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What Is Anthropology?

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Overview
Anthropology confronts basic questions
of human existence and survival.
How we originated.
How we have changed.
How we are changing still.

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Anthropology is holistic
Interested in the whole of the human
condition
Past, present, and future
Biology
Society
Language
Culture

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Four subfields
Cultural anthropology examines
cultural diversity of the present and
recent past.
Archaeology reconstructs behavior
by studying material remains

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Four subfields
Biological anthropology study of
human fossils, genetics, and bodily
growth and nonhuman primates
Linguistic anthropology considers
how speech varies with social factors
and over time and space

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Human Adaptability
Society organized life in groups
Culture traditions, customs and
innovations that govern behavior and
beliefs
Distinctly human
Transmitted through learning

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Adaptation, Variation, and Change


Adaptation process by which
organisms cope with environmental
forces and stresses
Humans adapt using biological and
cultural means

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Adaptation, Variation, and Change


Rate of change accelerated during the
past 10,000 years
Foraging sole basis of human subsistence
for millions of years
Only took few thousand years for food
production cultivation of plants and
domestication (stockbreeding) of animals

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Adaptation, Variation, and Change


First civilizations arose between 6000
and 5000 B.P. (Before the Present)
More recently, spread of industrial
production profoundly affected human life
Todays global economy and
communications link all contemporary
people, directly or indirectly, in modern
world system

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Table 1.1 Forms of Cultural and Biological


Adaptation (to High Altitude)

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General Anthropology
Academic discipline of anthropology
includes:
Sociocultural (cultural anthropology)
Archaeological
Biological
Linguistic

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Four-field Approach
Developed in U.S.
Early American anthropologists studying
native peoples of North America combined
studies of customs, social life, language,
and physical traits

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General Anthropology

Sound conclusions about human


nature cannot be derived from studying
a single nation, society, or cultural
tradition

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Cultural Forces Shape


Human Biology
Biocultural inclusion and combination (to solve a common problem) of
biological and cultural perspectives and approaches

Culture key environmental force in


determining how human bodies grow
and develop
Cultural standards of attractiveness and
propriety influence participation and
achievement in sports

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Cultural Anthropology
Describes, analyzes, interprets, and
explains social and cultural similarities
and differences
Ethnography Fieldwork in a particular
culture; provides account of that
community, society, or culture
Ethnology cross cultural comparison;
the comparative study of ethnographic
data, of society and of culture

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Table 1.2 Ethnography and Ethnology Two


Dimensions of Cultural Anthropology

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Archeological Anthropology
Study of human behavior and cultural
patterns and process through material
remains

Artifacts (e.g., potsherds, jewelry, and tools)


Garbage
Burials
Remains of structures

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Archeological Anthropology
Archaeologists use paleoecological
studies to establish ecological and
subsistence parameters within which
given groups lived
Archaeological record provides unique
opportunity to look at changes in social
complexity over time

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Archeological Anthropology
Archaeologists also study the cultures
of historical and living people
Historical archaeology combines
archaeological data and textual data to
reconstruct historically known groups
Rathjes garbology shows what people
report may contrast with real behavior

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Biological Anthropology
Study of human biological variation in
time and space
Includes evolution, genetics, growth and
development, and primatology
Draws on biology, zoology, geology,
anatomy, physiology, medicine, public
health, osteology, and archaeology

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Biological Anthropology
Special interests:
Paleoanthropology human evolution as
revealed by the fossil record
Human genetics
Human growth and development
Human biological plasticity Bodys
ability to change
Primatology study of biology, evolution,
behavior, and social life of primates

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Linguistic Anthropology
Study of language in its social and
cultural context across space and time
Historical linguists reconstruct ancient
languages and study linguistic variation
through time
Sociolinguistics investigates
relationships between social and linguistic
variation [anthropological linguistics:] to
discover varied perceptions and patterns of
thought and practice in different cultures

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Anthropology and
Other Academic Fields
Anthropology is a science
Systematic field of study or body of
knowledge that aims, through experiment,
observation, and deduction, to produce
reliable explanations of phenomena with
reference to the material and physical
world

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Anthropology and
Other Academic Fields
Anthropology is an art
Encompasses study of and cross-cultural
comparison of languages, texts,
philosophies, arts, music, performances,
and other forms of creative expression

Form of knowledge is often


intersubjective

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Anthropology and Other


Academic Fields
Cultural Anthropology and Sociology
Share an interest in social relations,
organization, and behavior
Originally, sociologists focused on
industrial West

Anthropology and Psychology


Malinowski contended that cultural context
molds individual psychology

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Science, Explanation,
and Hypothesis Testing
Scientists strive to improve understanding
by testing hypotheses that suggest
explanations of things and events
Explains how and why the thing to be
understood (the explicandum) is related to
other things in some known way
Associations observed relationships
between two or more measured variables

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Science, Explanation,
and Hypothesis Testing
A theory is more general
Explanatory framework, containing a series
of statements, that helps us understand
why (something exists or happens in a
particular way)
Theories suggest patterns, connections,
and relationships that may be confirmed by
new research

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Science, Explanation,
and Hypothesis Testing
Associations usually state probabilistically
with two or more variables that tend to be
related in a predictable way, but there are
exceptions
Theories cannot be proved; we evaluate
them through the method of falsification
Theories that are not disproved are
accepted because the available evidence
seems to support them

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