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• Focus on study of humans and
all aspects of being human
• Different from other social
sciences in time and scope
–Key concepts enable the
difference
• Society
• Culture
• Holistic perspective
• Ethnocentrism
• Cultural relativism
• Shared geographical territory
• People living in organized
groups with social roles and
statuses
• Social relations between
individuals and groups
• interdependence
• Language
• Making a Living & Economic
System
• Social Organization, Kinship,
Descent, and Marriage
• Political Organization; Culture
Change
• Religion; Arts
• Concepts of Illness and Disease
• Enculturation
–Culture is learned and
transmitted from one
generation to another
•What is important to know to
act as a member?
–Shaped by keep cultural
values and behavioral patterns
• Culture as an integrated whole
–All parts of culture are
interconnected
• No part of culture can be
studied in isolation
• Studying culture involves
studying the cultural models
people have learned
• Key Question: Why does this
behavior/emotion make sense
in this culture?
• Arrangement of Furniture in USA
reflects core cultural value of
individualism
• Individual bedrooms reflect value
on individualism & consistent with
an economy where families are
dependent on individual wage
earners
• Cultural data is drawn from
throughout the world and from
throughout human history
• Collect data about behavior and
beliefs in many societies in
order to understand the
diversity of human behavior and
emotions
• Understand common patterns in
ways people adapt to their
environment, adjust to their
neighbors, and develop cultural
institutions
• Archaeology
• Physical Anthropology
• Anthropological Linguistics
• Cultural Anthropology
• Study of past cultures
–Prehistoric & historic
• Relay on evidence (artifacts) from
material culture and the sites where
people lived
• Evidence reveals how people lived
as well as relationships between
groups
• Study of language and the
speakers’ use of language
• Relationship between language
and other cultural aspects
–Culture is learned through
language
• Biological Anthropology
• Study of Human origins (evolution)
and contemporary Human variation
• Primate social organization
• Interface between biology and
culture
–Example-Andes greater lung
capacity adaptation to low
oxygen
• “Race” is always a social not a
biological concept
• Conventional Classification of
“Race” is pseudoscience
• Hair texture, skin color and
facial characteristics are
arbitrary and randomly selected
• Skin tone is function of
evolutionary adaptation to
climate
• Solves problems
• Preserves cultural integrity of
groups
• Relies on cultural group for
information about desirable
solutions
• Bridges cultural and biological
anthropology disciplines
• Studies susceptibilities and
resistance of various
populations to disease
• Studies health care delivery
system
• Analyzes human
remains for law
enforcement and
disaster victims’
families
• Investigates human
rights abuses and
genocide
• Manages cultural resources
• Intended to preserve and
protect historic structures and
prehistoric sites
• Use of archaeology to assess
potential impact of construction
on a site
• The ways people organize their
living in societies
• The study of cultural behavior
in recent and contemporary
cultures
• Ethnology – building theories to
explain cultural practices based
on comparative study of
societies throughout the world
• Ethnography – a holistic
intensive study of groups,
through observation, interview
and participation
• The widespread human
tendency to perceive the ways
of doing things and beliefs
about things in one’s culture as
normal and natural and that of
others as strange, inferior, and
possibly unnatural
• Counters Ethnocentrism
• Stresses the importance of
analyzing cultures in their own
terms rather than in terms of the
culture of the anthropologist
• This does not mean that all
cultural practices, cultural
beliefs and behaviors can be
condoned
• Different from ethical relativism
— all right and wrong relative to
time, place, and culture so that
no moral judgments of behavior
can be made
• Distinguishes anthro form other
social sciences
• Cultural contact changes native
cultures
–colonialism
• Cultural transformation is due
to economic and technological
influences