Exam 2 Flashcards
Politics in anthropology
The anthropological approach is global and comparative and includes non-states, while political scientists tend to focus on contemporary nations. Anthropological studies have revealed substantial variation in power, authority, and legal systems in different societies.
Cultural polities: expanding “the political”
Over arching metaphor for the depth of politics in anthropology
Politics as prison
Originally a dry-erase board graphic at the Center for Khmer Studies, this penitentiary model of cultural politics was recently transformed into a labyrinthine prezi presentationx
Bands
-small group size
-flexible composition
-bilateral kinship
-egalitarian ethos & sharing
Ethnographic examples:
-Sans peoples of the Kalahari region
-Inuit of the Arctic
Tribes
Typically have a horticultural or pastoral economy and are organized into villages and/or descent groups
a notional form of human social organization based on a set of smaller groups (known as bands), having temporary or permanent political integration, and defined by traditions of common descent, language, culture, and ideology
NOT: Tribes have no formal government and no reliable means of enforcing political decisions
Pantribal sodalities
A group that developed in situations of warfare with neighboring tribes or nation-states, the Iroquois Confederacy is an example of this kind of political organization
Chiefdoms
Autonomous political unit of communities under permanent control of a paramount cheif.
ex: Kwakiutl, Pacific Northwest coast, Genghis Khan
States
Political and military rule by central government. Based on socioeconomic stratification.
States autonomous political units with social strata and a formal government. States tend to be large and populous, and certain statues, systems, and subsystems with specialized functions are found in all states
The presence of stratification is one of the key distinguishing features of a state
Max Weber
Maximilian “Max” Karl Emil Weber was a German sociologist, historian, jurist and political economist, who is regarded as among the most important theorists of the development of modern Western society. His ideas profoundly influence social theory and research.
had a profound influence on anthropological methodology and theoretical thinking on the relationship between religion and political economy
Weber defines “states” as:
“The state is a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory”
Social stratification:
Wealth
Power
Prestige
-Social Stratification (transition from chiefdom to state)
unrelated groups that differ in their access to wealth, prestige, and power/ the creation of separate social strata
-Wealth/economic status -> material assets (income and
property)
-Power/political status -> exercising will over others =
the basis for political status
-Prestige/social status -> the basis of social status =
respect, esteem, and
“cultural capital”
gives people a sense of worth and respect, which they
may often convert into economic advantage
Politics of underground economies
Written by Thai economists, “Guns, Girls, Gambling, and Ganja” describes the vice politics of these
The underground economy involves the exchange of goods and services which are hidden from official view
Illegal food
Shark fin soup, durian, unpasteurized milk, and certain distillations of Absinthe are examples of this category of prohibited edibles
Coercion
The practice of persuading someone to do something by using force or threats
Compelling an individual or group—either intellectually, morally, or physically—to do something; using force or threatening to use force.
The use of physical force. Persuasive Power. A form of power that influences people’s activities or ideas without relying on physical force.
Surveillance
The systematic monitoring of people or groups in order to regulate or govern their behavior
The monitoring of behavior, many activities, or information for the purpose of information gathering, influencing, managing or directing
Social Control
Refers to “those fields of the social system (beliefs, practices and institutions) that are most actively involved in the maintenance of any norms and the regulation of any conflict”
Include various techniques of persuading and managing people and of monitoring and recording their beliefs, activities, and contacts
“Informal” social control such as stigma, shame, and gossip, especially in small-scale societies/ non-western societies
Ju/’hoan Hxaro exchange
This is a Ju/’hoan delayed form of nonequivalent gift exchange
Is a far reaching and ingenious mechanism for circulating goods, lubricating social relations, and maintaining ecological balance. EX: “I’ll give you something today, and you give me something in return six months or a year from now”. What you return does not have to be of precisely equivalent value as long as things balance out in the long run.
Weapons of the Weak
Shame and Gossip can be a powerful social sanction.
Since it has the ability to spoil social reputation/ alienate people from their social networks
People aren’t just citizens of governments; they are members of society, and social sanctions exist alongside governmental ones. Such sanctions (shame and gossip) exemplify other “weapons of the weak” because they often are wielded most effectively by people, such as women or young people, who have limited access to formal authority structure.
Cross-cultural approaches to religion
“In studying religion cross-culturally anthropologist pay attention to religion as a social phenomenon as well as to the meanings of religious doctrines, settings, acts, and events. Verbal manifestations of religious beliefs…purity and pollution, sacrifice, initiation, rites of passage, vision quests, pilgrimages, sprit possession, prophecy, study, devotion, and moral actions”
Sacred and secular/profane
In lecture, the Sensōji Temple in Tokyo built as shrine to Kannon (a feminine form of the Bodhisattava in Japan), including its Thunder Gate, and Nakamise shopping district was used to demonstrate this binary concept
secular rituals include formal invariant, stereotyped, earnest, repetitive behavior and rites of passage that take place in nonreligious settings
For Emile Durkheim, the key distinction was between the sacred and the profane. “sacred” was the domain set off from the ordinary, or the mundane (profane).
It isn’t always easy to distinguish the sacred form the profane and that different societies conceptualize divinity, the sacred, the supernatural and the ultimate realities very differently
Religion
Doctrines, settings, acts, and events…Verbal manifestations of belief..purity and pollution, sacrifice initiation, rites of passage, vision quests, pilgrimages, spirit possession, prophecy, study, devotion, and moral actions,” are cross-cultural aspects of this
Pilgrimage
A religious journey to a sacred place as a sign of devotion in search of transformation and enlightenment
Communitas
Victor Turner’s (1969) concept of “an intense community spirit, a feeling of great social solidarity, equality and togetherness”
Social construciton of reality
According to Michael Lambek, “Good anthropology understands that religious worlds are real, vivid, and significant to those who construct and inhabit them.” This is humanistic concept describes the fundamentally manufactured nature of the social universe.
Religion embedded in politics and economics
Religious belief may help regulate the economy or permeate politics
Ex: the name of the airport being named something sacred, and the religious shrine
In the airport faith meets economy with the stores surrounding the shrine
Revitalization movements
Social movements that occur in times of change, in which religious leaders emerge and undertake to alter or revitalize a society
Like political mobilization, religious energy can be harnessed not just for change but also for revolution. Reacting to conquest or to actual or perceived foreign domination, for instance, religious leaders may seek to alter or revitalize their society.
EX: Christianity originated as a revitalization movement. Jesus was one of several prophets who preached new religious doctrines while the Middle East was under Roman rule. It was a time of social unrest, when a foreign power ruled the land. Jesus inspired a new, enduring and major religion. His contemporaries were not so successful.
Baseball Magic:
Ritual
Taboo
Fetish
-Magic: described as the use of supernatural techniques to accomplish specific aims
Baseball magic reduces psychological stress, creating an illusion of control when real control is lacking
-Ritual: An act or series of acts regularly repeated that embody the beliefs of a group of people
-Taboo: prohibition backed by supernatural sanctions/ actions set apart as sacred and off-limits to ordinary people
-Fetish: the primitive belief that godly powers can inhere in inanimate things/ when somethings, mainly an object, is embodied with supernatural power
Shamans
Religious specialists
This part-times religious practitioner mediates between ordinary people and supernatural beings and forces
Is a general term that encompasses curers (“witch doctors”), mediums, spiritualist, astrologers, palm readers, and other independent diviners. In foraging societies, shamans are usually part-time; that is, they also hunt and gather
Animism
The belief that non-human entities have souls
EX: Melanesian “Mana
Polytheism
The belief in multiple gods
Monotheism
The belief in a single all-powerful deity
Syncretism
A melding of different, often seemingly contradictory belies and practices/ a mixing of elements from different religious systems or traditions
Rites of passage (separation, liminality, reincorporation)
-Rites of passage: a category of ritual that enacts a change of status from one life stage to another (can be individual or collective)
Characterized by
-Separation: withdrawal from society
-Liminality: a transitional state; it is the limbo, or “time-out” during which people have left one status but have’ yet entered or joined the next; liminal people exist apart from ordinary distinctions and expectations
-Incorporation: reincorporation; reentering society having completed a rite that changes their status
Totemism
Totems could be animals, plants, or geographical features. Members of each totemic group believed themselves to be descendants of their totem/system of belief in which humans are said to have kinship or a mystical relationship with a spirit-being, such as an animal or plant
An animal, plant, or geographic feature associated with a specific social group, to which that totem is sacred or symbolically important
Totems are sacred emblems symbolizing common identity.
Ju/’hoan religion- //gangwasi
The system developed by the Ju/′hoansi to make sense of their world involves forces beyond the natural order. Their universe is inhabited by a high god, a lesser god, and a host of minor animal spirits that bring luck and mis- fortune, success and failure. But the main actors in this world are the //gangwasi, the ghosts of recently deceased Ju/′hoansi. The //gangwasi, not long before the beloved parents, kin, and friends of the living, hover near the Ju villages, and when serious illness or misfortune strikes, it is almost always the //gangwasi who cause it.
Language and communication
Language=symbols
Representations of something else, whether material or immaterial.
Anything we can apprehend with our senses that communicates meaning.
Language spoken (speech) and written (writing-which has existed for less than 6000 years) is our primary means of communication.
Language is based on arbitrary, learned associations between words and the things they stand for. Unlike the communication systems of other animals, language allows us to discuss the pas and future, share out experiences with others, and benefit from their experiences.
Communication came to rely almost totally on learning.
We communicate when we transmit information about ourselves to others and receive such information from them.
Nonverbal communication
We communicate when we transmit information about ourselves to others and receive such information from them. Our expressions, stances, gestures, and movements, even if unconscious, convey information and are part of our communication styles.
Kinesics
The study of how gestures, postures, and facial expressions communicate and convey messages without words
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
Rather than seeking universal linguistic structures and processes, they believe that different languages produce different ways of thinking. This position sometimes is known as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.
They argued that the grammatical categories of particular languages lead their speakers to think about things in different ways.
Language determines what humans are capable of thinking.
Language is shaping force that guides people’s thinking and behavior.
EX: Hopi subjective future verb tense; the hypothesis argues that this difference leads Hopi speakers to think about time and reality in different ways than English speakers do.
Focal vocabulary
Specialized sets of terms that particularly important to certain groups.
Lexicon influences perception
Gender speech contrasts
According to Robin Lakoff (2004), the use of certain types of words and expressions has been associated with women’s traditional lesser power in American society.
Women, says Tannen, typically use language and the body movements that accompany it to build rapport, social connections with others. Men, on the other hand, tend to make reports, reciting information to establish a place for themselves in a hierarchy, as they also attempt to determine the relative ranks of their conversation mates
Keith Basso and “To Give Up on Words”
-Keith Basso
15 March 1940- 4 August 2013
Cultural and linguistic anthropologist
Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language Among the Western Apache (1996)
“Knowledge of places is closely linked to knowledge of the self, to grasping one’s position in the larger scheme of things, and to securing a confident sense who one is a person.”
-“to give up on words”
Dives into the stereotype of Apache silence and what silence truly is. The anonymous quote at the beginning of the article “It is not the case that a man who is silent says nothing.” encapsulates the main idea of the article
Silence is used in Western Apache culture:
During initial courtship rituals with a new
girlfriend or boyfriend
When meeting strangers for the first time
When getting “cussed out”
Keeping silent in Western Apache culture is associated with social situations where participants perceive their relationships with one another to be ambiguous and/or unpred
Sociolingustics
Investigates relationships between social and linguistic variation
Sociolinguistics instead examines how language relates to various social groups and identities like race, gender, class, and age.
Lost and endangered languages
Unlike Navajo, Wukchumni is only spoken by a limited number of native speakers making it one of these
American Tongues
American Tongues is a 1988 sociolinguistic documentary examining American English dialects and accents and perceptions thereof.
Symbols and types of symbols
As something verbal or non-verbal standing for something else , these could also be described as arbitrary and conventional, meaningful, and the foundational basis of cultural life.
Representations of something else, whether material or immaterial.
Anything we can apprehend with our senses that communicates meaning.
Beyond written symbols->experiential data
Audial and visual symbols: Encoded in memory (i.e. music)
Language as audio and visual system of symbols
Physical Symbols: Material representations and abstract ideas
Hand signals, body postures, and sign languages
Tactile symbols: Encoded tactile memory, braille and other tactical languages
Olfactory symbols: Also encode memories and associations
Expressions of pleasure, pain, nausea, and nostalgia
Symbolic anthropology
The study of how people create meaning out of their experiences or construct reality through the use of shared cultural symbols, such as myths or language.
Clifford Geertz and “Notes on a Balinese Cockfight”
American cultural anthropologist
New approach: interpretive anthropology
Focus on ‘thick description’
A classic article written in 1972 by Clifford Geertz, who observed cockfighting during his fieldwork in Indonesia. The cockfights are illegal but widespread, with cocks – roosters – serving as proxies for powerful men and their status competition.
Interpretive anthropology
Influenced by Max Weber: “..man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun, I take cultures to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law, but an interpretive one in search of meaning”
A good ethnography is an interpretation of the heart of another culture.
Thick description
Describing the full context of important symbols and actions which are encoded with many layers of meaning.
Thick description is in-depth information that tells not only what is present, but how and why it is there; and what accompanies it; and what emotions and meanings are attached to it.
vs.
Thin description is superficial information that contains no explanations and little or no context.
Culture as text
Clifford Geertz’s approach to cultures as systems of significant symbols including words, gestures, drawings, and objects, interprets cultures as this
Culture is a collection of symbols
Symbols transmit meaning that reveals how people think about their world
Culture is a text of significant symbols: words, gestures, drawings, natural objects-anything that carries meaning
To understand another culture we must decipher the meanings of these symbols of cultural text
Total social fact
“a combination emotional explosion, status war, and philosophical drama of central significance to the society…”
An activity that has implications throughout society, in the economic, legal, political, and religious spheres
Deep play
This term is used by Clifford Geertz to describe a game with stakes so high it is irrational to take part in it
Sexual dimorphism
The physical differences between males and females of the same species
Gender
Concept could be described as the cultural expectations of thought and behavior “of whether one is female, male or something else”
Gender preformance
Gender is the expression what you do at particular times, rather than a universal mandate of who you are
Gender Stratification
This concept describes the unequal distribution of rewards between men and women reflecting their position in a social hierarchy
Domestic-public dichotomy
“the private-public-contrast”
Strong differentiation between the home and outside world (including politics, trade, warfare, or work)
According to this concept, gender stratification increases when domestic and public spheres are sharply separated
Matriarchy
A political system in which women play a more prominent role than men do in social and political organization
Patriarchy
A political system ruled by men where women have inferior social and political status
Gender and violence
Societies that feature a patrilineal-patrilocal complex, with warfare and inter-village raiding, feature patriarchy-based acts of bodily harm
Ju/’hoan marriage-by-capture ceremony
In this Ju/’hoan ritual, women assert an independent voice in decision making against the alliance of parents and potential husbands by dramatically kicking and screaming
Intersex
Formerly described as “hermaphroditism,” this group of conditions involves discrepancies between the external genitals and the internal genitals
Transgender:
“strange country this”
Berdache, two-spirit, Hijra
Transgender people tend to be individuals whose gender identity contradicts their biological sex at birth and the gender identity that society assigned to them in infancy.
“strange country this”, where males assume the dress and perform the duties of females, while women turn male and mate with their own sex
Berdache: “two spirit people” who fulfill mixed gender roles and contribute to the social and spiritual well-being of their communities
Hijra: N. Indian men who become women by undergoing castration and adopting women’s dress and behavior
Identify with and channel Indian mother goddess
Invited for ritualized performance at births and marriage
Campaigned for recognition as 3rd gender on passport
Ethnic groups
Share certain beliefs, values, habits, customs, and norms because of their common background.
They define themselves as different and special because of cultural features. This distinction may arise from language, religion, historical experience, geographic placement, kinship, or “race”.
Makers of an ethnic group may include a collective name, belief in common descent, a sense of solidarity, and an association with a specific territory, which the group may or may not hold.
Not limited to physical traits
Shared cultural characteristics: language, dress, religion, food, history, worldview
Ethnicity is a flexible form of identity that comes out of people’s relationship to others and the world around them.
Racial classification
In the 19th century scientists began to look for scientific evidence that race was a product of nature. Scientists, including anthropologists, of the time, tried to prove, quantify, and classify racial difference and inferiority.
Ju/’hoan “perceptions of the white man”
One of the Ju/’hoan terms for their neighbors, both Black and White, is “wild things of the village,” which used to connote derogatory fear, but is more recently a term of familiarity with social distance.
Race
when a ethnic group is assumed to have a biological basis (distinctively shared “blood” or genes)is is called this term
Ethnicity
Identification with and feeling part of an ethnic group and exclusion from certain other groups because of this affiliation.
Not limited to physical traits
Shared cultural characteristics: language, dress, religion, food, history, worldview
Ethnicity is a flexible form of identity that comes out of people’s relationship to others and the world around them.
Race and nationalism
Blood quantum
Attempts to measure the degree of ancestry for an individual of a specific racial or ethnic group and includes legislation enacted in the United States to define membership in Native American nations
Ethnocide
Destruction by a dominant group of the culture of an ethnic group
A dominant group may try to destroy the cultures of certain ethnic groups or force them to adopt the dominant culture (forced assimilation)
Assimilation
The process of change when a minority group is incorporated into a dominant culture to the point that it no longer exists as a separate cultural unit
