Race and Anthropology Huge topic-only going to cover a small portion of the discussion Two notions about race: Race has a biological meaning, but not a social meaning *Race has a social meaning but not biological meaning
The culture concept is fundamental to anthropology Years ago, we used to have more trouble introducing the concept, because people tended to think of the other meaning of culture, i.e., high culture, esp. art, music, refinement
Linguistic Aspects of Culture 1. How does culture hang together as system? How does it work? How does it interact with aspects of life that aren't culture? a. There has been a lot of efforts in the 20century to answer these question
The ethnographic reality behind these concepts Potlatch 1. The Culture a. North West coast cultural area is mostly in Canada b. Whole series of related groups all the way up to Alaska C. Fascinating area
1. In Anthropology some insights have come from observing simpler societies and then applying what we learn to our own society a. There are some things in our society that we take for granted that are of very recent origin:
Anthropology of Science Food for thought Is there a culture of science? Who is in that culture? Is there more than one? o What are the boundaries of science 1. Anthropology of science Uses ethnographic method to study science
1. History and Anthropology a. Hutchinson emphasizes that her ethnography tries to encompass the history of the Nuer people b. Evans-Pritchard (Ep)on the other hand, tries only to capture the nuer at one moment in time
