Kentner Novas CAS 2410-003 Essay 3 Dear U.S. Department of Energy I know you are looking for expert consultants that will write official recommendations for developing warning markers intended to deter future human societies from ever going near the newly formed Waste Isolation Pilot Project or (W.I.P.P.) for short. I know that an anthropologic take should be heard because it is the study of everything that means to be human. The study of anthropology is one of the newest sciences, but is the most important when we are talking about humans, since it is the study of the study of human societies and cultures, not only just now, but also how both have developed over time. Anthropology covers everything from the human race, and there should be specific focus on anthropologic study of symbols, religion and how humans learn and pass on information Anthropology can simply be put as the study of human society and culture. But that’s just the easy way anthropology can be way more broad or extremely specific, about any point in time at any place about any group of people. Through their studies of the main four subfields of anthropology, cultural, biological, archaeological, and linguistic. 1: Cultural anthropology is the study of human society, it is obviously the subfield that deals the most with the person to person contact. It describes, analyzes, interprets and explains the social and cultural differences. To interpret cultural diversity, anthropologists do two kinds of activities Ethnography and Ethnology. The first, ethnography, is field work, being in the place you are studying and living there, for some times years. Ethnography provides an account of a particular group, society or culture. During field work an ethnographer collects data that they organize, analyze and interprets to build and present what they have learned. Normally anthropologist will live in small towns, to study the local culture, beliefs, customs and much more. Studies that question economic or political sciences, focus more on national and official organizations and can’t forget the powerful elites.. The other thing that cultural anthropologists will do is an ethnology, these examine, interprets the results of an ethnography, the data gathered in other societies are used to compare and contrast and to generalize about the societies and cultures 2: Biological anthropology, is the study of human biological diversity through time and how it exists in the world today. This can be broken down into five parts, biological evolution, human genetics, growth and development, biological plasticity, primatology. A theme that runs through all five of those specialties is a distinct interest in the biological variation between humans, specifically their ancestors and our closest animal relatives, monkeys and apes. Because we’re talking about biology there is going to be overlap into other fields that are not anthropology, were going to be seeing a lot of zoology, anatomy, physiology and obviously biology, how about one I bet you haven’t even heard about. Osteology, the study of bones, this is essential for biological anthropologist who take a look at skulls, teeth and bones, they not only do ancient peoples bones, but they will look at modern bones to compare. When talking about old bones we get into the field of paleontology, this is the science of fossils, and when you mix this with anthropology you get paleoanthropologist, this is the study of human fossil records 3. Archeological anthropology, the reconstruction of human behavior and culture, through physical remains. Digging where people used to live, archaeologist rediscover and recover artifacts humans of old would have used, they will go through tools, weapons, building or even their garbage. The plant and animal remnants will tell us stories of what the peoples diet consisted of, and what some of their activities were. Looking specifically at the animal remains archeologist will look at the bones to determine the age and sex of the animal, to determine if it was hunted or if it was domesticated. When looking at the plant remains we can determine if it was gathered or if it was a farm product. The difference between the food being collected vs harvested, determines what stage of development the group of humans were in. When archeologist analyze such data, they discover answers about these ancient economies, did they hunt or did they domesticate, did they forage or did they farm. Going through theses sites we can also answer questions about the society, like whether or not they were trading, or did the residents buy particular items. From all of this data, archaeologist will piece together patters of production. Archeologist love studying clay fragments, because they are way more durable that other types of artifacts, so they are easier to find. They can determine parts of the society like how big the community was by how much pottery is there, they can determine if there was trade if there is materials used in the pottery that is not found locally. 4. Linguistic anthropology is the study of language and how it has changed through time, it does this by understanding it in its social and cultural context. Linguistic anthropology like any other type is to analyze and compare cultures to one another to get a better understanding of human life, well they do this a few different ways, some find links in language and connect them to uniformities in the brain, other reconstruct old languages by building of their descendant language, other work off of linguistic differences and discover new perceptions and patterns of thought in other cultures You see other animals may learn from experience; for example, they avoid fire after discovering that it hurts. Wolves however, learn hunting strategies from other pack members ,such social learning is particularly important among monkeys and apes, our closest biological relatives. But our own cultural learning depends on the uniquely developed human brain to use symbols and signs that have no necessary or natural connection to the things they signify or for which they stand for. Because humans as a whole can understand signs and symbols, with no written language, and it doesn’t matter what language you speak, the sign is would still invoke a similar feeling. To protect future generations from the W.I.P.P. you need to a symbol that will invoke fear or danger into the minds of humans for years to come. That’s where anthropologists come in, they must be put onto the board, because we have been working on understanding human past, and they will have an insight on how humans react to certain ideas or images. We all hear the saying history repeats itself, well then wouldn’t you want the people who study history and study culture to be on your board for when history inevitably does. A linguistic anthropologist would be perfect for the roll for helping design warning signs because they deal with how humans perceive language and I bet there pretty good at understanding how people respond to symbols. I also know that you guys are not only thinking of signs to keep people out but putting it in the culture, to stay away from the W.I.P.P. There is only one group of people that would be capable of such a task and that would have to be the cultural anthropologist, if you want people to respond you have to know how people responded previously and the people who study and understand the past is the cultural anthropologist. The society that may come after us after we have closed the Waste Isolation Pilot Project, we as a species moved past technology, we don’t believe in it anymore this will be a pre industrial society, this is also how no one remembers about the place. We will have reverted back to the ancient Greek ways of life, a life of kings exploration and philosophy. In my made up society it is chock full of waring parties over this huge salt mine and so not only are people actively mining but they are people fighting for it, so eventually there going to dig deep enough or wide enough to find the nuclear waste. The W.I.P.P. is berried underneath a giant salt plain, well salt is a very valuable resource, especially when no one uses refrigerators anymore. If there was no warning sign or type of structure built to keep people away then there would be nothing stopping these people mining all the way down to where all the dangerous nuclear waste is.
