ANTHROPOLOGY

Every one of us comes into the world in a natural state with a biological profile, but over time we acquire a cultural identity, etched into our minds and sometimes into our very skin.

Japanese tattoo artist Horiyoshi III with his newborn son.

ANTHROPOLOGY

•Recent product of Western Civilization•It is the study of humankind in all times and places.•Anthropologists have traditionally focused on non-

Western peoples and cultures.

ANTHROPOLOGYAdopts holistic approach

focus on the interconnections and interdependence of all aspects of

the human experience in all places, in the present and deep into the past, well before written history

A fundamental principle of anthropology, that the various

parts of human culture and biology must be viewed in the broadest

possible context in order to understand their interconnections

and interdependence.

CULTURE BOUND

•Avoids culture-bound, which is theories about the world and reality based on the assumptions and values of one’s own culture

EXAMPLE OF CULTURE BOUND•An infant sleeps in separate room apart from his

parents.• To most North Americans, this may seem quite normal•Cross-cultural research shows that “co-sleeping,” of mother

and baby in particular, is the rule.

EXAMPLE OF CULTURE BOUND

•Why do so many mothers continue to sleep apart from their infants?• In North America the cultural values of independence and

consumerism come into play. • To begin building individual identities, babies are provided with

rooms (or at least space) of their own. • This room of one’s own also provides parents with a place for the

toys, furniture, and other paraphernalia associated with “good” and “caring” parenting in North America.

FIELDWORK

ANTHROPOLOGY•Employs

•Quantitative approach•Qualitative approach

• Participant observation

•an empirical social science based on observations about humans

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK

Archeological and paleoanthropologists

Excavate in the field

Physical anthropologists

community of people

Example: effects of globalization on nutrition and

growth

Primatologist

Might live in a group of

chimpanzees or baboons

Linguist

Living in a community and study

their language

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK•Fieldwork requires the researcher to step out of his or her cultural comfort zone into a world that is unfamiliar and sometimes unsettling

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK•Challenges

•physical, social, mental, political, and ethical.•adjusting to unaccustomed food, climate, and hygiene conditions

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK

mental challenges

loneliness, feeling like a perpetual

outsider

being socially clumsy and

clueless in their new cultural

settinghaving to be alert always, anything that is happening or being said may

be significant

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK•Political challenges include:

• the possibility of unwittingly letting oneself be used by factions within the community

•being viewed with suspicion by government authorities who may suspect the anthropologist is a spy.

ANTHROPOLOGISTS’ FIELDWORK•ethical dilemmas

•what to do if faced with a cultural practice one finds troubling, such as female circumcision

•how to deal with demands for food supplies and/or medicine;

•the temptation to use deception to gain vital information

ANTHROPOLOGYAND GLOBALIZATION

GLOBALIZATION

•Worldwide interconnectedness, evidenced in global movements of natural resources, trade goods, human labor, finance capital, information, and infectious diseases.

POWERFUL FORCES DRIVING GLOBALIZATION

•Technological innovations•Lower transportation and communication costs•Faster knowledge transfers•Increased trade and financial integration among

countries

GLOBALIZATION

•Anthropologists describe and try to explain how individuals and organizations respond to the massive changes confronting them.

•They may also find out how local responses sometimes change the global flows directed at them.

GLOBALIZATION•Two-edged sword of globalization

generate economic growth and prosperity

undermine long-established institutions

GLOBALIZATION

•Anthropology may not only provide humanity with useful insights concerning diversity, but it may also assist us in avoiding or overcoming significant problems born of that diversity.

EXAMPLES OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDIES ON GLOBALIZATION

RACEemerged in the 18th century as an ideological vehicle for justifying European dominance over Africans and American Indians

differences of skin color are simply surface adaptations to different climactic zones and have nothing to do with physical or mental capabilities.

human “races” are divisive categories based on prejudice, false ideas of differences, and erroneous notions of the superiority of one’s own group.

SAME-SEX MARRIAGE• Legal in Denmark, USA, Spain, Canada, Belgium, and the

Netherlands•Human societies possess beliefs regarding homosexual

behavior, just as they do for heterosexual behavior•Researches illustrate that all human societies define the

boundaries for social relationships but does not dictate that one pattern is more right than another.

CONFUSION OF NATION WITH STATE

•States consists of people, defined territory, governments, and sovereignty

•Nation is a group of people who share a common origin, language, and cultural heritage

•states and nations rarely coincide and usually one of the main sources of conflict• Examples: Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda Genocide