Chapter 7
Making a Living
What We Will Learn
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What are the different ways by which
societies get their food?
How do technology and environment
influence food getting strategies?
How have humans adapted to their
environments over the ages?
Five Major Food Gathering
Strategies
1.
2.
3.
Food collection: collecting vegetation,
hunting animals, and fishing.
Horticulture: plant cultivation with simple tools
and small plots of land, relying solely on
human power.
Pastoralism: keeping domesticated animals
and using their products as a major food
source.
Five Major Food Gathering
Strategies
4.
5.
Agriculture: horticulture using animal or
mechanical power and some form of irrigation.
Industrialization: production of food through
complex machinery.
Human Adaptation
Humans adapt to climates in two ways:
1. Culturally - dietary patterns, levels of
activities
2. Biologically - changes in the body
Food Gathering and the
Environment
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Most anthropologists agree that the environment sets
limits on the form that food-getting patterns may take.
Cultures help people adapt to inhospitable
environments.
Characteristics of Food
Collecting Societies
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Low population densities.
Usually nomadic or semi nomadic rather
than sedentary.
Basic social unit is the family or band.
Contemporary food-collecting peoples
occupy the remote and marginally useful
areas of the earth.
Carrying Capacity
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The maximum number of people a given
society can support, given the available
resources.
Optimal Foraging Theory
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A theory that foragers look for those
species of plants and animals that will
maximize their caloric intake for the time
spent hunting and gathering foods.
Food Collecting
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A form of subsistence that relies on the
procurement of animal and plant
resources found in the natural
environment (aka foraging and hunting
and gathering).
Historically Known Foragers
Question
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_______ is a basic form of plant
cultivation using simple tools, small plots
of land, and relies on human power.
a) Pastoralism
b) Horticulture
c) Food collection
d) Agriculture
Answer: b
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Horticulture is a basic form of plant
cultivation using simple tools, small plots
of land, and relies on human power.
Question
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The gathering of wild vegetation and the
hunting of small game is the strategy of:
a) horticulture.
b) pastoralism.
c) agriculture.
d) food collection.
Answer: d
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The gathering of wild vegetation and the
hunting of small game is the strategy of
food collection.
Neolithic Revolution
Food Producing Societies
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Transition from food collection to food
production began 10,000 years ago
Humans began to cultivate crops and
keep herds of animals.
Humans were able to produce food rather
than rely only on what nature produced.
Ju/’hoansi
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Despite popular
misconceptions,
foragers such as the
Ju/’hoansi do not live
on the brink of
starvation.
Inuit
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To survive in their
harsh environment,
the Inuit from
Nunavut, Canada,
have had to develop
a number of creative
hunting strategies,
including the recent
adoption of
snowmobiles.
Changes Resulting From Food
Production
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Increased population.
Populations became more sedentary.
Stimulated a greater division of labor.
Decline in overall health reduced the life
expectancy from 26 to 19 years.
Why Food Production Led to
Declining Health
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Foragers had a more balanced diet
(plants and animal proteins).
Farmers ran the risk of malnutrition or
starvation if the crops failed.
Increased population brought people into
greater contact and made everyone more
susceptible to parasitic and infectious
diseases.
Question
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It is not until ________, some 10, 000
years ago, that human beings began
producing food by horticulture or animal
husbandry.
a) the industrial revolution
b) the French revolution
c) the neolithic revolution
d) the aquaculture revolution
Answer: c
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It is not until the neolithic revolution
some 10, 000 years ago, that human
beings began producing food by
horticulture or animal husbandry.
Horticulture
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The simplest type of farming, which involves the
use of basic hand tools rather than plows or
machinery driven by animals or engines.
Horticulturalists produce low yields and
generally do not have sufficient surpluses to
develop extensive market systems.
The land is neither irrigated nor enriched by the
use of fertilizers.
Shifting Cultivation (Swidden,
Slash and Burn)
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A form of plant cultivation in which seeds
are planted in the fertile soil prepared by
cutting and burning the natural growth;
relatively short periods of cultivation are
followed by longer periods of fallow.
Pastoralism
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Involves keeping domesticated herd
animals and is found in areas of the world
that cannot support agriculture because of
inadequate terrain, soils, or rainfall.
Associated with geographic mobility,
because herds must be moved
periodically to exploit seasonal pastures.
Pastoralism: 2 Movement
Patterns
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Transhumance
• Some of the men move livestock seasonally
to different pastures while the women,
children, and other men remain in permanent
settlements.
Nomadism
• There are no permanent villages, the whole
social unit of men, women, and children
moves the livestock to new pastures.
Tibetan Yak Herders
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Tibetan yak herders
must move
their animals
periodically to ensure
adequate pasturage.
Social Functions of Cattle
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The use of livestock by pastoralists not
only for food and its byproducts but also
for purposes such as marriage, religion,
and social relationships.
Stock friendship
• A gift of livestock from one man to
another to strengthen their friendship.
Agriculture
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Uses technology such as irrigation,
fertilizers, and mechanized equipment.
Produces high yields and supports large
populations.
Associated with permanent settlements,
cities, and high levels of labor
specialization.
Draft Animals
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The use of draft
animals, as practiced
by this farmer from
Hoi An, Vietnam,
involves a more
complex form of crop
production than
swidden farming.
Agriculture: Costs of Greater
Productivity
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Can support many times more people per
unit of land than the horticulturalist.
Agriculturalists must devote vast numbers
of hours of hard work prepare the land.
Intensive agriculture requires a much
higher investment of capital.
Terraced Farming
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This terraced form of
farming, as found in
Indonesia, involves a
long-term
commitment to the
land and a
considerable
expenditure of labor.
Peasantry
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Rural peoples, usually on the lowest rung
of society’s ladder, who provide urban
inhabitants with farm products but have
little access to wealth or political power.
Question
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Because of its reliance on animal power
and technology, ________ differs from
horticulture, and is a more intensive and
efficient system.
a) horticulture
b) nomadism
c) agriculture
d) pastoralism
Answer: c
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Because of its reliance on animal power
and technology, agriculture differs from
horticulture, and is a more intensive and
efficient system.
Industrialization
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A process resulting in the economic
change from home production of goods to
large-scale mechanized factory
production.
Ecosystems
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This Kayapo woman
from Brazil knows not
to kill the foraging
ants in her garden
because they actually
weed and fertilize her
crops.
Industrialized Food Production
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Uses more powerful sources of energy.
Requires:
• High levels of technology (such as
tractors and combines)
• Mobile labor force
• Complex system of markets
Features of Four Major Food
Procurement Categories
Foragers
Horticulturalist
Population Size
Small
Small/moderate
Permanency of
settlement
Nomadic (or semi)
Generally
sedentary
Surpluses
Minimal
Minimal
Trade
Minimal
Minimal
Labor
specialization
None
Minimal
Class differences
None
Minimal
Features of Four Major Food
Procurement Categories
Pastoralist
Intensive
agriculture
Population Size
Small
Large
Permanency of
settlement
Nomadic (or semi)
Permanent
Surpluses
Moderate
Usual
Trade
Moderate
Very important
Labor
specialization
Minimal
Highest degree
Class differences
Moderate
Highest degree