments/ stages, stages are not
obvious or universal, not always linear. social process
✔✔social reproduction - ✔✔process by which society reproduces itself overtime, not
just and individual level
✔✔affines - ✔✔related by marriage
✔✔cognates - ✔✔sharing descent
✔✔exogamy - ✔✔marrying outside of your group
✔✔endogamy - ✔✔marrying inside your group
✔✔descent - ✔✔matrilineal, patrilineal, consanguineous (blood relatives), bilateral
✔✔rites of passage - ✔✔separation from what you were, liminality, reincorporation
✔✔economic anthro - ✔✔including non market societies, how exchange embedded in
other aspects of social life, how econ distinguishes categories of person/ thing
, ✔✔reciprocity - ✔✔give a gift back
✔✔redistribution - ✔✔centralized acquisition and distribution of goods (includes
taxation)
✔✔market relations - ✔✔competitive buying and selling (includes commodities)
✔✔polygamy - ✔✔man has many wives
✔✔polyandry - ✔✔woman has many husbands
✔✔cultural evolution of kin - ✔✔matril--partil--bilat
✔✔structural functionism - ✔✔viewed social institutions like kinship as keys to
maintaining social order
✔✔post structuralism - ✔✔concerned with how categories are made/ maintained,
emphasis on power and historical change
✔✔prop 8 - ✔✔only marriage between a woman and man in CA (old law)
✔✔social categories - ✔✔ie men/ women, categories by which people are understood
as parts of groups, based on socially significant characteristics, power laden, categories
existence/ power vary cross culturally
✔✔social construction - ✔✔a category/ phenomenon that 's defined and givien meaning
through social processes, ie race, not essential, must be maintained and reaffirmed,
powerful
✔✔race - ✔✔looks, but also power, situation, issues, etc
✔✔polygenesis - ✔✔idea in 18-19 cent that races developed from diff origins
✔✔monogenesis - ✔✔same origin, but why different results?
✔✔eugenics - ✔✔study race then improve it through selective breeding
✔✔franz boaz - ✔✔first eugenics program in the US, he was DE/ Jewish imm, stated
that everyone is culturally complex not better worse, must know history (cultural
particularism). All humans can lear, have equal abilities, vs eugenics
✔✔Joseph mengela - ✔✔concentration camp experiements, anthro
✔✔web dubois - ✔✔ethnographic research, holistic study of culture, no innate groups
WITH ANSWERS GRADED A+
✔✔cultural materialism - ✔✔rooted in marxian tradition/ Karl Marx. material conditions
of existence (tech/ econ) determine social relations that ar reflected and reinforced by
these beliefs
✔✔structuralism - ✔✔associated with Claude Levi Strauss. culture reflects human need
to organize their world through categories. In vs out group, but doesn't explain structure
changes, creates very strict groups
✔✔symbolic anthropology - ✔✔post structuralism, study of how people communicate
through symbols. Examine symbols in their social/ cultural context, ie language: sounds
stand for object, ie "ball" unconscious in use, no obvious connection between meaning
and symbol
✔✔interpretive anthropology - ✔✔form of symbolic anthropology (its child), approaches
culture as a text: analyze symbols and meanings in cultural/ historical contexts. studies
how people interpret their own lives, emphasis on text and interpretation
✔✔cultural production - ✔✔culture is staged/ dramatized, accomplished unevenly: high
status
✔✔life cycle - ✔✔division of life into meaningful segments/ stages, stages are not
obvious or universal, not always linear. social process
✔✔social reproduction - ✔✔process by which society reproduces itself overtime, not
just and individual level
✔✔affines - ✔✔related by marriage
✔✔cognates - ✔✔sharing descent
✔✔exogamy - ✔✔marrying outside of your group
✔✔endogamy - ✔✔marrying inside your group
✔✔descent - ✔✔matrilineal, patrilineal, consanguineous (blood relatives), bilateral
✔✔rites of passage - ✔✔separation from what you were, liminality, reincorporation
✔✔economic anthro - ✔✔including non market societies, how exchange embedded in
other aspects of social life, how econ distinguishes categories of person/ thing
, ✔✔reciprocity - ✔✔give a gift back
✔✔redistribution - ✔✔centralized acquisition and distribution of goods (includes
taxation)
✔✔market relations - ✔✔competitive buying and selling (includes commodities)
✔✔polygamy - ✔✔man has many wives
✔✔polyandry - ✔✔woman has many husbands
✔✔cultural evolution of kin - ✔✔matril--partil--bilat
✔✔structural functionism - ✔✔viewed social institutions like kinship as keys to
maintaining social order
✔✔post structuralism - ✔✔concerned with how categories are made/ maintained,
emphasis on power and historical change
✔✔prop 8 - ✔✔only marriage between a woman and man in CA (old law)
✔✔social categories - ✔✔ie men/ women, categories by which people are understood
as parts of groups, based on socially significant characteristics, power laden, categories
existence/ power vary cross culturally
✔✔social construction - ✔✔a category/ phenomenon that 's defined and givien meaning
through social processes, ie race, not essential, must be maintained and reaffirmed,
powerful
✔✔race - ✔✔looks, but also power, situation, issues, etc
✔✔polygenesis - ✔✔idea in 18-19 cent that races developed from diff origins
✔✔monogenesis - ✔✔same origin, but why different results?
✔✔eugenics - ✔✔study race then improve it through selective breeding
✔✔franz boaz - ✔✔first eugenics program in the US, he was DE/ Jewish imm, stated
that everyone is culturally complex not better worse, must know history (cultural
particularism). All humans can lear, have equal abilities, vs eugenics
✔✔Joseph mengela - ✔✔concentration camp experiements, anthro
✔✔web dubois - ✔✔ethnographic research, holistic study of culture, no innate groups
