Test Bank For Asking Questions About Cultural Anthropology Concise Introduction 2nd Edition By Robert L. Welsch , Luis A.Vivanco 9780190878078 ALL Chapters .What is anthropology? - ANSWER: A comparative study of humankind. The study of human societies and cultures and their development What does it mean to say that anthropology is holistic? - ANSWER: Anthropologists study the entire range of humans' biological, social, political, economic, and religious behavior as well as the relationships among the different aspects of human behavior in the past and present.What are the main subfields of anthropology? - ANSWER: Cultural anthropology, linguistic anthropology, archaeology, biological (physical) anthropology, and applied anthropology.How did anthropology begin? - ANSWER: During the nineteenth century, the rise of industrialization, the influence of evolutionary theory, and colonial contact with less-industrialized cultures led to the discipline of understanding how cultures operate and interact What is the anthropological position on race? - ANSWER: Race is not a valid scientific category but rather is a social and cultural construct.Give a definition of culture. - ANSWER: The learned, symbolic, at least partially adaptive, and ever- changing patterns of behavior and meaning shared by members of a group. Human are vitally dependent on culture for their existence.Describe the importance of symbols in culture. - ANSWER: Humans understand the world by classifying it and using symbols to give it meaning. Different cultures use different systems of classification. People use symbols to give meaning to their lives. Anthropologists analyze and interpret symbols and rituals to understand cultural meanings.In what ways are cultures like biological organisms, and what are the problems with this organic analogy? - ANSWER: Cultures are systems of related elements working together. However, unlike biological organisms, cultural systems include contradictions that lead to conflict.What are norms and values? Do people within a culture agrees on them? - ANSWER: Shared ideas about the way things ought to be done. Values are shared ideas about what is true, right, and beautiful. Typically, people within a culture do not fully agree on norms and values. Some amount of conflict is the rule, not the exception.Are cultures typically static, or do they change? - ANSWER: All cultures change. Many factors determine the acceptance or rejection of a culture change.What role does anthropology play in coping with cultural differences? - ANSWER: Culture makes humans unique, but the vast differences between human cultures make cultural understandings a challenge. Anthropology supplies tools to meet that challenge.Ethnocentrism - ANSWER: Judging other cultures from the perspective on one's own culture. The notion that one's own culture is more beautiful, rational, and nearer to perfection than any other.Racism - ANSWER: The belief that some human populations are superior to others because of inherited, genetically transmitted characteristics.Cultural Realitivsm - ANSWER: The idea that cultures should be analysed with reference to their own histories and values rather than according to the values of another culture. 1 / 2
Ethnography - ANSWER: The major research tools of cultural anthropology, including both fieldwork among people in a society and the written results of such fieldwork.Participant Observations - ANSWER: The fieldwork technique that involves gathering cultural data by observing people's behavior and participating in their lives.Consultant/Informant/Interlocutor/Respondent/Partner - ANSWER: A person from whom anthropologists gather data.Ethnology - ANSWER: The attempt to find general principles or laws that govern cultural phenomena through the comparison of cultures.Human Relations Area Files - ANSWER: An ethnographic datatbase that includes cultural descriptions of more than 300 societies Postmodernism - ANSWER: A theoretical position in anthropology that focuses on issues of power and voice. They hold that anthropological accounts are partial truths reflecting the backgrounds, training, and social positions of their authors.Collabroative Ethnography - ANSWER: pulls together threads of collaboration between ethnographers and their consultants that have found their way into ethnographic field methods and writing - pulls together threads of collaboration between ethnographers and their consultants that have found their way into ethnographic field methods and writing
Emic perspective - ANSWER: an insider's view of his or her culture
Ethic perspective - ANSWER: An outsider observer's view on culture
What distinguishes ethnographic fieldwork from other types of social research? - ANSWER: ethnographic fieldworks requires anthropologists to live in the community of the people they are studying for an extended period of time. Fieldeork provides rich and nuanced insights of the cultural logic of social life and cultural practices because the reserach gets a chnace to what people do , not just what they say How do anthropologist actually do ethnographic fieldwork? - ANSWER: Becoming involved in peoples live's through participant observation, asking question through interviews and taking notes Other cultural methods anthropologists use - ANSWER: Anthropologist draw on the comprative method, the genealogical method, life histories, ethnohistory, rapid appraisals, action research, anthroplogy at a distance and, the analysis of seondary materials Unique ethical dilemmas faced by anthropologist - ANSWER: Their primary ethical obligation is to protect the interest of informants. In the past few decdades anthropologist have increasingly attempted to help their stuy communities by assisting with locally defined goals or standing up for the rights of individuals in thse communities> Language - ANSWER: A system of communication consisting of sounds, words, and grammar
Proto-language - ANSWER: the common ancestor of a family of modern languages
Cognate words - ANSWER: words in two or more languages that may sound somewhat different todsy but would have changed systematically fomr the same word.Descriptive linguistics - ANSWER: The systematic analysis and description of a language's sound system and grammar - linguist ditinguish three types of structure in language
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