Unit 6 Definitions

Question 1

a geological epoch that explains how the earth is so affected by the actions of humans that its detectable in all aspects of the environment (climate change)

Answer 1

anthropocene

Question 2

consumption (!)

Answer 2

using up material goods necessary for human survival

Question 3

the study of the ways in which human beings relate to one another and to their natural environment

Answer 3

cultural ecology

Question 4

distribution (!)

Answer 4

the allocation of goods and services

Question 5

“part of anthropology that debates issues of human nature that relate directly to the decisions of daily life and making a living”

Answer 5

economic anthropology (!)

Question 6

the culturally specific processes used by members of a society to provide themselves with material resources

Answer 6

economy (!)

Question 7

a form of cultivation that depends on slash-and-burn techniques, rainwater, human muscle power, and a few simple tools (digging sticks, hoes, machetes)

Answer 7

extensive agriculture (!)

Question 8

food collection (!)

Answer 8

people who gather wild plant materials, fish, and/or hunt for food

Question 9

food production (!)

Answer 9

people who depend on domesticated plants and/or animals for food

Question 10

institutions

Answer 10

stable and enduring cultural practices that organize social life

Question 11

a form of cultivation that employs plows, draft animals, irrigation, and fertilizer to bring a large amount of land under cultivation at one time

Answer 11

intensive agriculture (!)

Question 12

labour (!)

Answer 12

the activity linking human social groups to the material world around them

Question 13

a mode of exchange in which the exchange of goods (trade) is calculated in terms of a multi-purpose medium of exchange and standard of value (money) and carried on by means of a supply-demand-price mechanism (the market)

Answer 13

market exchange (!)

Question 14

means of production (!)

Answer 14

the tools, skills, organization, and knowledge used to extract energy from nature

Question 15

mechanized industrial agriculture (!)

Answer 15

large-scale farming that is highly dependent on industrial methods of technology and production

Question 16

“a specific, historically occurring set of social relations through which labour is deployed to wrest energy from nature by means of tools, skills, organization, and knowledge”

Answer 16

mode of production (!)

Question 17

patterns according to which distribution takes place; reciprocity, redistribution, and market exchange

Answer 17

modes of exchange

Question 18

a formal attempt to explain the workings of capitalist enterprise, with particular attention to distribution

Answer 18

neoclassical economic theory (!)

Question 19

production (!)

Answer 19

the transformation of nature’s raw materials into a form suitable for human use

Question 20

a mode of exchange in which individuals exchange goods and/or services…
1. under the assumption that the exchanges will eventually balance out
2. with the expectation of immediate balance
3. in the hope that at least one party will get something for nothing

Answer 20

reciprocity (!)

Question 21

a mode of exchange in which a centralized social organization receives contributions from all members of the group and __________ them in a way that provides for every member

Answer 21

redistribution (!)

Question 22

relations of production (!)

Answer 22

the social relations linking the people who use a given means of production within a particular mode of production

Question 23

the different strategies used by members of a society to meet their basic material survival needs

Answer 23

subsistence strategies

Question 24

what are the three phases of economy

Answer 24

production, distribution, consumption