1. As an organizing principle for life a. We tend to think of kin as something natural biological or as having some basis beyond culture i. For example, children reuniting with birth parents b. Kinship is actually highly variable and artificial from one culture to the next
1.The Nuer a. Famous in anthropology long before Hutchinson's book i. The Nuer were pacified by the British colonial forces 1. After their pacification anthropologists could study them 2. Much of early anthropology was caught up in colonialism b. Studied by many, but there can't be a definitive book on their culture or any other
More Problems With Culture 1. The culture concept has been used and misused This notion has traveled around the world it can be considered one of Anthropology's great successes b. Culture has also been distorted 1. Assumptions that cultures have clear boundaries
1. Strength and weakness of anthropology: Anthropologists are often swayed by a single key case a. Weakness in that this is an obviously inadequate sample. No way of knowing if typical or how typical b. Strength in that rich analysis, really can tell you a lot
More On The Nuer 1. Ghost Marriage: a woman is married to a dead man a. Among the Nuer, this kind of marriage is almost as frequent as marriage to a living man b. A living man is found to physically father a child for the dead man. TO understand this, one must distinguish between:
Symbolism and Ritual It's a huge topic, it could cover a whole course 1. Two examples: a. Mariage ritual from the Kuna called\the dragging' i. Bride and groom would not choose each other, but their parents would arrange the marriage secretly. The groom's friends would traditionally surprise him and drag him down the street. (Now a days, they don't fight back so hard and they know ahead of time)
1. INTRO We all suffer in writing, one way or another. We have trouble writing or we get writer's block. But there are ways to go at it that are less painful. a. Divide and conquer the rules of writing. Taking them one at a time will make learning the rules earlier. i. We'll keep nagging you on your writing. Take the time to go over the comments we write on your papers
