Student Number: 18461034
Assessment Number: 02
Date of Submission: 17 September 2025
, QUESTION 1: Introductory unit & Lesson 1
a. Applied anthropology is the use of studies, perspectives and observations to
alleviate and address problems that humans are experiencing such as education,
environmental and health challenges. It not only studies cultures and human behaviour
within these cultures but also applies this knowledge to partner with organizations to
find suitable solutions that will not disrespect cultural beliefs and traditions.
Anthropologists observe cultures through fieldwork, taking many factors into account
within the cultural system before interventions are considered. Applied Anthropology
looks at any given culture as a whole taking historical behaviour and tradition into
account thereby not only looking at the issue at hand but rather the broader picture.
(APY3702 2025:8).
Anthropology was influenced by colonial narratives and history, thereby making
applied anthropology as we know and understand it today very much community
oriented. This approach creates a certain responsibility in how it affects people and
does not exist as a study alone, but a valuable resource to solve some of humanity’s
most complicated issues when the knowledge gained is applied (APY3702 2025:7–8).
b. Working together with communities by finding solutions corroboratively, evaluating
and recognizing challenges for them and measuring success defines the pluriversal
approach that is far from the colonial anthropology from the past. By distancing itself
from the Western approach and validating African ideologies and perspectives to come
to a tailored and situational outcome, the Anthropologist acts as a facilitator so that
assorted epistemologies can formulate results. (APY3702 2025:10).
Preserving applied anthropology holds a responsibility to compassionate socially
conscious practice. Working together with diverse cultures to find solutions that are
ethical, and considerate to the highest degree of the influence it will have on the people
it will affect, precisely the united perspective Mignolo invokes (APY3702 2025:10).
QUESTION 2: Lesson 3
Participant observation
Planned and consistent long-term participation in day-to-day life establishes trust and
provides a valuable inside view of the effects of implemented programmes. It promotes