Essential Outcome 2: The Concept Of Culture

Culture is such a dynamic term, that it is hard to define it to a single definition. Basically though, culture is WHO we are. It defines everything we do, from our living styles, to our thoughts about each other, to what we eat, how we dress, everything! A good example is that in our culture, we have lots of fast food places that serve burgers, and we love them, and don’t think twice about eating them. However, in other cultures, such as those in India, where the cow is sacred, they view our consumption of cow meat as barbaric and cruel. We could flip that around the other way as well. An example? In our culture, we view dogs as man’s best friend, and a great loving pet. In some other cultures (maybe even India?), dog is a delicacy, and people love to eat it. We as Americans view that as wrong, gross, and disgusting, and maybe even as animal cruelty. Heck, we can go to jail for even kicking a dog here, and over in other countries they cook them and eat them and have no consequences. Thus, we have cultural differences.

Culture to me is something that is a part of us, and that is where enculturation comes into play. Enculturation pretty much is how we “learned” our culture, and put it into practice. It is what we learn is “right and wrong” in our culture, and how we learn the proper way or fashion to do things. Some of enculturation you know you are learning, and some you just learn and don’t even realize it. For example, we were talking about the elevator etiquette. Usually parents don’t go around telling their children, “Ok, now, when we get into the elevator, make sure to face the door ok?” Instead, we just observe the other people facing the door, and we follow suit. That would be one that we just instinctually learned. I believe that most of our enculturation comes from observing the others that are around us. Some of it is learned by language yes, but mostly observations.

Explicit and tacit culture are basically two different ways of thinking about culture. Something that is tacit in our culture helps shape the way that we act and behave, and can be expressed through objects. And again going back to the enculturation, and how some of it is learned without us even knowing it; as is tacit culture. As soon as we can think about something, and analyze it, it becomes explicit. For example, traffic jams. Cars and roads and transportation all play a huge role in our culture. But why do traffic jams occur? It is because too many people are heading the same direction at around the same time, thus causing congestion and traffic backup. Now, because I was able to think about that and process it, it is not tacit, because I know it is going on, and what is causing it. Mostly everything we do in our everyday lives can be considered tacit. Say for example, putting clothes on. We usually don’t think twice about putting on clothes before heading out the door, as it has been a cultural norm for us since we were little kids. And because we don’t think about that, it is considered tacit. To me, that is now explicit though, because I thought about it and typed it in this response.

Cultural events are made up of three main elements: Cultural knowledge, cultural practice, and cultural artifacts. Now, a cultural event may include more than these three things, but it must include those three at least.

There are a few main elements of cultural knowledge. Values, or what people within a culture consider to be right or wrong, whether it be actions, words, anything of that matter. A Norm is another big part, as they basically run society. It is a rule that is within a society that the people follow. Beliefs and world views are also part of it. They are basically ideas and concepts that need no explanation, as well as how the society views the world and what is going on around them. Symbols and desires are a part of it too. Symbols are signs that stand for other things, while desires tie into norms, values, and most everything else on this list. Knowledge is obviously an abstract idea, and not something you can actually see yourself.

Cultural practices are very complex. Now, yes it’s obvious that the way we act and behave can be considered a practice, but there are also more complex roots to that. Like Dr. Archer said, even speech can be a practice of its own. Or maybe perhaps thought and intuition are practices as well. So it goes beyond just what we do and can branch out into what we think as well.

Cultural artifacts can also be very simple or very complex in nature. They are the result of human actions. Obvious examples, such as a television set, are artifacts, but so are some not-so-obvious things, such as T.V. channels. Technically, that is an artifact. Although it seems like an abstract sort of thing, that just goes along with the television, a channel is its own entity and can thusly be considered an artifact of its own.

Anthropologists look for the three main elements in analyzing cultural events. A great example provided by Dr. Archer would be American football. All three elements are indeed present in American football. It has knowledge built right into it, obvious artifacts such as the football itself, football helmets, etc, and practices, maybe such as the plays that are called, or the creation of new plays.

Another example of my own could be a school. It has a hierarchical system, with the principal at the top, and the students at the bottom. So ultimately, what the principal decides to do will impact everyone down the line, all the way to the student. So, you could say that the principal, as the head of the school, would examine his cultural knowledge, choose what is right or wrong in his/her opinion, and act upon that (which is also practices). Artifacts could be the results of the principal’s actions. Say for example, there was a change in school policies, and so the principal decided to print out a newsletter to give to the teachers to hand out to the students. The newsletter could be considered an artifact that was created from the cultural knowledge and practices of the principal.

A great example including all of these elements from the assigned course material would have to be the anthropologist traveling on the commuter train to Chicago. One of the first things he noticed was that most of the people on the train were reading something, which could be considered a cultural behavior. He said that the reading was a cause of the many cultural artifacts that were around us, including the newspapers, books, tickets, and billboards. Cultural knowledge is what is embedded deeply within the subject. In the book, it talks about what the people needed to know in the first place in order to do that behavior, which was reading. They would have to know a language, how it is used in the context of reading, all the grammar rules, that they were supposed to read left to right, that a period was the end of a sentence, etc. So by sitting back and observing his surroundings, and the behavior of the people around him, he was able to successfully analyze the cultural event and break it down into its three main subcategories.

Essential Outcome 1: Introduction to Anthropology

Outcome 1: Introduction to Anthropology: Shaun Piazza

Anthropology is the study of humans/humanity. Anthro comes from a Greek word “Anthropos” meaning humanity, and “–ology” means “the study of.” Anthropologists can study a variety of things within their subject. From ancient humans, to modern day humans, to culture, to body structure, etc. It is very broad, and can cover almost everything in our everyday lives.

General principles are: Global, comparative, holistic, empirical, and relative.

Four subfields are: archaeology, cultural anthropology, physical anthropology, and linguistic anthropology.

Global: Anthropology not only has to do with us in America, but the entire human race around the world. We try to study every group of humans that we can, so that we may better understand our own culture. Global pretty much tries to see all the various qualities that we as humans have from all around the world.

Holistic: The Holistic principle basically brings upon the idea that each part or section of culture around the world contributes to the whole understanding of what we as humans are in their own little ways. It means that you can consider all of the "smaller" parts of the whole picture to see what it really is all about. Take for instance Dr. Archer's example about his kids' afternoon care sessions. He had to choose between keeping them in the program, and paying the people there, but in return he had less time with his kids. However, if he took them out of the program, he would have more money in his pocket, and more time to spend with his kids. So holistic is basically all the little factors of something that tie into the main idea/concept. You can think as broadly as you'd like to. Following Dr. Archer's teeth example, I will go with body sculpting. Why is it that we as a society tend to favor lean, muscular, and fit bodies over out of shape and overweight ones? How have our culture and our minds evolved to that type of mentality? Was it different in the past? That's what holistic is. Taking a concept, and thinking about everything you can possibly think of in relevance to that particular subject.

Comparative: We can compare our own culture to another one to see the differences and/or similarities that we share. We can even use other cultures to learn more about our own.

Relative: Again comparing cultures, however, trying not to value one culture over another. Treating them all equal. No group is superior to any other, we all have strengths and weaknesses in different areas.

Empirical: Has everything to do with experience, and the way anthropologists think about the research and data that they collect through their work. If you experience it first hand, it is going to be empirical. You were there, and you collected the data.

Cultural implies anything passed down from generation to generation that’s not genetic, such as words, ideas, concepts, ways of doing things, etc. It helps us understand other culture’s way of doing things as well. If we see a culture making sacrifices to their god, it may seem strange to us, however, they may view our activities, such as eating hamburgers or driving cars as weird. It covers everything from politics, to law, to relations, to exchanges; basically anything having to do with one’s culture can be found under this subfield. They try to understand how different cultures interact with each other and how they understand the world around them.

Physical Anthropology focuses on evolution, genetics, and primatology, amongst other things. They would look at say for example, how humans learned to walk, and they would say it would have something to do with the feet evolving or something, while the cultural anthropologist would say it was a learned behavior. In fact, forensic anthropologists, and crime scene investigators are sub fields of this subfield (if that makes any sense). They could, for example, look at the differences between primates bone structures and our own, and try to connect a link as to how we evolved.

Linguistic: These guys look at the history and basic overall structure and integrity of all human languages throughout time. They try to connect behavior to actions and movements and thoughts and words. Without language, our society wouldn’t be the same as it is today, that’s for sure. It is important to realize they look at both verbal AND non-verbal communications, and how they both relate to one another. They can look at cave paintings on the wall from the Neanderthals, or perhaps study a written script that was unearthed, or even look for vocal signs in human skull remains.

Archaeology: Study the humans of the past. These guys look at everything from writings left behind by cultures, to human remains, to artifacts associated with cultures, etc. They also look at how the artifacts relate to the culture, and how they affected/impacted it as a whole. They try to understand the humans of the past and relate them to today’s world. An example of something archaeologists would study would be human remains.

A subject that two or more subfields could study could be the remains of the people of Pompeii. The Physical Anthropologists could examine the human remains, bones and things, and see how they compared to the different cultures today (a holistic point of view). And try to see how we changed over time. Archaeologists could not only study the human remains, but the artifacts and objects that were found in the buried town of Pompeii. And hey, cultural anthropologists could even come into the picture and study the remains and artifacts and try to link them to today’s world and see how they compare and how they differ.

Anthropology can be related to many other fields. One such is criminal justice. A huge part of the criminal justice system is the crime scene investigation unit. Forensic Anthropologists know all about human remains and things like that, and so they can help out in that regard to the crime scenes. They could look at victims and determine many things.

There are many strengths of anthropology. Anthropology can seek to help out human- kind as a whole. It helps us all understand each other, and how our cultures are similar and different in many different ways. Basically, since it is such a BROAD field, it helps out our society in more ways than imaginable. Archaeology helps us better understand ourselves today compared to the past. Cultural helps us understand who we are in relation to other cultures around the globe. Physical helps us see how we as humans have evolved over time, and how our body functions. And Linguistic helps us understand how our language has helped our culture change.

There aren’t too many weaknesses of anthropology, but there is one I can think of. Since the study is so broad, it is hard to define what is in each subfield, because many subjects cross over into two or more of them. And since the subjects cross into different subfields, many anthropologists in the fields disagree on many points.

Anthropology actually has been a big part of my life over the past year or so. My girlfriend is an anthropology major up at Humboldt State University, so I learn a lot from her, because I’m taking a lot of the same classes that she has (like this one). I took physical anthropology last semester so I learned a lot about the body and how we compare to primates, and how we as a species came into existence. I’ve always been kind of interested in anthropology, and I hope that with this class I can learn more about it.