what is social anthropology Flashcards
definition of social anthropology
the study of human society and culture across a range of different societies and cultures at different times
particularization + examples
strategy to study diveristy by stressing the social, linginguistic, cultural and historical singularities and comparing/contrasting these across different societies
e. g. franz boas and kwakiutl
e. g. malinowski and the trobrianders
generalization
stressing commonality, recurrence and universals about human social organizaiton, ritual and cognition across societies
why is paticularization valuable
- description and analyze can be too culturally other to be translatable; hence informants sometimes not containable in western categories
cultural relavativism
franz boas; peoples meanings are speicific to a society and cant be transalted to another;
hence each society has distinct formations of cultural ethos to be comprehened by hisotircal particularization and cultural relativism
ontological turn of particularization
p-anthrology reveals insufficiences of western categorgies; isolate transferable parts to western lens
prompts conceptual refinements in west
cultures (such as jokes and poems) are difficult to translate, hence translating mythologies is easier
franz boas and kwakiutl
1892; north west american coastal culture in vancouver island on TOTEMS
- totems and exchange cerecomies where aspiring chiefs exchanging wealths
- man who ‘throws the most wealth’ at rivals; becomes cheaf
boas; in book; said its difficult to translate meaning as too specific to culture
malinowski and the trobrianders date and focus
1916; “kula” circulation
- aimed to study kula in trobriand society by interpreting SPECIFICITY and NONECONOMIC motive;
hence also studied Trobriand religion and culture to contextual kula trade in 20th century
kula meaning
kulas: 2 way circulation of prized arm-bands and necklaces; are form of ritualized trade (stric, directional flow to specific partners)
- work in rituals by males
- have to be produced outside island chains
malinowski findings about kula
= groups exchange kula on boats in water
- groups can only go with bracelets in one direction to other (directional trade; necklackes go one way and bracelets another; officially sanctioned trade path)
- youc ant trade and come back empty handed
- all neckalces have stories behind them about heroes; these are in criculaiton
- none of the kula are produced on trobriand islands
malinowski conclusions about kula
= kula not a function of trade but circulation of history
- not like trade in west
- particulaiztion links kula to other trobriand aspects such as funerals, ancetral appreciation and ritual analysis
how does generalizatino work
translate indigenous terms and compares/decodes practices
-its METHODOLOGICAL rather than CONCEPTUAL; scientific approach to demosntrates regularities and laws and human universals
name some examples of generalization cases
marcel mauss 1950; gift giving
arnold van gennep 1909 + victorer torner; rituals
max cluckman 1963; power and authority
marcel mauss
1950: studying gift giving as a universal idea (essay on the gift);
different forms of repricoal human social universals consist of
- the giving gift
- the reciprocal gift
- the circulation of continual gift giving and recieving
van gennep and torner
arnold van gennep (1909) and victor torner (1996) claim that no human society exists without rituals; rituals are a human social universal process
consists of:
1. entry ritual (when people do things)
- people act in strange was different from normal life (special transformation)
- exit ritual: return to normal
gluckman
1963: max cluckman (rites of rebellion)
says representation of power and authority always different but commonly socieities have their own annual reidicul and negation of chiefs where chief is symplogically defeated in triump
e. g. shakespeare; henry IV and V
e. g. office parties at XMAS
‘laws’ of modern anthropology about culture study
- reject racial and anatomical deternisim; no correlation between anatomical and psychological differencs that create cultural varaition
- accept sociopyschoological transfertaiblity of human mind across cultures and societies; i.e. all people can be socialized to anothers culture
contants in human nature
human nature has social/cultural formations of central, constants
- incest taboo
- ritualization of death
- gift giving
philosophers of enlightenment
hobbes, roussau, kant, hegel, marx;
‘regardless of society, we are all human’
allen abramson ethnography
- fiji (1974-2000); 2 years; structures of myths, ritual and social organization in polyneziation society;
a) ritualizzation of social life and use of hallucingoens
b) women make marsks to use at funerals
- uk/london; aritificial climbing walls
; symbolic transformation of sport in society; what is it about climbing walls that makes it sociall trending?
a) risk-taking and playing as universal; adernaline as desire
what do anthropologists mean when referring to the concept of ‘the other
the outgroup/no me
- in social context; outgroups usually defined as not/less human
e. g. in ancient greece and medieval europe, believe that the sacred center (civilizzation) surounded by wild peripheries (savagery)
- in social context; outgroups usually defined as not/less human
herodutus
5th century BC; greece surrounded by people with animal and deviant characteristics;
- divine and fully humans are closer to greece
- herodutus; two headed people, cannivals, etc etc; are the distant people
homo monstrous
sub-human unvivillized beheaviour; ungodly adn lack of arts
e.g. wolfheaded or devil people
=== a type of humanity; proportionate to proximity to sacred center, as sacred centers more of affliication with fod
; this idea migrated to 16th century exploraiton of the ‘new world’ where people where thought to have bestialized beheaviour in america
hans staden
wrote; ‘true story and description of a country of wild, naked, grim, man-eating people in the new world, america’ (1557)
- depicted images of cannibals in south america, despite not ever having pbeen there
- cannibalism then in medieval europe was then used to distinguish animals from humans (e.g. withces and sorceres as cannibals)
carl linneaus
1771; ‘system naturea’; human like-genus; ‘paradoxa’ (homo monstrous)
- he categorized organisms and non human animals into ‘non human taxa’
- he assumed the existence of monkey like people in africa
; hence western 18th century civilizzation the most/full humans
how non westerns have conceptualized the western ‘other’
could be bad:
andean people believed europeans were fat suckers (Taussing)
east africans thought William Arens was a blood sucker during his ethnography there
could be in good light; saw them as dieties
polynesians and the other?
believed that europeans (such as captain cook) were gods [ sahlins and tcherkezzof]
-captain cook was sent to hawaii by royal society to study venus astrology; depicted as a god (diefied)
[SAHLINS analysis of ritual]
- in ‘lono’ mythology; cook a diety that represents the lono god who is killed and reborn in ritual batle by Ku god
- historical reflections of cosmology; the endeavour ship returned to hawaii 5 months after cooks first visit, which brought fertility, and then symbolically killed by hawaiian priest)
- cultural expectatations from cosmological scheme mirror historical events.
modern society + homo monstrous
- people use ‘the other’ as a cultural gaceotry to created subjective interpretations of outgroups
- anthropology had aimed to take a ‘humanistic’ approach to conceptualizatino the others post-enlightnment
- in modern sociery; racist imagery often used (jews/blacks as subhuman in ww2, rwandan genocide and the hutsi and tutsi)
- xenophobia; trump and subterrean patriosm in the subrubs
- approproation and asethetic glorification of cultures
- eugenics and controversy
