Shared Voices An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology [Revised Edition]

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Anthropology is a uniquely broad discipline that investigates everything that makes us human—from culture and language to material remains and evolution—through four interconnected subfields that together provide a multi-faceted picture of the human condition.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What anthropology studies: everything that makes us human, including culture, language, material remains, and human evolution.
• The four subfields in the U.S.: cultural anthropology, archaeology, biological (physical) anthropology, and linguistic anthropology.
• Common confusion: anthropology is structured differently around the world—in the U.K. and Europe, cultural anthropology is called social anthropology and the subfields are often separate disciplines; in Mexico, anthropology focuses more on cultural and indigenous heritage within the country.
• Cultural anthropology's approach: studying similarities and differences among living societies through immersive fieldwork, suspending one's own sense of "normal" to understand other perspectives.
• Why it matters: anthropology addresses compelling questions about human origins, diversity, commonalities, and change over time, and can be applied to solve practical problems.

🌍 The scope and structure of anthropology

🔍 What anthropology investigates

Anthropology: the study of human beings.

• Anthropologists investigate "everything and anything that makes us human."
• The discipline examines every dimension of humanity through broad questions:
  • How did we come to be human and who are our ancestors?
  • Why do people look and act so differently throughout the world?
  • What do we all have in common?
  • How have we changed culturally and biologically over time?
  • What factors influence diverse human beliefs and behaviors?
• These questions are intentionally expansive, reflecting anthropology's comprehensive approach.

🧩 The four subfields in the United States

The U.S. organizes anthropology as a "four-field discipline":

Subfield	Focus
Cultural anthropology	Similarities and differences among living societies and cultural groups
Archaeology	(Not detailed in excerpt; material remains implied)
Biological (physical) anthropology	Human origins, evolution, and variation
Linguistic anthropology	(Not detailed in excerpt; language implied)

• Together, these subfields provide a multi-faceted picture of the human condition.
• Cultural anthropology is the largest subfield in the U.S., measured by the number of PhDs graduated each year.

🌐 How anthropology differs globally

Don't confuse: the U.S. four-field model with structures in other countries.

• United Kingdom and many European countries: "cultural anthropology" is called "social (or socio-cultural) anthropology"; archaeology, biological anthropology, and linguistic anthropology are often separate disciplines.
• Mexico: anthropology tends to focus on cultural and indigenous heritage of groups within the country rather than comparative research.
• Canada: some university departments mirror the British model by combining sociology and anthropology; others follow the U.S. four-field approach.
• The excerpt emphasizes that anthropology is "structured differently" depending on location.

🛠️ Applied anthropology

Applied anthropology: an area of specialization within or between the anthropological subfields that aims to solve specific practical problems.

• Works in collaboration with governmental, non-profit, and community organizations, as well as businesses and corporations.
• Bridges the subfields to address real-world issues.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Cultural anthropology in depth

🎯 What cultural anthropologists study

• Cultural anthropologists study "the similarities and differences among living societies and cultural groups."
• They examine every aspect of human life: art, religion, healing, natural disasters, even pet cemeteries.
• The excerpt states: "no aspect of human life is outside their purview."
• While initially intrigued by human diversity, anthropologists "come to realize that people around the world share much in common."

🏕️ The fieldwork method

Immersive fieldwork: living and working with the people one is studying.

• Cultural anthropologists "suspend their own sense of what is 'normal'" to understand other people's perspectives.
• The approach goes beyond description: anthropologists ask broader questions about humankind (e.g., Are human emotions universal or culturally specific? Does globalization erase cultural differences?).
• Why study different groups: the excerpt explains that "fresh insights are generated by an outsider trying to understand the insider point of view."

📚 Example: Jean Briggs and the Inuit

• Beginning in the 1960s, Jean Briggs (1929–2016) immersed herself in the life of Inuit people in Nunavut, central Canadian arctic.
• She arrived knowing only a few words of their language and braved sub-zero temperatures.
• In Never in Anger: Portrait of an Eskimo Family (1970), she argued that anger and strong negative emotions are not expressed among families living together in small igloos in harsh conditions.
• Key insight: Briggs challenged the view that anger is an innate emotion; her research showed that "all human emotions develop through culturally specific child-rearing practices that foster some emotions and not others."

🏙️ Example: Philippe Bourgois and urban poverty

• In the 1980s, American anthropologist Philippe Bourgois studied why extreme poverty persists in the U.S. despite overall wealth and high quality of life.
• He lived with Puerto Rican crack dealers in East Harlem, New York.
• He contextualized their experiences historically (Puerto Rican roots and migration) and in the present (social marginalization and institutional racism).
• Key insight: Rather than blaming individuals or society alone, Bourgois argued that "both individual choices and social structures can trap people in the overlapping worlds of drugs and poverty" (Bourgois 2003).
• Trend: Cultural anthropologists are "increasingly turning their gaze inward to observe their own societies or subgroups within them."

🦴 Biological anthropology

🐒 What biological anthropologists study

Biological anthropology: the study of human origins, evolution, and variation.

• Some biological anthropologists focus on our closest living relatives: monkeys and apes.
• They examine "the biological and behavioral similarities and differences between nonhuman primates and human primates (us!)."

🌿 Example: Jane Goodall and chimpanzees

• Jane Goodall devoted her life to studying wild chimpanzees (Goodall 1996).
• She began her research in Tanzania in the 1960s.
• What she challenged: At the time, it was assumed that monkeys and apes lacked the social and emotional traits that made humans exceptional.
• What she discovered: Like humans, chimpanzees also make tools, socialize their young, and have intense [excerpt cuts off here].
• Implication: Goodall's work challenged "widely held assumptions about the inherent differences between humans and apes."

🎓 Personal pathways into anthropology

💡 Why the authors share their stories

The excerpt includes two personal narratives from the textbook authors (Vanessa Martínez and Demetrios Brellas) to illustrate how people discover anthropology and why it matters.

🌟 Common themes in their stories

• Accidental discovery: Both authors took their first anthropology course somewhat by chance (Vanessa through a mentor, Demetri through an R.A.'s suggestion).
• Transformative impact: "A class really can change the trajectory of your life" (Vanessa); "This ended up being the very first college course I attended... I was in love" (Demetri).
• Engaging teaching: Both emphasize the importance of professors who brought topics to life through narrative and rich understanding.
• First-generation challenges: Demetri notes it "can be difficult for first generation students whose families lived experience does not include the pursuit of academics."
• Diverse backgrounds: Vanessa is Latin@/x/e from a working-class military family; Demetri comes from a Greek immigrant family and grew up in diverse Flushing, Queens.
• Values and motivation: Vanessa wants to "leave the world better than I found it" and center equity in teaching; Demetri was influenced by his parents' work ethic and the multicultural community he grew up in.

🔑 Self-reflection prompt

The excerpt ends with: "Self Reflection: What are you excited to learn about this semester in this class?"

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Note: The excerpt includes introductory material (preface, author bios, learning objectives) and two personal narratives before the main content on anthropology begins. The substantive content on anthropology starts at section 1.2 and is incomplete (the section on biological anthropology cuts off mid-sentence).

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Linguistic anthropology reveals that language does not merely express pre-existing thoughts but actively shapes how speakers perceive time, love, and other aspects of reality, while applied anthropology demonstrates how all four subdisciplines can address real-world problems like healthcare inequality.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Linguistic anthropology's core question: how language, thought, and culture influence one another—whether we think first and then speak, or whether language constrains what we can think.
• The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (linguistic relativity): the language you speak allows you to think about some things and not others; grammatical structures (like tenses) may inspire different experiences of time.
• Common confusion: critics debate whether differences like Hopi vs. English tenses prove fundamentally different worldviews or are less pronounced than originally claimed.
• Applied anthropology's role: anthropologists work outside academia (business, government, healthcare, NGOs) to solve practical problems using theories and methods from all four subdisciplines.
• Medical anthropology example: rather than treating illness as purely individual and biological, medical anthropologists examine environmental, social, and cultural conditions—illustrated by Paul Farmer's work linking Haitian patients' diseases to historical and political forces.

🗣️ Language shapes thought and culture

🗣️ What linguistic anthropology studies

• Linguistic anthropology explores the relationship between language, thought, and culture.
• Key research questions include:
  • How did language first emerge and evolve?
  • How does language help humans succeed as a species?
  • How does language convey social identity?
  • How does language influence our views of the world?
• The field also studies nonverbal communication and how children learn culture and social identity through language (socialization).

🧠 The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (linguistic relativity)

The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (also known as linguistic relativity): the language you speak allows you to think about some things and not others.

• It may seem intuitive that thoughts come first ("Think before you speak"), but this hypothesis argues the reverse: language constrains or enables certain thoughts.
• Benjamin Whorf (1897–1941) studied the Hopi language and found not just vocabulary differences but grammatical differences between Hopi and English.
• Example: Whorf claimed Hopi has no grammatical tenses to convey the passage of time; instead, Hopi indicates whether something has "manifested."
  • English grammatical tenses (past, present, future) → inspire a linear sense of time.
  • Hopi language (lack of tenses) → inspires a cyclical experience of time.

🔍 Critiques and ongoing debate

• Ekkehart Malotki (German-American linguist) refuted Whorf's theory, arguing:
  • Hopi do have linguistic terms for time.
  • A linear sense of time may be natural and perhaps universal.
• However, Malotki recognized that English and Hopi tenses do differ, albeit in ways less pronounced than Whorf proposed.
• Don't confuse: the debate is not whether languages differ, but how much those differences shape thought and whether certain concepts (like linear time) are universal.

🌐 Other areas of linguistic anthropology

• Some linguistic anthropologists track the emergence and diversification of languages over time.
• Others focus on language use in today's social contexts (e.g., how people use language in everyday interactions).
• Still others explore socialization: children learn their culture and social identity through language and nonverbal communication.

💬 Language and nuanced meaning

• Example from the excerpt: English says "I love you," but Spanish uses different terms—te amo, te adoro, te quiero—to convey different kinds of love (romantic, platonic, maternal, etc.).
• The Spanish language arguably expresses more nuanced views of love than English.
• This illustrates how vocabulary differences can reflect and shape cultural distinctions.

🛠️ Applied anthropology in action

🛠️ What applied anthropology is

Applied anthropology: the application of anthropological theories, methods, and findings to solve practical problems.

• Applied anthropologists are employed outside of academic settings, in both public and private sectors:
  • Business or consulting firms
  • Advertising companies
  • City government
  • Law enforcement
  • The medical field
  • Non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
  • The military
• Applied anthropologists span all four subdisciplines (cultural, linguistic, archaeological, biological).

🏗️ Examples across subdisciplines

Subdiscipline	Applied example from the excerpt
Archaeology	An applied archaeologist might work in cultural resource management to assess a potentially significant archaeological site unearthed during a construction project.
Cultural anthropology	An applied cultural anthropologist could work at a technology company to understand the human-technology interface in order to design better tools.

🏥 Medical anthropology

• Medical anthropology is both an applied and theoretical area that draws on all four subdisciplines.
• It studies the interrelationship of health, illness, and culture.
• Rather than assume disease resides only within the individual body, medical anthropologists explore environmental, social, and cultural conditions that impact the experience of illness.

🌍 Cultural approaches to illness

• In some cultures: people believe illness is caused by an imbalance within the community.
  • Therefore, a communal response (e.g., a healing ceremony) is necessary to restore both the health of the person and the group.
• In mainstream U.S. healthcare: people go to a doctor to find the biological cause of an illness, then take medicine to restore the individual body.
• Don't confuse: the excerpt contrasts communal/social vs. individual/biological models of illness, not which is "better," but how culture shapes health practices.

👨‍⚕️ Paul Farmer's applied work

• Paul Farmer (died February 2022) was trained as both a physician and medical anthropologist.
• During college in North Carolina, he became interested in Haitian migrants and visited Haiti, where he was struck by poor living conditions and lack of healthcare facilities.
• As a physician, he treated Haitian patients suffering from diseases like tuberculosis and cholera (rarely seen in the United States).
• As an anthropologist, he contextualized his patients' experiences in relation to the historical, social, and political forces that impact Haiti (the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere).
• He co-founded Partners in Health, a nonprofit that opened health clinics in many resource-poor countries and trained local staff to administer care.
• Example of applied anthropology: Farmer applied his medical and anthropological training to improve people's lives by addressing both immediate health needs and underlying structural inequalities.

🔄 Applied vs. academic anthropology

• The excerpt implies that applied anthropology works outside universities to solve practical problems, while academic anthropology focuses on research and teaching within universities.
• Applied anthropology uses the same theories and methods but directs them toward real-world applications (e.g., designing better technology, managing cultural resources, improving healthcare delivery).

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Anthropology is distinguished from other social sciences by its use of four key perspectives—holism, cultural relativism, comparison, and fieldwork—that together enable researchers to understand the full complexity of human life across cultures, time, and species.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Four defining perspectives: holism (studying interconnected aspects of life), cultural relativism (understanding beliefs within their own cultural context), comparison (examining similarities and differences across societies/species/time), and fieldwork (conducting research directly with the people or species studied).
• Holism means interconnection: anthropologists examine how different aspects of human life (biology, culture, language, history) influence one another, rather than isolating single factors.
• Cultural relativism vs ethnocentrism: the core distinction is between understanding other cultures on their own terms versus judging them by one's own cultural standards as superior.
• Common confusion: ethnocentrism is a common human tendency (believing "our way is normal/better"), but anthropologists must consciously set it aside to practice cultural relativism.
• Fieldwork is inductive: ethnographic research starts with day-to-day observations and participant observation, then builds increasingly specific questions from the ground up, rather than testing predetermined hypotheses.

🔍 What Makes Anthropology Distinct

🌐 Holism as a unifying approach

Holism: the perspective that one cannot fully appreciate what it means to be human by studying a single aspect of our complex histories, languages, bodies, or societies.

• Anthropologists ask how different aspects of human life influence one another, not just what each aspect looks like in isolation.
• The approach reveals complexity rather than simplifying phenomena.
• Example: A cultural anthropologist studying marriage in a village considers local gender norms, family networks, laws, religious rules, and economic factors together—not just one dimension.
• Example: A biological anthropologist studying monkeys examines physical adaptations, foraging patterns, ecological conditions, and human interactions to understand social behaviors.

🧩 Four subfields working together

Anthropology in the United States comprises four major subfields:

• Cultural anthropology
• Biological anthropology
• Linguistic anthropology
• Archaeology

Why this matters: While anthropologists often specialize in one subfield, their research contributes to a broader understanding of the human condition—culture, language, biological and social adaptations, and human origins and evolution.

🌍 Cultural Relativism vs Ethnocentrism

🧭 Cultural relativism defined

Cultural relativism: the idea that we should seek to understand another person's beliefs and behaviors from the perspective of their culture rather than our own.

• Anthropologists do not judge other cultures based on their own values.
• They do not view other ways of doing things as inferior.
• Instead, they seek to understand people's beliefs within the system they have for explaining things.
• This is the guiding philosophy of modern anthropology.

⚠️ Ethnocentrism as the opposite

Ethnocentrism: the tendency to view one's own culture as the most important and correct and as a measuring stick by which to evaluate all other cultures that are largely seen as inferior and morally suspect.

• Common human experience: Many people are ethnocentric to some degree.
• People typically believe their ways of thinking and acting are "normal."
• At extreme levels, some believe their ways are better than those of others.
• The excerpt notes that answers like "because that is how it is done" should be expanded to "that is the way it is done in our culture at this time"—acknowledging cultural context and time-bound nature.

🚫 Why ethnocentrism is problematic

• Not useful in contexts where people from different cultural backgrounds come into close contact (common in many cities and communities).
• People must adopt culturally relativistic perspectives for governing communities and guiding interactions.
• For anthropologists specifically: We must set aside innate ethnocentric views to allow cultural relativism to guide inquiries and interactions so we can learn from others.

🔄 Don't confuse: natural tendency vs professional practice

• Ethnocentrism is a common human experience (natural tendency).
• Cultural relativism is a conscious professional practice that anthropologists must actively adopt by setting aside their innate ethnocentric views.

🔬 The Comparative Approach

📊 What anthropologists compare

Anthropologists across all subfields use comparison to learn:

• What humans have in common
• How we differ
• How we change

🌐 Scope of anthropological comparison

Discipline	Comparison scope
Sociology or psychology	Between people in a given society
Anthropology	Across societies, cultures, time, place, and species (including other primates)

Key distinction: Anthropologists compare not only within societies (like other social sciences) but also across societies and between humans and other primates.

🔍 Types of questions asked

• How do chimpanzees differ from humans?
• How do different languages adapt to new technologies?
• How do countries respond differently to immigration?
• In cultural anthropology: comparing ideas, morals, practices, and systems within or between cultures.

Example: Comparing the roles of men and women in different societies, or contrasting how different religious groups conflict within a given society.

Why it matters: Through comparison we learn more about the range of possible responses to varying contexts and problems.

🏕️ Fieldwork and Ethnography

🔬 What fieldwork means

• Anthropologists conduct research in the field with the species, civilization, or groups of people they are studying.
• Research happens directly with subjects, not in laboratories or libraries alone.

📝 Ethnography: process and product

Ethnography: both the process and result of cultural anthropological research.

Etymology:

• Greek "ethno" = people
• Greek "graphy" = writing

As a process: The ethnographic process involves the research method of participant observation fieldwork—you participate in people's lives while observing them and taking field notes that, along with interviews and surveys, constitute the research data.

As a product: The word ethnography also refers to the end result of fieldwork—descriptive accounts of culture that weave detailed observations with theory (not "novels").

🔄 Inductive research approach

Inductive research: based on day-to-day observations, the anthropologist asks increasingly specific questions about the group or about the human condition more broadly.

• Starts with day-to-day observations rather than predetermined hypotheses.
• Questions become increasingly specific as research progresses.
• Informants actively participate in the research process, helping the anthropologist ask better questions and understand different perspectives.

🤝 Collaborative nature

• Informants are not passive subjects.
• They help anthropologists ask better questions and understand different perspectives.
• This collaborative approach distinguishes ethnographic fieldwork from other research methods.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Anthropology is distinguished from other social sciences by its unique combination of holism, evolutionary perspective, comparative approach, and fieldwork methodology, which together enable the study of human diversity across societies, cultures, time, and species.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Four distinguishing perspectives: holism, evolutionary/historical lens, comparison across societies and species, and fieldwork-based research set anthropology apart from sociology and psychology.
• Comparison spans wider: unlike other disciplines, anthropologists compare not only within societies but also across societies, cultures, time periods, and between humans and other primates.
• Fieldwork as core method: cultural anthropologists conduct ethnography—participant observation that is inductive, building questions from daily observations rather than testing pre-set hypotheses.
• Common confusion: anthropology includes both scientific (deductive, material data) and humanistic (inductive, interpretive) approaches, leading to internal debate about whether anthropology is purely a "science."
• Practical value: anthropological training develops transferable skills—observation, critical thinking, cross-cultural understanding—that combat ethnocentrism and prepare students for diverse careers.

🔍 What makes anthropology unique

🌐 Holism

The excerpt does not detail holism in this section, but it is listed as one of the four anthropological perspectives that distinguish the discipline from other social sciences.

🧬 Evolutionary and historical perspective

• Anthropologists examine how humans have changed over time and how we differ from other primates.
• Questions include: "How do chimpanzees differ from humans?" and "How do different languages adapt to new technologies?"
• This temporal and biological lens is not typical in sociology or psychology.

🔄 Comparative approach across boundaries

In cultural anthropology, we compare ideas, morals, practices, and systems within or between cultures.

• Anthropologists compare roles (e.g., men and women in different societies) and conflicts (e.g., religious groups within a society).
• Key distinction: while sociology and psychology also compare people within a society, anthropologists extend comparisons across societies, cultures, time, place, and species.
• Example: comparing responses to immigration across countries, or contrasting human and primate behavior.
• This breadth of comparison reveals "the range of possible responses to varying contexts and problems."

🏞️ Fieldwork and ethnography

Ethnography: both the process and result of cultural anthropological research.

• "Ethno" = people; "graphy" = writing.
• Method: participant observation—living with people, observing daily life, taking field notes, conducting interviews and surveys.
• Inductive process: the anthropologist starts with day-to-day observations and asks increasingly specific questions, rather than testing a predetermined hypothesis.
• Informants (research participants) actively help shape better questions and offer different perspectives.
• Output: ethnographies are descriptive accounts that weave detailed observations with theory to answer both specific and fundamental questions about human society and behavior.
• Don't confuse: ethnographies are not novels; they are social science research outputs.

🧪 Scientific vs humanistic tensions

🔬 Deductive (scientific) sub-disciplines

• Biological anthropology and archaeology use the scientific method.
• They test hypotheses and collect/analyze material data (bones, tools, seeds) to study human origins and evolution.

📖 Inductive (humanistic) sub-disciplines

• Cultural anthropology and linguistic anthropology rely on humanistic and inductive approaches.
• They collect and analyze nonmaterial data: observations of everyday life, language use, narratives, and interpretations of meaning.

⚖️ Internal debate

• Tension has arisen between scientific and humanistic subfields.
• Example: In 2010, some cultural anthropologists objected to the American Anthropological Association's mission statement describing anthropology as "the science that studies humankind in all its aspects."
• Critics wanted to replace "science" with "public understanding," arguing that not all anthropologists use the scientific method; many rely on narratives and interpretation.
• Resolution: the word "science" remains in the mission statement, and anthropology in the United States is predominantly categorized as a social science.
• Don't confuse: this is an internal disciplinary debate, not a rejection of rigor—both approaches contribute valid knowledge.

🎯 Why anthropology matters

🛠️ Transferable skills and career paths

• Anthropology prepares students for diverse careers: medicine, museums, archaeology, education, international business, documentary filmmaking, management, foreign service, law, and more.
• Core skills developed:
  • Broad knowledge of other cultures
  • Observation and analysis
  • Critical thinking
  • Clear communication
  • Applied problem-solving

🌍 Perspective-shifting and combating ethnocentrism

"I believe an anthropology course has one basic goal: to eliminate ethnocentrism."

• Anthropology encourages extending perspectives beyond familiar social contexts to view things from others' viewpoints.
• A former student noted that many contemporary issues (racism, xenophobia) stem from the "toxic idea that people are 'other.'"
• Learning to value different cultures is essential in today's globalized world.
• Example: understanding beliefs, practices, and symbols that bind groups together helps dismantle "us vs. them" thinking.

🧭 Ethical considerations in fieldwork

• Anthropologists encounter ethical dilemmas when conducting research with human subjects:
  • Who might be harmed by conducting or publishing this research?
  • What are the costs and benefits of identifying individuals?
  • How to resolve competing interests of funding agencies and communities?
• Anthropologists follow a professional code of ethics to navigate these questions.

📚 Key terms and concepts

Term	Definition (from excerpt)
Ethnography	Both the process and result of cultural anthropological research; the in-depth study of everyday practices and lives of a people.
Participant observation	Research method where the anthropologist participates in people's lives while observing and taking field notes.
Inductive research	Reasoning from specific observations to general conclusions; the researcher collects evidence and asks questions based on day-to-day findings rather than testing a pre-set hypothesis.
Deductive research	Reasoning from general to specific; the researcher creates a hypothesis and designs a study to prove or disprove it; more common in natural sciences.
Cultural relativism	The idea that we should seek to understand another person's beliefs and behaviors from the perspective of their own culture, not our own.
Ethnocentrism	The tendency to view one's own culture as most important and correct, and as the standard by which to measure all other cultures.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Culture is a set of learned and shared beliefs, practices, materials, and symbols that shapes how human groups perceive the world, behave, and relate to one another.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Core definition: Culture encompasses both observable characteristics (food, clothing, art) and deeper elements (beliefs, values, worldviews) that are learned and shared.
• Beliefs go beyond right/wrong: The term "belief" includes all mental aspects—values, norms, philosophies, worldview, and knowledge systems.
• Practices as action: Behaviors may be consciously motivated by beliefs or performed automatically as everyday routines.
• Common confusion: Students often think culture is only visible things (food, clothing, traditions), but culture also includes the deeper, invisible frameworks that shape perception and behavior.
• Why it matters: Understanding culture as learned and shared helps anthropologists recognize human diversity and how social contexts shape people everywhere.

🎯 Defining culture

🎯 What culture means

Culture: a set of beliefs, practices, materials, and symbols that are learned and shared.

• When students first encounter this question, they typically list observable elements: food, clothing, religion, language, traditions, art, music.
• These observable characteristics are indeed part of culture, but culture runs deeper.
• Culture is a powerful defining characteristic that shapes perceptions, behaviors, and relationships within human groups.

🧠 Beliefs as mental frameworks

Belief: not just what we consider right/wrong or true/false, but all mental aspects of culture including values, norms, philosophies, worldview, and knowledge.

• The excerpt emphasizes that "belief" is broader than everyday usage suggests.
• It encompasses the entire mental landscape of a cultural group.
• Don't confuse: "belief" here is not limited to religious or moral convictions—it includes all ways of thinking and knowing.

🏃 Practices as behavior

Practices: behaviors and actions that may be motivated by belief or performed without reflection as part of everyday routines.

• Some practices are conscious and deliberate, driven by cultural beliefs.
• Other practices are automatic, part of daily life without active thought.
• Example: An action might be performed simply because "that's how we've always done it," not because someone consciously chose it based on a belief.

🌍 Culture as integrated system

🔗 Learned and shared

• The definition emphasizes that culture is both learned and shared.
• This allows anthropologists to understand that people everywhere are thinkers and actors shaped by their social contexts.
• Culture is not innate or biological—it is transmitted through social learning.

🌐 Diversity and unity

• Social contexts are incredibly diverse, creating the human cultural diversity that attracts many anthropologists to the field.
• Despite diversity, cultures form "an all-encompassing, integrated whole."
• This integrated whole binds groups together and shapes their worldview and lifeways (ways of living).

🔍 Different anthropological emphases

The excerpt notes that anthropologists may emphasize different aspects when defining culture:

Emphasis	What it includes
Material life and objects	Tools, clothing, technologies
Other aspects	(The excerpt indicates there are other emphases but does not complete this thought)

• Don't confuse: These are not competing definitions but different focal points within the same broad understanding of culture.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Culture is a learned and shared system of beliefs, practices, and symbols that shapes how groups of people think, behave, and relate to one another, and it can only be properly understood through direct fieldwork rather than distant observation.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What culture encompasses: beliefs (values, norms, worldviews), practices (behaviors and routines), and symbols (meaningful representations) that are both learned and shared
• How anthropology evolved: the field moved from "armchair anthropology" (studying cultures from a distance with ethnocentric bias) to participant-observation fieldwork (living among people to understand their perspective)
• Cultural relativism vs ethnocentrism: cultures must be understood on their own terms rather than judged by an outsider's standards; ethnocentrism measures other cultures as inferior to one's own
• Common confusion: culture vs society—culture is what people think/feel/do; society is the institutional structure linking people together
• Ethical challenges: anthropologists must balance insider participation with professional boundaries and avoid exploiting the communities they study

🎭 Core characteristics of culture

🎭 Culture is performed and enacted

• Culture is something people do, not just believe
• It sustains daily life yet often operates below conscious awareness
• We take our own culture for granted, making it difficult to define from the inside

🤝 Culture is shared

• Sharing does not mean uniformity—individuals within a culture vary by age, gender, status, and other factors
• Members share many commonalities despite individual differences
• The shared aspect creates group identity and cohesion

📚 Culture is learned through enculturation

Enculturation: the process of learning culture, both directly through instruction and indirectly through observation and imitation

• Humans are born with the capacity to learn any culture, not with a specific culture
• Learning happens through parents, peers, and broader social observation
• Example: A child learns table manners, language, and social norms from family and community

🔄 Culture is dynamic and changes

• Culture constantly responds to internal and external factors
• Some elements change rapidly (technology), others slowly (core values like individualism)
• All parts are interconnected—when one element changes, others follow
• Humans can conform to, resist, or transform their culture

🎨 Culture is symbolic

Symbol: something that stands for something else, often without a natural connection

• Individuals create, interpret, and share meanings within their group
• The same symbol can have different meanings for different groups
• Example: A red octagonal sign universally means "stop" in the U.S.; the Confederate flag symbolizes heritage to some but oppression to others
• Symbols powerfully convey shared or conflicting meanings

🧬 Culture and biology are connected

• Humans have biological needs (hunger, thirst, reproduction) shared with other animals
• Culture uniquely channels these urges in specific ways
• Cultural practices then impact biology, growth, and development
• This interaction enables humans to adapt and thrive in diverse environments

📖 Evolution of anthropological methods

🪑 Armchair anthropology (early approach)

Armchair anthropology: an early and discredited method that did not involve direct contact with the people studied

• Early anthropologists relied on written accounts and opinions of others (travelers, missionaries, officials)
• They never visited the cultures they studied
• This distance led to ethnocentric interpretations measuring other cultures as inferior

Key figures:

• Sir James Frazer: wrote The Golden Bough (1890) on comparative religions without fieldwork
• Sir E.B. Tylor: defined culture as "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom..." without field research

Problems with this approach:

• Promoted ideas of racial superiority during the colonial era
• Used terms like "primitive" and "savage" to describe non-European peoples
• Measured cultures by European standards of "right and wrong"
• Reinforced white supremacy and colonial attitudes

🚶 Participant-observation (modern approach)

Participant-observation: a type of observation in which anthropologists observe while participating in the same activities in which their informants are engaged

The shift "off the veranda":

• Anthropologists began traveling to locations, living among people, and observing daily life
• Bronislaw Malinowski: lived with Trobriand Islanders and wrote The Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922), the first modern ethnography
• He studied social life, food, shelter, sexuality, kinship, and family through direct observation

Don't confuse: Participant-observation vs "going native"

• Participant-observation: living among people while maintaining professional boundaries
• Going native: becoming fully integrated (taking leadership roles, marrying, fully participating in rituals)—this blurs ethical lines and puts both anthropologist and community at risk

🌍 Development of cultural theory

🇪🇺 European functionalism

Functionalism: an approach emphasizing how social institutions contribute to the organization of society and maintenance of social order

Key concepts:

• Malinowski's functionalism: cultural traditions develop in response to human needs (food, safety, knowledge, reproduction)
• Radcliffe-Brown's structural-functionalism: social structures (especially family) maintain stability across generations

Aspect	Culture	Society
Definition	What people make, think, feel, and do	People linked through social institutions
Focus	People and their practices	Institutions and structures
Study method	Enculturation	Socialization
Research tool	Fieldwork	Surveys

Limitations:

• Views cultures as stable and orderly; cannot explain social change
• Struggles to explain why societies develop particular institutions

🇺🇸 American cultural relativism

Cultural relativism: the idea that cultures cannot be objectively understood since all humans see the world through the lens of their own culture

Franz Boas (founder of American anthropology):

• Trained as a scientist in Germany; brought empirical methods to anthropology
• Conducted fieldwork with Inuit people on Baffin Island (1883)
• Observed that cultural practices are shaped by natural environment
• Promoted understanding cultures on their own terms rather than by outsider standards

Boas' students expanded the concept:

Zora Neale Hurston:

• Black woman anthropologist studying African American and Caribbean folklore
• Traveled extensively across the Caribbean and American South
• Produced over 50 bodies of literature (including Their Eyes Were Watching God)
• Her work was ignored for decades due to racism and sexism; only recognized in late 20th century

Ruth Benedict:

• Wrote Patterns of Culture (1934)
• Argued culture gives coherent patterns for thinking and behaving
• Culture shapes individual personality traits psychologically

Margaret Mead:

• Studied adolescent girls in Samoa (1925)
• Coming of Age in Samoa (1928) showed teenagers there experienced less stress than American teens
• Contributed to nature vs nurture debate: learned cultural roles matter more than biology

Alfred Kroeber:

• Studied how cultures change over time and influence one another
• Examined cultural diffusion (spread of cultural traits)
• Documented Native American languages before extinction

Clifford Geertz (postmodernist):

• Culture is not "locked inside people's heads"
• Culture is publicly communicated through speech and behavior
• Defined culture as "an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols"

🔑 Key contributions from American school

• Emphasized enculturation: the process of learning culture shapes individual identity, self-awareness, and emotions
• Established need for holism: considering entire context including history
• Highlighted importance of language in transmitting culture and communicating complex ideas

⚖️ Ethical considerations in fieldwork

📜 Development of ethical standards

Post-World War II turning point:

• Nuremberg Trials (1945): prosecuted Nazi physicians and scientists for unethical human experimentation
• Nuremberg Code: established principles for ethical treatment of human research subjects
• Universities adopted guidelines for protecting human subjects
• American Anthropological Association (AAA) developed codes of ethics

Core ethical principles:

• Obtain informed consent from research participants
• Protect participants from harm
• Respect cultural values and practices
• Maintain professional boundaries
• Be transparent about research goals

🔍 Case study: Malinowski's diary

• Malinowski's private diary was published after his death as A Diary in the Strictest Sense of the Term (1967)
• Revealed personal feelings: loneliness, isolation, sexual fantasies
• Contained insensitive and contemptuous opinions about Trobriand Islanders
• Raised questions: Did his personal bias and racism affect his published conclusions?
• Shows even ethical anthropologists struggle with ethnocentric attitudes

Don't confuse: Private field notes vs published ethnography

• Most anthropologists keep private diaries to track research
• These are almost never made public
• Published work should separate personal feelings from professional analysis

⚠️ Case study: Napoleon Chagnon and the Yanomami

The controversy (1960s–2000s):

• Chagnon (anthropologist) and Neel (geneticist) researched Yanomami people in Amazon rainforest
• 2000: Journalist Patrick Tierney published Darkness in El Dorado with serious allegations:
  • Deliberately infected Yanomami with measles, causing epidemic
  • Conducted medical experiments without consent
  • Created conflicts between groups to study violence

AAA investigation:

• 2002: Found Chagnon misrepresented violent nature of Yanomami culture, causing harm
• Found failure to obtain proper consent
• 2005: AAA rescinded conclusions, citing problems with investigation process
• Chagnon denied allegations and complained process was unfair
• Debate continues with no definitive resolution

Lessons:

• Truth can be elusive in anthropological inquiry
• Different perspectives create different interpretations
• Anthropologists must ensure their stories are truthful and represent people's voices ethically
• Need for rigorous ethical standards and oversight

🎯 Final reflection on culture

🌐 Why culture is complex

• Culture is ever-changing by nature, making solid definitions difficult
• As many definitions exist as there are anthropologists
• The term is used differently outside anthropology, creating further confusion

✅ Common elements remain clear

Despite definitional challenges, core characteristics are consistent:

• Culture is performed (enacted in daily life)
• Culture is shared (creates group identity)
• Culture is learned (through enculturation)
• Culture is symbolic (uses meaningful representations)
• Culture is ever-changing (dynamic and adaptive)

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Ethnographic fieldwork evolved from armchair speculation to immersive participant observation, and modern anthropologists now combine cultural relativism with diverse methods—including activism and mixed approaches—to study human cultures in both traditional and new sites while grappling with tensions between objectivity and advocacy.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• From armchair to field: Early anthropologists theorized from afar using secondhand accounts, but pioneers like Malinowski developed participant observation, requiring researchers to live among communities and learn local languages.
• Cultural relativism vs ethnocentrism: Anthropologists strive to understand cultures on their own terms rather than judging them by outside standards, though complete objectivity is sometimes impossible or inappropriate.
• Salvage ethnography's problematic legacy: Early 20th-century efforts to "preserve" supposedly dying cultures reflected racist assumptions that non-Western societies must either westernize or go extinct; modern anthropology rejects this view and recognizes all cultures as constantly changing.
• Common confusion—holistic vs problem-oriented: Early ethnographers documented entire cultures inductively; today most use deductive, problem-oriented research focused on specific questions, often combining qualitative and quantitative methods.
• New field sites and methods: Ethnography now occurs in urban settings, online spaces, and multi-sited locations, not just isolated villages, and increasingly blends observation with surveys, statistics, and activist goals.

🏛️ The evolution of ethnographic methods

📚 Armchair anthropology's failures

Armchair anthropology: theorizing about cultures based on secondhand reports without direct fieldwork.

• Early anthropologists relied on travelers', missionaries', and colonial officials' accounts.
• Major problems arose from this approach:
  • Informants might have limited knowledge (e.g., a colonial administrator knowing little about local rituals).
  • Cultural taboos could prevent certain questions (e.g., men forbidden to ask women about rites of passage).
  • Resulted in incomplete or erroneous data.
• Example: If a culture prohibited men from discussing women's ceremonies, armchair researchers might wrongly conclude women had no such ceremonies.

🌍 Malinowski's participant observation breakthrough

• Polish anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski (1884–1942) spent nearly four years in the Trobriand Islands starting in 1914.
• He developed rigorous techniques requiring researchers to "get off the armchair" and live among communities.
• Key innovations:
  • Participant observation: not just watching but actively participating in daily activities and ceremonies.
  • Language learning: unlike predecessors who used translators, Malinowski learned the native language for deeper immersion.
  • Detailed documentation: carefully recorded observations and personal reflections.
• His study of the Kula Ring ceremony revealed its central importance to Trobriand life—something he discovered only through participation.
• Don't confuse: Early ethnographers like Boas and Haddon visited field sites but stayed with Western hosts and made brief forays; Malinowski's method required extended, intimate community engagement.

🗿 Salvage ethnography and its racist roots

Salvage ethnography: the process of documenting and writing stories about people who were thought to be near extinction.

• Common early 20th-century belief: many "primitive" cultures were disappearing and needed preservation.
• Anthropologists like Malinowski, Boas, and students sought to document traditions, photograph people, and collect artifacts from groups like Native Americans.
• Problems with this approach:
  • Viewed people as "living fossils" with only two options: westernize or go extinct.
  • Rooted in ethnocentrism and racist "civilize the savage" ideology.
  • Sometimes staged "authentic" scenes (e.g., filmmaker Flaherty asking Inuit to use spears instead of rifles).
• Modern anthropology rejects this view:
  • Recognizes all cultures constantly change in response to internal and external influences.
  • No moment is more "authentic," "civilized," or "primitive" than another.
  • Culture is fluid, not isolated in time and space.

🔬 The four-field holistic approach

• Salvage ethnography led to documenting "everything" about endangered cultures.
• Developed into the four-field approach (general anthropology) in the United States:
  • Cultural anthropology
  • Archaeological anthropology
  • Biological/physical anthropology
  • Linguistic anthropology
• Hallmark: holistic perspective—studying everything that makes us human using multiple approaches across time and space.
• Recognizes that biology, culture, history, and language must all be considered together.
• Example: Jason De León's "The Land of Open Graves" combines forensic anthropology, archaeology, and ethnography to examine migrants' experiences at the U.S.-Mexico border.
• Example: Peter Gordon studied the Pirahã tribe of Brazil, noting they have only three number words (one, two, many) and difficulty remembering larger quantities, illustrating relationships between language, thought, and culture.

🔄 Modern ethnography: new sites and approaches

🏙️ Expanding beyond isolated villages

• Early ethnography focused on small-scale, isolated groups with simple economies.
• Modern field sites include:
  • Complex, technologically advanced societies like the United States.
  • Urban environments worldwide.
  • Multiple locations (multi-sited ethnography) for studying migration and diasporas.
• Example: Katie Nelson studied undocumented Mexican immigrant students in Minnesota and also traveled to Veracruz, Mexico.
• New technological "sites":
  • Text messages, emails, video calls, social media platforms.
  • Online groups for support, mutual aid, resource sharing.
• These new sites expand fieldwork definitions but create ethical challenges around privacy.

🎯 Problem-oriented vs exploratory research

Approach	Goal	When used	Example
Inductive (early)	Explore entire culture; let focus emerge gradually	Early ethnography	General ethnographic descriptions
Deductive (modern)	Select specific problem before arriving; let it guide research	Most contemporary work	Nelson's study of identity formation among undocumented youth

• Most anthropologists now take a deductive, problem-oriented approach.
• They don't document every dimension of informants' lives—only what relates to the research problem.
• Don't confuse: Problem-oriented doesn't mean ignoring unexpected findings; it means having a focused starting question rather than trying to describe everything.

📊 Quantitative and mixed methods

Qualitative research: aims to comprehensively describe human behavior and contexts.

Quantitative research: seeks patterns in numerical data that can explain aspects of human behavior.

Quantitative methods in anthropology:

• Surveys with closed-ended questions, multiple-choice answers, rankings.
• Statistical analyses, maps, charts, graphs.
• Useful for gathering specific data points within large populations.
• Example: Nutritional anthropology—Katherine Dettwyler in Mali weighed, measured, and tested subjects to understand child malnutrition causes.

Mixed methods:

• Integrate qualitative and quantitative evidence for comprehensive analysis.
• Combine ethnographic data with questionnaires, statistics, media analysis.
• Example: Leo Chavez's "The Latino Threat" used ethnographic case studies, surveys, and visual image analysis (photographs, magazine covers, cartoons) to study how citizenship and Latino identity are discussed in U.S. mainstream media.
• Particularly useful in complex, literate societies where statistical data are available.

🧭 Core perspectives and techniques

🌐 Cultural relativism: the guiding philosophy

Cultural relativism: the idea that we should seek to understand another person's beliefs and behaviors from the perspective of their culture rather than our own.

• Anthropologists don't judge other cultures based on their own values.
• Instead, seek to understand beliefs within the system people use for explaining things.
• In the field, researchers must temporarily suspend their own moral, value, and aesthetic judgments.
• Example: In Brazil, people commonly stand close, touch, hold hands, and discuss each other's bodies. Neighbors commented on the author's skin color, hair texture, and body shape—not rude but affectionate, showing care and community inclusion.
• Without cultural relativism, the researcher would have been frustrated, confused people, and missed an important cultural component.
• Don't confuse: Cultural relativism is a methodological tool for understanding, not necessarily moral approval of all practices.

⚖️ Ethnocentrism: the opposite problem

Ethnocentrism: the tendency to view one's own culture as most important and correct and as a stick by which to measure all other cultures.

• People who are ethnocentric view their cultures as central and normal, rejecting others as inferior and morally suspect.
• Common human experience to some degree.
• Often people do things simply "because that is how it is done"—missing that what/how/why are culturally determined.
• Not useful in contexts where people from different backgrounds interact closely.
• Anthropologists must set aside innate ethnocentrisms and let cultural relativism guide observations to avoid bias.

🔥 The objectivity vs activism debate

• Complete objectivity is not always possible or appropriate.
• Researchers may encounter practices that violate strongly held moral values or human rights.
• Some may conduct research specifically to advocate for marginalized groups.

Example: Female genital cutting (FGC/FGM)

• Practices range from partial clitoris removal to infibulation (removal of clitoris and labia, narrowing vaginal opening).
• Anthropologist Janice Boddy studied FGC/FGM in rural northern Sudan from a culturally relativistic perspective.
• Found it persists partly because it's believed to preserve chastity and curb sexual desire, preventing affairs—important in a culture where women's sexual conduct symbolizes family honor.
• Relativistic explanation makes the practice comprehensible and internally culturally coherent.
• But should anthropologists accept it once they understand it? Should they fight practices viewed as injustices?

Two stances:

1. Objectivity-focused: Ethnography should be free from subjective opinion as much as possible.
2. Activism-focused: Use anthropological research and writing to fight for equality and justice for disempowered groups.

• The debate is ongoing; anthropologists don't always agree on appropriate professional stance and responsibility.

🔬 Science, social science, or humanities?

• Anthropology is all of these, depending on the research type.
• Described as "the most humanistic of the sciences and the most scientific of the humanities."
• Early anthropologists borrowed methods from physical sciences to legitimize the field.
• Today categorized as a social science in most U.S. institutions alongside sociology, psychology, economics, political science.
• Many cultural anthropologists have embraced more-humanistic approaches:
  • Interpretive anthropology: treats culture as a body of "texts" rather than testing hypotheses.
  • Studies texts to untangle webs of meaning embedded in them.
  • Includes context of interpretations, researchers' perspectives, and how participants view themselves.
• Most anthropologists apply whichever approaches best suit their particular problem.
• Anthropology is unique for its diversity of approaches and broad range of orientations.

👀 Key ethnographic techniques

👁️ Observation and participant observation

General observation:

• Paying attention to everything happening in the field—routine activities and major events.
• Observing how people interact, how environment affects people, and how people affect environment.
• Rigorously documenting observations through field notes and personal journals.

Participant observation:

Participant observation: ethnographers observing while they participate in activities with their informants.

• Important because it allows understanding why people do what they do from an emic (insider) perspective.
• Malinowski: helps "grasp the native's point of view, his relation to life, to realize his vision of his world."
• Requires living with or spending considerable time with informants to establish rapport.
• Rapport: a sense of trust and comfortable working relationship where informant and ethnographer are at ease and agreeable to working together.

Example: Katie Nelson's huipil textile research in Maya highlands

• Studied why some Mayan towns' hand-woven blouse designs changed rapidly while others didn't.
• Zinacantán (near city, tourist access): women said weaving was easy and they changed designs to avoid boredom.
• San Andrés (isolated, politically progressive but conservative): women said they were "superior weavers" who didn't need to change designs.
• Only when Nelson tried weaving herself did she understand the truth:
  • Took days to learn correct sitting position and tension.
  • Failed repeatedly at setting up the loom.
  • Never got close to creating a design.
  • Weaving is exceptionally difficult; even experts make mistakes.
• Through participant observation, Nelson recognized that other factors (cultural change from tourism and urban travel) likely drove design changes in Zinacantán.
• Don't confuse: Watching vs doing—observation alone can be misleading; participation reveals hidden complexities.

💬 Conversations and interviews

• Range from casual, unstructured conversations to formal scheduled interviews.
• Establishing rapport (trust) is essential for success.
• Ethnographers use multiple forms for a single project based on needs.
• Sometimes recorded; more often researchers write down everything they recall afterward.
• Essential because spoken communication is central to human experience.

🗺️ Mapping cultural landscapes

• Drawing, using Google Maps/Earth, or creating narratives about physical space.
• Allows readers to engage differently with content.
• Example: Vanessa Martínez created a written narrative of an environmental walk in Springfield, Massachusetts, highlighting physical space's importance to community health equity work.
• The walk revealed:
  • Structural violence: diesel bus garage causing air pollution, highway dividing neighborhoods.
  • Barriers: vertical housing across from bike path but no access due to highway.
  • Hope: small community gardens tended by adults and youth.
  • Gerena School built under Interstate 91, suffering from transportation-related air exposures, flooding, mold.
  • Missing elements: limited green spaces, barriers to riverwalk, few pools and family-friendly spaces.

📖 Life histories and genealogical methods

Life histories:

• Personal narratives of someone's life.
• Provide context in which culture is experienced and created by individuals.
• Describe how individuals reacted, responded, and contributed to changes during their lives.
• Help anthropologists understand what makes life meaningful to individuals.
• Often included in ethnographic texts to intimately connect readers to informants' lives.

Genealogical (kinship) method:

• Long tradition in ethnography.
• Developed early to document family systems of tribal groups.
• Still used today to discover kinship connections.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Anthropologists must navigate complex ethical responsibilities—including building trust, avoiding harm, obtaining consent, and protecting informants—while also understanding that language and communication systems are culturally shaped, constantly evolving, and central to human identity and power dynamics.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Core ethical principles: Do no harm, obtain informed consent, maintain anonymity, make results accessible, and practice reciprocity with communities.
• Power dynamics in research: Researchers must acknowledge their position as both outsiders and (sometimes) insiders, recognizing historical exploitation and working toward genuine collaboration.
• Language as open system: Unlike closed animal communication, human language can create infinite new meanings through phonemes, morphemes, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.
• Common confusion: Researcher goals vs. community needs—the "hole story" illustrates how academics may study problems without addressing community priorities, leaving people feeling used.
• Cultural variation in communication: Non-verbal systems (kinesics, proxemics, paralanguage) and gendered speech patterns vary across cultures and reflect identity, status, and power.

🤝 Building Trust and Reciprocity in Research

🤝 Why trust matters

The excerpt emphasizes that researchers must overcome historical legacies of exploitation:

• Grave robbing and medical experimentation on Black bodies and marginalized populations created lasting mistrust.
• Misinformation and stigmatization of people of color continue in media today.
• The researcher must demonstrate "best intentions" and a "goal of collaboration," not extraction.

🔄 Reciprocity as a principle

Reciprocity: the concept that research relationships should be mutually beneficial, not one-sided extraction.

• Betty (a community member in the excerpt) needed to see that the relationship was not just "get my research done and then leave."
• Researchers hold dual positions: academic (outsider) and sometimes member of communities of color (insider).
• Both positions influence research, collaborations, and power in the community.

Example: A researcher studies health disparities in a neighborhood. Reciprocity means sharing findings in accessible formats, contributing resources, and ensuring the community benefits—not just publishing and leaving.

🕳️ The "hole story" allegory

This workshop story illustrates the gap between researcher and community perspectives:

• Researchers ask permission to study a hole in the ground.
• The community wants the hole fixed because it harms them.
• Researchers measure the hole (length, width, depth), explain why it exists, then leave.
• The community is left with the hole and feels "used and unheard."

Key lesson: Researchers must connect their study goals with community needs, or they perpetuate extraction and hold "academic power" without distributing data, resources, or power.

⚖️ Core Ethical Responsibilities

⚖️ Do no harm

Do No Harm: Anthropologists must ensure their involvement does not harm or embarrass informants, considering legal, emotional, political, economic, social, and cultural dimensions.

• Researchers must continually monitor their work because not all risks can be anticipated at the outset.
• The excerpt cites Napoleon Chagnon's work with the Yanomami as a cautionary example: he was accused of encouraging violence, staging scenes, and fabricating data.
• Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) review research plans to prevent harm to human subjects.

Don't confuse: "Do no harm" is not a one-time checklist—it requires ongoing reevaluation during and after fieldwork.

📝 Informed consent

Informed consent: the informant's agreement to participate, given with full knowledge of the research topic, funders, uses, access, and risks.

• Participation must be optional and not coerced; informants can stop at any time.
• In medical/psychological research in the U.S., consent is typically a signed document.
• In anthropology, signed documents may not be appropriate if people distrust bureaucracy or cannot read.
• The anthropologist must determine the culturally appropriate way to obtain consent.

🔒 Anonymity and privacy

• Researchers must protect informants who face risk (e.g., undocumented immigrants).
• The excerpt's author used pseudonyms for informants, relatives, friends, schools, and workplaces—even in field notes.
• Maintaining privacy is a key way to ensure "do no harm."

📢 Make results accessible

• Anthropologists must share findings with informants and other researchers.
• A written report in the researcher's language may not be the best format.
• Creative alternatives include:
  • Accessible databases
  • Films portraying results
  • Texts or recommendations that provide tangible assistance to communities
• The goal is to ensure those who participated can review and benefit from the research.

🗣️ Language as a Human Universal

🗣️ What makes human language unique

Language: an open system that can create infinite new meanings and messages, unlike the closed communication systems of most animals.

• Most animal communication is innate and cannot create new meanings.
• Great apes use a gesture-call system combining sound, body language, scent, facial expression, and touch.
• Human language evolved embedded within non-verbal systems and remains intertwined with them.

🧬 Anatomical basis for speech

Human bipedalism (walking on two feet) freed the forelimbs and triggered anatomical changes:

• The skull attachment to the spine moved toward the center of the skull base.
• The larynx (voice box) sits lower in the throat, creating a longer pharynx (throat cavity) that amplifies speech sounds.
• The rounded tongue and palate (roof of the mouth) enable a greater variety of sounds than any great ape can produce.

How speech is produced:

• Exhaled air passes through the larynx.
• Vocal folds vibrate when pulled tightly together; narrower slit = higher pitch.
• Sound waves pass through the pharynx and out through the mouth/nose.
• Articulators (tongue, lips, jaw) produce different speech sounds.

🧠 Brain specialization

• The modern human brain is among the largest (proportional to body size) of all animals.
• Two areas in the left brain are dedicated to language processing:
  • Broca's area (left frontal lobe near the temple)
  • Wernicke's area (temporal lobe behind the left ear)
• No other species has these specialized areas.

🎭 Non-Verbal Communication Systems

🎭 Kinesics: body language

Kinesics: all forms of human body language, including gestures, body position and movement, facial expressions, and eye contact.

• All humans can potentially perform these the same way, but cultural rules differ.
• Example: Eye contact in the U.S. shows attention and respect; in Japan, it is often inappropriate, especially between people of different social statuses (lower status must look down).
• Facial expressions convey attitude or emotional state.
• Hand gestures may be unconscious or deliberate (e.g., thumbs up, "OK" sign in the U.S.).

Don't confuse: A gesture with one meaning in one culture may be obscene or meaningless in another.

📏 Proxemics: social use of space

Proxemics: the study of the social use of space, specifically the distance an individual tries to maintain in interactions.

• The size of the "space bubble" depends on relationship, status, gender, age, attitude, and culture.
• Example: Brazilians typically interact in close physical space with lots of touching; Japanese prefer greater distance with minimal touching.
• Standing too far away may signal emotional distance; invading the bubble may signal threat or desire for closeness.

Author's reflection: On a crowded train in Russia, Russians seemed relaxed while Americans were uncomfortable. In contrast, on a bus in Massachusetts, Americans used book bags to claim extra space.

🎵 Paralanguage: speech beyond words

Paralanguage: characteristics of speech beyond the actual words, including pitch, loudness, and tempo.

• Pitch can convey questions, sarcasm, defiance, surprise, confidence, impatience, etc.
• Loudness at close range often conveys emotion (anger, urgency).
• Duration (holding a syllable) intensifies impact: "It's beauuuuu-tiful!"
• Other features: chuckle, sigh, sob, throat clearing, "hm," "oh," "ah," "um."

Most non-verbal behaviors are unconscious unless someone violates cultural standards. Deliberate violations can themselves convey meaning.

🌍 Language Variation and Change

🌍 How languages change over time

Historical linguistics: the study of how languages change, affecting phonology, morphology, lexicon, syntax, and semantics.

• All languages change; it is impossible to prevent.
• Historical linguists group languages into taxonomies (family trees) based on words with similar meanings.
• Example: Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian) are "sister languages" derived from Latin; Latin is a "sister" to Sanskrit and classical Greek, all from "Indo-European."

🗺️ Causes of dialect variation

The excerpt lists eight factors that create dialect differences (illustrated with English in the U.S.):

Factor	How it works
Settlement patterns	First English settlers brought their own dialects; clustering in new areas created regional dialects (New England, Virginia, etc.).
Migration routes	Westward migration established dialect boundaries along travel and settlement paths.
Geographical factors	Rivers, mountains, lakes, islands affected isolation; Appalachian and island dialects sound archaic.
Region and occupation	Rural farming people may use archaic expressions vs. urban people with more diverse contact.
Language contact	Interaction with Native Americans, French, Spanish, Germans, African-Americans led to mutual borrowing.
Social class	Education and income level affect speech across all regional variations.
Group reference	Ethnicity, national origin, age, gender symbolize in-group vs. out-group identity; includes occupational jargon.
Linguistic processes	Simplification of pronunciation or syntactic changes to clarify meaning.

Example of language contact: "Spanglish" near U.S. borders incorporates English words into Spanish phonology, morphology, and syntax (e.g., parquear from "park," troca from "truck"). Similar blends include Franglais and Chinglish.

Don't confuse: These factors do not work in isolation—dialect change results from multiple interacting social, historical, and linguistic forces.

🎭 Gender and language

Gender differences in language: taught from birth, based on cultural role expectations, not biology.

• In the United States:

  • Men are expected to speak in low, monotone pitch (masculine); higher pitch may be labeled effeminate.
  • Women use their full pitch range, especially when expressing emotion.
  • Women use more minimal responses (m-hm, yeah, I see) and more eye contact; men often do not, leading to complaints that "men don't listen."
  • Deborah Tannen's research: women use cooperative styles to emphasize equality; men use competitive styles to establish hierarchy.

• In Madagascar:

  • Men use flowery, indirect speech (proverbs, metaphors, riddles) to avoid confrontation.
  • Women speak bluntly and directly.
  • Both admire men's speech and think women's speech is inferior.
  • Women control marketplaces because bargaining requires direct speech.

• In Japan:

  • Women traditionally expected to use "feminine" style, subservient to men.
  • Modern women in the workforce must balance feminine identity with authority—a "challenging balancing act."

Example: Margaret Thatcher took speech therapy to "feminize" her language while maintaining authority.

🌐 Globalization and Language

🌐 What globalization means for language

Globalization: the spread of people, cultures, languages, products, money, ideas, and information around the world.

• Globalization has been happening throughout human history but has accelerated in the last 500 years due to improved transportation and communication.
• Example: English explorers spread their language to colonies worldwide starting in the 15th century; English is now one of the most widely spoken languages with official status in at least 60 countries.

🔤 Language as identity and resistance

• Language is a marker of identity and group solidarity.
• When a majority discriminates against a minority, some minority members may adopt the majority's language to blend in.
• Others may continue speaking their language as a symbol of resistance against the more powerful group.
• Example: Spanish in the U.S. is the largest minority language and shows no sign of dying out, either in the U.S. or globally.

📝 Writing Ethnography with Ethical Awareness

📝 Ethnographic authority and voice

Historically, anthropologists wrote as if they possessed "ultimate scientific knowledge," often omitting informants' voices.

Criticisms:

• Feminist anthropologists noted women's experiences were frequently omitted or misrepresented.
• This style reinforced global power dynamics and privileged Western anthropologists' voices.

🎤 Polyvocality: multiple voices

Polyvocality: presenting more than one person's voice in a text, ranging from including informants' perspectives to co-authoring with informants.

• Example: Ruth Behar's Translated Woman includes large sections in Esperanza Hernández's own words, plus Behar's life story and anthropological analysis.
• Polyvocality allows readers to form their own opinions and critique the author's analysis.
• It encourages transparency in methods and data.

🪞 Reflexivity: acknowledging the researcher's impact

Reflexivity: acknowledging how the researcher's life experiences, status, and roles affect their research and analysis.

• Anthropologists insert themselves into texts, analyzing how their characteristics affected the research.
• Reflexivity is "the most significant change in how ethnography is researched and written in the past 50 years."
• It calls on anthropologists to acknowledge they are part of the world they study and can never be truly objective.
• It highlights unequal power dynamics and allows less-empowered voices to be heard.

Author's reflection: Vanessa used reflexivity in her doctoral research to communicate her positionality (light-skinned Latine body, questioned by Black community organizers) and her commitment to transparency and collaborative, community-engaged research.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The excerpt provided does not contain substantive content on race and ethnicity; instead, it covers topics related to technology and language change, foodways, and subsistence systems.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• The excerpt appears to be from a textbook covering multiple anthropology topics, but the section titled "9.0 Race and Ethnicity" is not included in the provided text.
• The material covers digital divides, language preservation through social media, discussion questions about language and inequality, a glossary of linguistic terms, and extensive content on foodways and subsistence systems.
• No actual content about race and ethnicity concepts, theories, or analysis is present in the excerpt.
• The document includes chapters on technology/language (4.9) and foodways (5.0-5.3), but the race and ethnicity section referenced in the title is missing.

📄 Content Summary

📄 What the excerpt contains

The provided text includes:

• Brief sections on digital natives vs. digital immigrants and technology's role in language preservation
• Discussion questions about language and social inequality
• A comprehensive glossary of linguistic anthropology terms
• An extensive chapter on foodways covering foraging, pastoralism, horticulture, and agriculture
• Author biographies and learning objectives for the foodways chapter

❌ What is missing

• Any substantive discussion of race as a concept
• Analysis of ethnicity and ethnic identity
• Theories about racial categories or racism
• Historical or contemporary perspectives on race and ethnicity
• The actual "9.0 Race and Ethnicity" section content

Note: The excerpt does not contain the material indicated by the title "9.0 Race and Ethnicity." To create meaningful review notes on that topic, the actual section content would need to be provided.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Anthropologists study subsistence systems—the methods societies use to obtain food—to understand how food production shapes social structures, cultural identities, and relationships with the environment.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Four modes of subsistence: foraging, pastoralism, horticulture, and agriculture—each adapted to specific environments and requiring different social organization.
• Food is cultural, not just biological: foodways encompass acquisition, preparation, sharing, and eating; they reflect history, social structure, and worldview.
• Common confusion—immediate vs. delayed return: foragers eat what they gather immediately; farmers must wait months between planting and harvest.
• Agriculture ≠ progress: while agriculture supports larger populations, it also created inequality, harder labor, and nutritional problems compared to diverse foraging diets.
• Global food system paradox: the world produces enough food for everyone, yet malnutrition persists because distribution is unequal and food is a commodity, not a right.

🌍 What are foodways?

🍽️ Definition and scope

Foodways: the cultural norms and attitudes surrounding food and eating, encompassing all social, economic, ritual, and cultural practices around acquisition, preparation, sharing, and eating of food.

• Food is one of the strongest cultural identity markers.
• Foodways tell the story of a culture's history, environment, social structure, and worldview.
• The excerpt emphasizes that to understand foodways is to understand the complex relationships between food and culture.

🔗 Four dimensions of foodways

1. Acquisition/production: how groups obtain food (farming, hunting, fishing, gathering).
2. Preparation: techniques, recipes, rituals; reflects cultural norms and heritage passed through generations.
3. Sharing and eating: dining customs, etiquette, symbolic meanings (status, gender roles, religious beliefs).
4. Social significance: commensality (sharing meals) reinforces social cohesion; food-related celebrations create collective identity.

🥖 Subsistence systems: the basics

🧩 What is a subsistence system?

Subsistence system: the set of skills, practices, and technologies used by members of a society to acquire and distribute food.

• Every person plays a role as producer, distributor, or consumer.
• The excerpt contrasts a fishing village (same person catches, distributes, consumes) with a city restaurant (complete separation of roles).
• Subsistence affects nearly every aspect of daily life.

📊 Carrying capacity and population

Carrying capacity: the number of calories that can be extracted from a particular unit of land to support a human population.

• Thomas Malthus (1798) argued population grows exponentially but food production grows arithmetically → inevitable shortages.
• Ester Boserup countered: population pressure drives innovation in farming techniques (necessity is the mother of invention).
• Modern research shows population growth is slowing (about 1% per year).

⚖️ Immediate vs. delayed return

System type	Definition	Example
Immediate return	Food can be consumed right away	Foragers eating fish they caught that day
Delayed return	Investment of work over time before food is available	Farmers waiting months between planting and harvest

🏹 The four modes of subsistence

🌿 Foraging (hunting and gathering)

Foraging: a mode of subsistence relying on wild plant and animal food resources already available in the environment, rather than domesticated species.

Key characteristics:

• Broad spectrum diet: wide range of resources (insects, worms, many plant species).
• Example: The Aché in Paraguay eat 33 mammal species, 15+ fish species, 5 insect types, 10 larvae types, 14 honey types, and 40 plant species.
• Immediate return system: food gathered can be eaten right away.
• Small, mobile populations: low density (less than 5 people per square mile); frequent camp moves.
• Egalitarian social structure: sharing is a social norm; private property is minimal; wealth differences are rare.

Gender and age dynamics:

• Work often divided by gender; men hunt large animals (high prestige), women gather (provides majority of food but less prestige).
• Children don't contribute significantly until teenage years; elders expect care from others.

Historical perspective shift:

• Thomas Hobbes (1651): foraging life is "nasty, brutish, and short" (ethnocentric view).
• Marshall Sahlins (1960s): "original affluent society"—foragers work fewer hours, have more leisure, stronger community bonds.
• Modern view: foraging is effective and dynamic, but Sahlins was overly romantic; some groups work up to 70 hours/week; comfort varies by environment.

Contemporary challenges:

• Foragers rarely live in isolation; conflicts with farming populations are common.
• Government policies, land loss, and ecosystem destruction have forced many into marginal areas or reservations.

Don't confuse: "Natural" environments with human-influenced ones—the excerpt's Nukak example shows foragers actively shape their environment by creating "wild orchards" through selective clearing and seed dispersal.

🐄 Pastoralism

Pastoralism: a subsistence system relying on herds of domesticated livestock.

Key characteristics:

• Nomadic lifestyle: moving several times yearly to provide grazing fields and water.
• Over half of world's pastoralists live in Africa; also found in Central Asia, Tibet, arctic regions.
• Animals raised: cows, goats, sheep, pigs, alpacas, llamas, camels, donkeys.

Goal is not primarily meat:

• Use milk (60-65% of calories in some societies), butter, yogurt, cheese.
• Use fur, wool, dung (fuel, building material).
• Trade with farming communities for grain and balanced diet.

Social organization—Maasai example:

• Wealth and status measured by number of animals owned.
• Polygynous marriages provide labor for cattle care.
• Women do most daily work (milking, cleaning) but cannot own cattle—only have "milking rights."
• Men own cattle and make all major decisions → gender inequality.
• Women support each other, keep each other's secrets about love affairs (resistance to male authority).

Property and resources:

• Private property: animals are "money on legs"; households have more possessions than foragers.
• Communal resources: grazing land and water are shared (impractical to own/fence given mobility).

Tragedy of the Commons debate:

• Garrett Hardin (1968): people don't respect resources they don't own → environmental destruction.
• Evidence contradicts this: pastoralists have rules regulating land use that conserve resources.
• Example: Maasai rotate pastures seasonally, improving ecosystem biodiversity; their land management supports Serengeti ecosystem worth $83.5 million in tourism.

Contemporary pressures:

• Tourism industry demands private land for safari centers.
• Urban/agricultural expansion encroaches on territories.
• Drought, famine, civil war (especially central Africa).
• Tense relationships with agricultural neighbors intensifying due to climate change.

🌾 Horticulture

Horticulture: small-scale cultivation of crops intended primarily for subsistence (not sale).

Three defining differences from other farming:

1. Shifting cultivation: farm fields moved periodically to use best growing conditions.
2. Limited mechanical technology: rely on human and animal labor (e.g., oxen pulling plow), not machines.
3. Scale and purpose: crops consumed by growers or shared in community, not sold for profit.

Common in: tropical areas of South/Central America, Southeast Asia, Oceania.

Crop examples:

• Manioc (cassava): grows in various tropical environments, can remain in ground without rotting (flexible harvest).
• Bananas, plantains, rice, yams.
• All lack protein → must supplement with pigs, chickens, hunting, fishing.

Slash-and-burn technique:

• Clear forest section, cut trees, set controlled fires to burn undergrowth.
• Sounds destructive but ecological impact is complex: abandoned fields return to forest, soil quality renews over time.
• Farmers return after several years to reuse fields → reduces total forest disturbance.
• Residences don't move; rotate through gardens within walking distance.

Multi-cropping and intercropping:

• Grow variety of plants → biodiverse gardens reduce risk.
• Example: "three sisters" (beans, corn, squash) grown together are healthier than separately.
• Maintain some trees/weeds as habitat for predators of garden pests.
• These practices make horticultural gardens resilient.

Social meaning—Trobriand Islands yams:

• Men grow yams but cannot keep entire crop; women "own" them.
• Men must share with daughters, sisters, wives' families, chief, and for special occasions.
• Large yam pile in yam house = respected by family and friends.
• Stingy men receive few yams → empty yam house shows lack of social approval.
• Chief has largest yam house but most obligations (sponsor feasts, support community).
• Yams treated as living beings with minds; farmers talk to them, use magic/incantations.
• Shows close social and spiritual association between farmers and crops.

🚜 Agriculture

Agriculture: cultivation of domesticated plants and animals using technologies (irrigation, draft animals, mechanization, fertilizers, pesticides) that allow intensive and continuous use of land.

Neolithic Revolution:

Neolithic Revolution: period of rapid innovation in subsistence technologies beginning 10,000 years ago, leading to emergence of agriculture. "Neolithic" = "new stone age."

• New tools: scythes (harvesting), adzes/hoes (tilling).
• Dramatically improved yields, supporting larger populations in less space.
• Not necessarily more efficient (more work for more food) but an intensification of horticultural strategies.

🏛️ Four hallmarks of agricultural societies

1️⃣ Reliance on staple crops

Staple crops: foods forming the backbone of the subsistence system by providing the majority of calories a society consumes.

Mono-cropping: reliance on a single plant species as a food source.

• Examples: rice in China, potatoes in Ireland.
• Farmers grow surplus for profit.
• Risks: decreased dietary diversity → malnutrition; crop failure → famine (common in agricultural communities).

2️⃣ Link between intensive farming and population density

• Archaeological record: human communities grew rapidly when agriculture developed.
• Chicken-or-egg debate: Did more food → more people? Or more people → pressure to develop better farming?
• Ester Boserup: population growth preceded agriculture, forcing innovation.
• The cycle: agriculture allows more food → incentive for larger families (children help with farm labor) → more mouths to feed → pressure to expand production → repeat.
• Cost: farmers work more daily hours than foragers.

3️⃣ Division of labor

Division of labor: system in which individuals specialize in certain roles or tasks.

• Higher yields mean not everyone must participate in food quest.
• Specialized occupations emerge: house builders, scientists, religious specialists, politicians, lawyers, academics.
• This feature made non-agricultural occupations possible.

4️⃣ Wealth inequality

• Agriculture is a critical factor explaining origins of social class and wealth inequality.
• Complex economic system → more opportunities to manipulate economy for personal benefit.
• Elites passed labor burden to others.
• Agricultural societies were first to use enslaved and indentured labor.

Don't confuse: Agriculture as "progress" vs. agriculture as a mistake—Jared Diamond argues it was "humanity's worst mistake" because it created social inequality, violent conflict, environmental degradation, and lower quality of life despite higher food production.

🌐 The global agriculture system

🌍 The paradox of plenty

• Key fact: There is enough worldwide agricultural capacity to feed everyone on the planet.
• The problem: Capacity is unevenly distributed; power is in hands of wealthiest nations (including the U.S.).
• Some countries produce much more than they need, others much less.
• Distribution systems are inefficient; much food lost to waste/spoilage.
• In agricultural economies, food costs money → many starving people lack food because they cannot pay, not because food is unavailable.

🔗 World system and commodity chains

World system: a complex web through which goods circulate around the globe; characterized by separation of producers from consumers.

Commodity chain: the series of steps a food takes from the field to the store.

Example—coffee commodity chain:

1. Farmers grow and harvest (paid $1.40/pound).
2. Processors refine (roast beans).
3. Wholesalers package.
4. Retailers sell (Starbucks charges $10-20/pound).

Consequences:

• Food becomes more valuable at end of chain than beginning.
• Farming is not lucrative, especially for small-scale farmers in developing countries (lowest financial returns despite their labor creating profit for others).
• Food moves far from origin → wealthy people access variety (strawberries in winter), but food diverted from locales where grown.
• Quinoa example: When popular in wealthy countries, price tripled; Bolivians exported crop instead of eating it, replacing nutritious traditional food with cheap white bread and Coca-Cola → obesity and diabetes increased.
• Global food travels affect social relations once strengthened by food growing/sharing; distance and competition replace communal experiences.
• Yearning for connection fuels "foodie culture," farm-to-table restaurants, farmer's markets.

🔍 Key concepts and definitions

📖 Important terms from glossary

Domestic economy: the work associated with obtaining food for a family or household.

Built environment: spaces that are human-made, including cultivated land as well as buildings.

Historical ecology: the study of how human cultures have developed over time as a result of interactions with the environment.

Broad spectrum diet: a diet based on a wide range of food resources (characteristic of foraging societies).

Don't confuse: The excerpt clarifies that no environment is truly "natural"—humans have been altering environments and domesticating landscapes for thousands of years (see Nukak example of creating wild orchards).