CULTURAL AND HUMAN FACTORS IN RURAL DEVELOPMENT (UNIT-1)

Introduction

Anthropology is the scientific, comparative and holistic study of the human being and it is the
study of human being and all the things they do, think, say and make. Anthropology is a uniquely
wide-ranging discipline because of its twin perspective-biological and cultural. It is also often
described as the bio-cultural since it includes every aspect of the human existence and activities.
Anthropology also describe in the holistic approach.

It is comparative study in which it seeks to compare and contrast the differences among the
human groups and comprehensive since no human group is excluded.

Definition

“Anthropology is the study of a mankind especially of its societies and customer, study of
structure and evolution of the man as an animal.” (Oxford dictionary)

“Anthropology is the scientific study of the physical, cultural, social development and behavior of
human being as their appearance on earth.” (Jacobs and Stern)

“Anthropology is the broad scientific discipline which is dedicated to the comparative study of
mankind from its first appearance to present stage of development.” (Dictionary of Anthropology)

Origin and Development

Mr. Edward B. Taylor was the father of Anthropology in 1872. Bohannan explains, “For many
years in the 19th century, anthropology was said to be Mr. Taylor science in England”. Edward
Taylor under the influence of Mr. Mathew Arnold and others in his days adopted the word
Anthropology and the study of cultural from Germany. In 20th century, according to T. K. Penn
Inman have formed the following steps:

 Formulator period – Before 1835

 Convergent period – (1835-1859)
 Constructive period – (1859-1900)

From the period of this or E. B. Taylor Anthropology is divided into two terms:

 Physical Anthropology
 Cultural Anthropology

Critical Period

During the critical period (1900-1935) it is divided into two terms that is: Evolutionism and
Expansionism. After critical study of evolutionism and expansionism it becomes to

 Functionalism
 Structuralism

Different anthropologists around the 20th century, defined anthropology as the Convergence and
Consideration period – After 1935.
Natural and Scope

 Empirical (first hand information)

 Cumulative
 Objectivity
 Predictable

Anthropology used scientific method to collect data, to interpret data, to generalize and to
formulate theories. Anthropology, the study of people can be considered as a scientific discipline.
Unlink most other science, however, anthropology is both social science as well as biological
science depending on exactly what is being studied with what degree of subjectivity or objectivity.

Scope Anthropology

 1930 Anthropology studied only about non-western people.

 2nd world war anthropological studied primarily focused on tribal people, especially Asian
and African tribal, Australian aborigines etc.
 Since World War II, anthropologists have increasingly studies peasant communities of
Latin America, Asia, Africa, Europe and many new studies are focuses on urban settings
of third world war as well as western countries.
 It is wide discipline and scope of anthropology is broader than any other social science. It
studies physical, social, cultural development and behavior of human beings from past to
present.

Area of Anthropology

 The study of man (Physical aspect)

 Human evolution
 Variation
 Biological

1. Study of work of man (Social aspect)

 Pre-historical Archaeology
 Cultural Anthropology (this is the total study of human life.)

2. The study of racial and cultural distribution of man on the earth

 Comparative study of races

 Present distribution of races
 Migration and diffusion of races

Conclusion

Any maters to human being from past to present are the subject matter of the Anthropology and
physical and cultural totality of human beings in the scope of Anthropology.

Branches of Anthropology

1. Academic anthropology

 Physical anthropology
 Cultural anthropology
Physical Anthropology: is also known as the Biological Anthropology. “Physical Anthropology is
concerned with body characteristics of the men.”(Paddington).
It tries to trace the ancestry of the human species in order to understand how, when and why we
because the kind of human beings as we are today.

Cultural Anthropology

 Archaeology and human language

 Studies origin of history and development of social and cultural factors of human
 Heritage of customs and beliefs
 Human ecology: System of adaptation of men on earth from the beginning
 Political anthropology: Study of political institution
 Economic anthropology: It is study of production and exchange of goods
 Legal anthropology: It is the study of the law or rules of the state

Archaeology derived from two words Archaios and Logia, which mean ancient and the logia
means to study about human life. It is classified into three periods, which are as follows:

 Paleolithic period – stone age that is before 20000 years

 Mesolithic period – from stone age to bond age (20000-7500yrs.)
 Neolithic period - metal age, in which metal weapons were made (7500-3500yrs)

Archaeology is concerned with the human not only past but also ideas, values and customs
before the origin of writing and it deals with ancient culture and past phase of modern civilization.

Ethnology

 Comparative study of human races and their culture

 It is the branches of cultural anthropology that studies cultural institution like social,
political, economical, religious, etc. and related to one another to understand the total
cultural system of particular group.

Linguistic Anthropology

It studies the different language comparatively and describes the present language and studies
past language to understand how people perceive themselves and around them.

2. Applied anthropology

 Human evolution
 Human variation

Relation of Anthropology with other social sciences

 Anthropology and Sociology

 Anthropology and Political Science
 Anthropology and History
 Anthropology and Economics
 Anthropology and Economic Activities

Organization and functions of political institution: Political science is only political study of the
human being but anthropology is the holistic study of them.
Dissimilarity

 Anthropology – holistic approach

 Anthropology – general social science other social science – specific
 Anthropology studies biological aspect of human beings
 Anthropology primary used first hand information

Development of Anthropology

 Modernization
 Trickle down approach

Only economic growth is not development, equitable distribution is development. During 1990’s
two school of thought are formed such as:

 Development Anthropology
 Anthropology of Development

Bhowmix defines Development Anthropology is directly related to the social change and cultural
contact. This is oriented towards the better planning of social development schemes by adequate
data collection and proper analysis of this information for such development programs to achieve
the positively better result.

 1881 – Lane Fox Pitt rivers

 1920 – A.R. Radcliff
 1929 – Bronislaw Malinowski
 1920 – Establishment of African institution
 1930 – Anthropological unit was formed in USA
 1941 – American society of applied anthropology was formed in USA and a Journal
published namely “Human Organization”

Different Approaches of Development Anthropology

Ralf Paddington

 A roof from practical use

 Remain far from practical matter
 Involve in pure research teaching and publication
 Involvement in development activities as a consultant
 Involvement in each an every stage of project

Gerald D. Berreman

a. Human engineers - directly involve in human activities

 Practicing Anthropology: It shares the knowledge and idea in market. Its main work is
program implementation but it doesn’t make policies and so on.

 Public Interest Anthropologist: Development projects and programs should be

implemented according to the need of the public.
 b. Ivory Tower Anthropologists are involved in the pure academic research only.

Larry Nayor

a. Consultative approach

 As a consultant
 Relation with administrator only in implementation

b. Research and development approach

 Research and Development

 Interview approach

c. Action approach

 Two fold approach

 Learning by doing

d. Claims litigation approach: Social and general discrimination and human rights.

Development Anthropology

 Glyn Cochrane 1971-Development Anthropology

 Anthropologists cure the ills of the society as physician cure the ills of patient
 Knowledge of local cultural system
 Sophisticated knowledge
 Knowledge about how to implement policy and program.

Development Anthropology has a sound footing to work for the people, involving the people in a
concrete way for both spectral and overall development. It refers to the use of anthropological
knowledge and methods for the purpose of rationally and humanely solving contemporary social,
economic and technological problems and it also seeks to improve the livelihood condition of the
people in practical life.

It involves in raising the issue of human society by providing information and tries to solve the
practical problems by creation appropriate policy and taking action.

Anthropology of Development

 Critically analyzes the development

 Studies the historical emergence of development
 Why development is western biased?
 Criticized the role of development institution such as NGOs, INGOs, WB
 Anthropology of development is a recent approach that critically studies the development
process to justify development in essence which has different implementation that the
intended ones.
 Development is an illusion

Negative Impact of Development in Underdeveloped Countries

  Unemployment
 Dependency
 Deteriorates ethnic identity and indigenous knowledge
 Brain drain in local communities

In general anthropology of development can be loosely arranged around the following themes:

1. The social and cultural effects of economic growth change

 Rural to urban migration

 Agricultural change and polarization
 The gender effects of economic change

2. The socio-cultural effects of development projects

 Trickle down approach

 Lack of understanding of socio-cultural condition of particular place
 To develop under-developed countries, state should use their resources and knowledge

3. The internal working and discourse of aid industry

 Any countries have their own working mechanism

 Aid industries discuss about the development of the countries

Practicing Anthropology

Practicing Anthropology is the new field of anthropology, which is opened up outside the
academy. Practicing Anthropologists are either self-employed in many case or employees with
agencies and corporations for others. Their activities are widely varied and changed according to
the assignments. They include in the research, management, evaluation, training, consultation,
advocacy and so forth. The results are judged by the employer and clients, usually according to
their own standard result of evaluation that is direct consequences for future job or assignments.

According to Willigen, “It appears unlikely that the large numbers of anthropologists entering the
job market as practicing anthropologists now will take academic job in the future. They will not
return because there will be no jobs for them, their salary expectation can’t meet and they just
don’t want to.”

CULTURAL AND HUMAN FACTORS IN RURAL DEVELOPMENT

Cultural factor in Rural Development

Regional

 Regional is the richest source of value.

 Poor feel justified in their poverty.
 The rich celebrate their success as evidence of god’s blessing and the poor see their
condition as God’s condemnation.

Trust in the individual

 Principal engine of development is the work and creativity of individuals

  To trust the individuals to have faith in the individual is one of the value systems that
favor development

The moral imperative

 Highest level of morality; altruistic and self-denying

 Lowest; criminal, disregard for the rights of others
 Intermediate; a reasonable egoism
 In development favorable culture, there is wide spread compliance with laws and norms.
Two concept of wealth

 In development resistant society, wealth above all consists of what exists

 In favorable society, wealth above all, consists what does not exist
 In underdeveloped world, principle wealth is land and what derived from it
 In developed world, principle wealth resides in the promising process of innovation

Two views of competition, healthy and negative

Two notions of justice

 In resistant societies, the distributive justice is concerned with those who are now
(consumption is higher than saving)
 In favorable societies, the distributive justice is also concerned with the future generation
(saving is greater than consumption)

Value of work

 Work is not highly valued in progress resistant societies but highly valued in progress
prone societies

To educate is not to brain wash

 Education is the principle instrument for the nurturing of individual capacity and ability in
development favorable culture.
 In resistant culture, education is a process that transmits, dogma, producing conformists
and followers.

The importance of utility

The role of heresy (Unpardonable crime which is not sin)

 Questioning minds creates innovation and innovation is the engine of development but in
religious views scientific innovation is heresy. This is against to the religious myth.

Time focus

 For stages of time, past, present, immediate future and distant future
 The time focus of advance society is future i.e. within reach
 Characteristics of traditional culture are the exaltation of the past

The lesser virtues

 Traditional virtual, love, justice, courage and management

  Lesser virtual, a job well done, tidiness, courtesy punctuality. These contribute to both
efficiency and harmoniousness in human relation

Rationality

 The developed work is characterized by its emphasis on rationality

 The rational person derives satisfaction at the end of the day from achievement and the
progress of the consequences of vast sum of small achievement

Authority

 Rational society; power resides in the law, supremacy of law, society function according
to the rationality attributed to the cosmos – natural law
 In resistant society only few person are authorized

World view

• Development favorable; the world is seen at setting for action

• Development resistant; the world is perceived as a vast entity in which irresistible forces
(e.g. God, the Devil, Capitalism, Marxism, etc.) manifest themselves

Life view

 Favorable; life is something that will make happy

 Resistant; life is something that happen to me

Salvation from or in the world

 Resistant; the goal of life is to save oneself from the world, i.e. quest of other world, the
world after death
 Favorable; salvation is depends on the individuals efforts to transform this world

Two utopias

 Favorable; the world progress slowly towards a distance utopia through the creativity and
efforts of individuals
 Resistant; individual seeks early utopia i.e. beyond reach

The natural of optimism

 Resistant optimist is the person who expects that luck, the Gods or the powerful will favor
him or her
 Favorable optimist is the person who is resolved to do whatever is necessary to assure a
satisfactory destiny

Two vision of democracy

• Resistant; legal limits and power are not dispersed

• Favorable; power is dispersed among different sectors and law is supreme

Human Factor in Rural Development

Sympathy Empathy Hard working nature
Fatalistic value Entitlement Rationality
Rational thinking Thinking power Life guided value
Cause-effect relations Epistemology Conflict
Challenges Competition Egoism
Self-reliance Self esteem Peoples experience
Endurance. Level of personal development with in people

INEVITABILITY OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE/METHODS IN RD PROCESS

General Context

 Before 1970’s development paradigm was more eco-centric and techno-centric, cultural
aspects were missing.
 At that time, most of the development projects were failed, socio-cultural factors were as
obstacle for the diffusion of innovation.
 Development activities were/are donor motivated and implemented with western
experience they are not succeeded in developed countries.
 It is realized that study about local villagers and their cultures is inevitable for the
development process.
 Post 1970’s, development focus has been social and cultural sector, the problem of
social sector must be addressed to improve economic growth.
 In 1972, the ADB emphasized in the study or rural life of Asian villages for development.
 Concept of target group, focus group or community (for whom development is aimed at)
was emerged along with the study of norms and traditional values as well as caste,
religion, ethnicity etc.

Donor Agencies, Western

Countries/Institutions
Knowledge, money and technology

Rural Development

Development Countries

Conventional Entry Point:

 Ex-post evaluation and impact assessment of the project

 During the crisis of the project, when people don’t participate in project activities

Why Anthropological knowledge is significant: some special features/attributes:

1. Holistic perspective/Approach
  Anthropology studies the any problem in totality
 Holistic approach gives us the potential seeing the target picture-weaver
 Politics are seen in the connections within society as a whole, other policies, the
environment and so forth
 To perspective is effective for anticipating potential consequences of particular actions
 Mapping out as many of the linkage as possible, encourages analysis to come up with
policies or decisions that simultaneously benefit several institutions or sub-groups

Religion
Education
Cast, ethnicity
Food habit, Accessibility to health institution
Sanitation
HEALTH