What is Anthropology?
What is Culture?
Today
Lecture
O What is Anthropology?
O What is Culture?
O Seminar – Tuesday @ 11:30
Me
O My name is Lisa Cooke
O My mother is Judith Thrasher and my father is
Richard Cooke
O My mother and father were both born on Anishinabek
territory in the place now most dominantly known as
London, Ontario.
O They now live on Blackfoot, Tsuu T’ina, Ktunaxa
territory in what is most dominantly now called the
Crowsnest Pass.
O I was born on Huron-Wendat, Anishinabek, and
Algonquin territories in the place now most
dominantly known as Ottawa
O I grew up on Blackfoot, Tsuu T’ina, Ktunaxa
territory in what is now most dominantly known
as Calgary.
O In high school we moved to Métis and
Ojibway/Chippewa territory in what is now most
dominantly known as St. Boniface in Winnipeg.
O My son, Norry, was born on Kwanlin Dun and
Ta’an Kwach’an territory in what now most
dominantly known as Whitehorse.
You?
O On the final exam take home assignment
you will be asked on whose Indigenous
territories you are from, and have lived.
Introduction to Cultural
Anthropology
What is Anthropology?
“…the study of humankind in
all times and all places.”
(Haviland et. al. 2009: 5)
The study of what it means to be human…
○ Anthropology is the study of people –
past, and present.
○ All aspects of the human experience
– physical bodies, language, cultural
practices, social interactions…
○ In all time and all places
Subfields of Anthropology
O Physical / Biological Anthropology
O Linguistic Anthropology
O Archaeology
O Cultural Anthropology
O ** Applied Anthropology
Physical / Biological
Anthropology
 How do humans adapt to different environments.
 What causes disease and early death.
 How humans evolved.
 How do biology and culture work together to
shape our lives.
How?
O Study human bodies – living and dead.
O Study primates
O Study fossil remains of human ancestors
O Human Paleontology
O Physical / Biological Anthropology
O Primatology
O Forensic anthropology
Linguistic Anthropology
 The study of the ways that people communicate
across the globe.
 How is language linked to how we see the world
and relate to each other?
O How do we use language to build and
share meaning?
 How have languages changed over
time?
Archaeology
O The study of past human cultures
O Use “material culture” to re-create
how a group might have lived.
O Concerned with examining the
differences and similarities in human
societies across time and space.
How?
 Analyze human bones and teeth to
determine diet and health.
 Examine physical environments to figure
out how people used and altered their
environments.
 Look at material remains (garbage) left
behind.
Ethnoarchaeology
O Subfield of Archaeology
O looks at the behaviors of
living groups as a way of
making sense of what past
groups might have done.
Cultural Anthropology
 Study of living people as cultural beings.
 Interested in all aspects of human
experience shaped by culture.
O We want to know what people think and how
they understand the world around them.
O How do rules get made and how do you get
people to follow them?
O How do people organize themselves?
Cultural Anthropology
Applied Anthropology
 Any one of these fields can
be “applied.”
○ Marketing
○ Development
○ Cultural impact assessments
Cultural Anthropology
What is Culture?
Culture is….
The shared, learned, integrated, symbolic,
adaptive, ever-changing matrix of meaning
making through which we interpret,
experience, and survive in the world.
Most of the time, it also goes completely
unnoticed.
 We are all cultural beings
 We live, experience, interpret the world
through our own particular cultural lens.
Culture is:
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
Learned: Enculturation
Shared
Symbolic
Integrated
Constantly changing
Naturalized / unconsidered
Practical
O Adaptive
O Maladaptive
 Culture defines “normal” (and thus,
“abnormal”).
 It is the taken-for-granted, unconscious
ways that we know, understand, and relate
to the world and each other.
Doing Anthropology /
Studying Culture
Key Concepts in Anthropology
 Holistic Approach
 Cultural relativism
 Ethnocentrism
 Participant Observation
 Ethnography
 Emic
 Etic
Holistic Approach
 This means that to understand
something we need to consider it within
the entire cultural context.
 A fundamental principle in anthropology
that requires that all parts of culture be
viewed in the broadest possible context
to understand how they are
interconnected and interdependent.
Cultural Relativism
O This means that a cultural system, belief,
practice (whatever we are studying) is
being evaluated and analyzed in its own
terms – and not the terms of the
anthropologist or another group.
Ethnocentrism
O Ethnocentrism is when one is evaluating /
studying / judging another culture from the
perspective of their own (and imposing
their own cultural values, and judgments
on the other).
Ethnography
 The collection of descriptive material
on a culture.
 Also the term used for the methodology
used by cultural anthropologists.
 We “do” ethnographic research and
produce ethnographies.
2 Approaches to Ethnography
O Emic - insider research
O Etic - outsider research
Participant Observation
“The method of learning a people’s culture
through direct observations and
participation in their everyday lives.”
Example of participant observation:
An Anthropology of YouTube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPAO-lZ4_hU
Let’s consider….
O What is anthropology?
O How might it be relevant or important to
understanding a real life situation? What
might it contribute to?
What is culture?
O Let’s consider examples of how culture is:
O Shared
O Learned
O Symbolic
O Adaptive
O Always changing
O Integrated
O Goes unnoticed most of the time
How do we do
anthropology?
O Holistic approach
O Cultural relativism (vs ethnocentrism)
O Participant Observation
O Ethnography
O Emic and Etic