Final Exam after midterm Flashcards
Why is sex an important social organization priniciple?
- affects status, economic division of labour, political roles, inheritance, etc.
- division of labour
- often, men hunt, use plough, trade, take on leadership and warrior role in 88% of cultures
- often, women gather, prepare food, care for children, gather wood and fuel
- theories: compatibility with childcare, expendability, strength, economy of effort
What is the definition of sex?
Sex is the observable, reproductive females and males in a population
What are the different ways sex can be defined?
- Morphological sex = genitals, secondary sexual features, reproductive structures (uterus)
- sexual dimorphism - Gonadal sex
- Chromosomal sex
- Hormonal predominance
Dualistic sex in North America
How has the control of sex impacted human rights?
Has created
- Sexual taboos
- Sexual double standard
- human rights issues
- control of female sexuality in patrilineal systems
- seclusion, “honour killings”, child marriage, FGM/FGC (optional website reading available)
- dowry murders
What is the definition of intersex?
Intersex people cannot be strictly classified as male or female – “hermaphrodites” or androgynous
- causes of intersex
- “five sexes”intersex issues (e.g. Castor Semenya, Ren Kauffman)
What is the definition of gender?
culturally ‘appropriate’ behaviours and/or roles for a sex
How is gender assigned?
Gender can be assigned based on:
1. physical attributes (sex)
2. behavioural attributes (emotions, likes/dislikes)
3. gender role they choose (‘appropriate’ activities) e.g. caregiver, hunter
4 . identity - what a person feels they are; assigning a gender to oneself based on identification of “sameness”
5. sexuality (attraction/eroticism, mate choice)
What is meant by supernumerary genders?
Gender varies by culture (minimum two of M/F), but can have 3 or more
Supernumerary gender = culturally recognized extra gender category
- Twin Spirits (e.g. ‘berdache’) in 150+ First Nations cultures and others
- Manly hearted women (‘amazon’)
- Womanly hearted men (e.g. castrati, hijras, cochònes)
-‘X’ (indeterminate) in Canada, UK, Germany, Australia, India, Nepal and others
What is a complex society?
- Non-egalitarian (unequal access to wealth, power and prestige); presence of classes
- different settlements in a hierarchy
- Does not imply “smarter than those backward savages”!
Explain the civilization traits associated with monument architecture
- populations & war: cities, mounds, defensive walls
* infrastructure: public buildings for religion and; admin, canals, roads, sewers and aqueducts
Explain the civilization traits associated with ascribed status
- tombs and grave goods; infant burials (ascribed status)
- house variations; built on platforms, art, multiple rooms or storeys
Explain the civilization traits associated with occupational specialization
- standing army, priestly class, bureaucrats
- concentration of artifacts, manufacture, art
- pottery, metalworking, carpentry, stonemasons, jewelers, leatherworking…
Explain the civilization traits associated with artifacts of legitimization
- support from supernatural
- “best ruler” in time of trouble
Explain the civilization traits associated with trade items
- luxury items, trade seals
- evidence for trade: exotics and sourcing
Explain the civilization traits associated with writing
- trade and taxation
- legal/government
- astronomy (Halley’s Comet)
- religious
- world/geographic
What are the theories for the rise of states?
- Leisure time from domestication
- Water and irrigation management
- Population growth, social control
- Land shortage, conflict, warfare
- Trade and cultural sharing
- no one theory is applicable to all situations
- multifaceted approach seems most useful
Define economic systems
How cultures meet material needs and make a living
- economic activities include production, distribution and consumption
Explain modes of production in an economic system
Modes of production are the means by which raw resources are transformed into useful goods
Division of labour is the assignment of daily tasks by gender, age, status or job specialization
Different ways to divide labour
- domestic mode = kin (family) group
- tributary mode = means of production supplied by elite and tribute is extracted in return (e.g. serfdom)
- capitalist/industrial = means of production individually owned, labour is sold
Explain how distribution and modes of exchange occur in an economic system
- reciprocity is exchange without money
- generalized (e.g. parents and children)
- balanced (e.g. trade, Kula ring)
- negative (e.g. bargaining, theft) - redistribution accumulates goods/labour centrally, distribution according to needs
- EI, taxes, Kwakiutl potlatch, etc. - market exchange is based on supply and demand in a marketplace, contracts for labour, and money (general and specific purpose money)
Explain consumption and affluence in an economic system
Consumption is using up of material goods
- basic need, availability
- cultural choices and economic systems (India’s Sacred Cow)
Affluence is when resources and production outweigh consumption
- earn more, or minimize “needs” (desires)
- “the original affluent society”
- !Kung about 20 hrs per week for basics; Canadians about 42.5+ hrs per week
What are subsistence patterns in socio-cultural anthropology?
Subsistence patterns refer to how humans make food/feed themselves
- food collection = gathering wild foods from the environment (e.g. plants, animals, fish)
- food production = primary dependence on domesticated species (often supplemented with food collecting)
)• pastoralism, horticulture, agriculture
Who are food collectors or foragers?
- most ancient human economy- e.g. Baka, !Kung San, Inuit, Kwakiutl
- Division of labour by age and gender - e.g. men hunt, women gather, elders teach
- small nomadic groups, largest territory
- seasonal round to exploit resources
Explain what horticulturalists food producers do
- growing domesticated crops with simple tools in the absence of permanent fields
- use of fallow; no fertilizer or irrigation
1. . tree crops (breadfruit, banana)
2. extensive/swidden horticulture with slash-and-burn technique, rotating garden plots - larger, more sedentary communities
- often men clear gardens, women grow crops and weed