Anthro on the web
The IB curriculum guide specifies three themes: social organisation, systems of belief and knowledge, and processes of change and transformation. These three themes are then further subdivided into 'elements'.
Everything in the boxes in black type below are copied directly from the IB Subject Guide. Column 1 contain the subdivisions ('elements') of each theme. Column 2 is the Guide's 'suggested material for study'. Note that the same 'suggested material for study' comes into several elements. This is not a list of topics to be covered. They are just suggestions for the sorts of things that can be used to provide an understanding of the 'elements'.
I have added two more columns. Column 3 links the items in the second column to articles or ethnographic material we have read and discussed in class. This is what you should use to illustrate the ideas for each subdivision. Column 4 crosslinks the themes with the book Small Places, Big Issues. [Eriksen, T.H. 2001. Small Places, Large Issues. London: Pluto Press]
| Social organisation |
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The study of social organisation is a central concern of social and culural anthropology which emphasises the interdependence of social, economic and political institutions and processes. |
| ELEMENTS | SUGGESTED MATERIAL FOR STUDY | Articles and materials discussed in class | Eriksen: Small Places, Large Issues |
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Authority & the exercise of power Political organisation takes many forms, but all have the common element of ordering internal and external relations |
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The main sources for this section are the Bedouin material, and the Sripuram material. In both societies, an ideology of inequality is being challenged by an ideology of equality. [Take ideology of inequality to mean 'genuinely held beliefs which nevertheless justify unequal access to resources and unequal sharing of political power'] The Sripuram material covers power & political systems, systems of stratification, relations of inequality (class & caste), and patron-client relationships. more on Patron-client relationships The Bedouin material covers relations of inequality (gender), domination and resistance. The Kakiutl material can be used for status, role and prestige, and can also be used for discussing war and conflict. Social control: positive and negative diffuse and organised sanctions. Legal institutions define which organised negative sanctions shall be appropriate for which behaviour, determine to whom these sanctions shall be applied, and apply them. |
Power & authority Caste & Class |
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Adaptation & economic organization Anthropology focuses on how societies adapt to their environment and on how these societies produce, allocate and value goods, services and labour |
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Kwakiutl (pre-contact) adaptation to a bountiful but unpredictable environment. The problem of survival for the Kwakiutl as a hunting/gathering society over the course of a year. Maus: There is an obligation to give gifts (defined occasions), accept gifts, and return gifts. Because gifts must be returned, they are an example of immediate or delayed reciprocity. Gifts are goods or services produced for social rather than economic ends. Where these are an important way of satisfying perceived needs by allocating scarce resources, this is called the 'embedded economy'. The functions of gifts include: binding people together (Yanomamö), validating status (Kwakiutl), constraining behaviour (Trobriand Islanders: the Kula). Mundurucú and bitter manioc. How a subsistance crop became a cash crop and changed the marriage residence rules from patrilocal to matrilocal. Systems of exchange: Trobriand islanders and the Kula ring. The relation between trade goods and ritual objects (vaygu'a). |
Exchange: p. 178-185 |
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Kinship as an organising principle Kinship can be seen as a basic unit of human social relations. It is structured in many different ways to define groups and the differences between them. Kinship groups are not static units but define fields of relationship and meaning through which economic and political processes occur |
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Patrilineal (Yanomamö) & matrilineal societies (Kaguru: 'Hyena & Rabbit'). How dividing people into lineal kin and affines reduces conflict over inheritance and authority. How exogamy (incest rules) promote alliances. Patrilocal and matrilocal residence. Why the Yanomamö lie! How conflict leads to village fission (Yanomamö). Men compete with kin for wives, so new villages are formed from close kin together with their affines. Corporate descent groups: Kwakiutl numima own their communal dwellings collectively as well as fishing rights. How the numima recruits members. |
Kinship: p. 93-102 p. 108-111 |
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Individual & society Each indivual learns the ideals and behaviour expected from him/her as a member of society and develops a sense of self within a field of social relations and throug the parameters of his/her culture |
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Growing up to be male or female (Yanomamö). Relationships between men and women (Bedouins). Domestic and public domains. Gender as a social construction (Bedouins, 'Rosie the Riveter'). Ethnicity as an aspect of a relationship (Eid: Muslims in Paris). Note that ethnicity (including 'race') is NOT defined by a list of cultural or biological traits. The social, classificatory and ideological function of stereotypes. Caste & class (Sripuram). Caste is maintained by myths and pollution rituals. An ascribed status with no social mobility, which determines occupation. Class is an achieved status having social mobility, largely determined by occupation and income. |
Gender: Rites of passage: Ethnicity: |
| Systems of belief and knowledge |
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Culture contains and expresses beliefs, values and practices. While culture is structured, it is also the site of conflicts and challenge, and undergoes change over time. |
| ELEMENTS | SUGGESTED MATERIAL FOR STUDY | Articles and materials discussed in class | Eriksen: Small Places, Large Issues |
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Belief systems & practices This element focuses on ideas and actions that refer to notions of the sacred |
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Religion as an institutionalised system of beliefs (in non-empirical entities with supernatural powers) and practices (which seek to control these entities and powers), involving a mix of myths and rituals, which both do useful things (functionalism) and 'explain' why we are here and the meaning of our lives. (Durkheim: mechanical and organic solidarity; worshipping a deity is worshipping society, Malinowski: M*A*S*CH, Van Gennep: rites of passage/transition rituals, Lévi-Strauss: N/C). Myths: Hyena & Rabbit. Rituals: Food given to appease the spirits of sewing machines by the Maya of San Lucas, Guatemala, while reciting Catholic prayers. Witchcraft can be discussed under two headings: function and meaning. It is means of social control (functionalism) and a way of assigning meaning to random events (Azande). Mary Douglas: 'Witchcraft is in the non-structure'. Witchcraft and interstitial persons. The distinction between witchcraft and sorcery. Divination (Kpelle: hot knife ordeal). Oracles (Azande: the poison given to chickens). Magic: the use of magic by the Trobriand Islanders to make rain, protect boats from the hazards of the sea, and ensure success in warfare (formerly throwing spears, now cricket balls!). Magic and religion are at opposite ends of a continuum of beliefs and practices; magic is the least and religion the most institutionalised. |
Religion: Rituals: Witchcraft : |
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Moral systems By enabling and constraining behaviour, moral systems regulate the life of the individual in society |
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Why shared notions of just/unjust are necessary for the settlement of disputes where compensation/ negative organised sanctions are involved. M*A*S*CH Ritual pollution as sustaining caste boundaries (Sripuram). |
Ideology:
p. 160-161 |
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Cognative systems Cognitive systems are ways of organising and comprehending social and natural environments |
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Cosmology (Yanomamö: the soul, the universe as a series of horizontal planes, explanations for sickeness and death). Lévi-Strauss: N & C. (Goldilocks & the Three Bears; Little Red Riding Hood). |
Knowledge: Classification: N& C: |
| Processes of change & transformation |
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This theme identifies processes of change and transformation, both on a large scale and at a local level. These processes work over long periods of time, and therefore should be placed in their historical context, and studied with attention to the interaction between the large scale and local level. |
| ELEMENTS | SUGGESTED MATERIAL FOR STUDY | Articles and materials discussed in class | Eriksen: Small Places, Large Issues |
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Societies & cultures in contact Societies have always interacted with one another, whether in friendship or in conflict, and they define themselves, in significant ways, through their mutual interaction |
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Kwakiutl (post-contact): how the potlatch was transformed in response to demographic, economic and political changes. Ethnocide/genocide is ethnic exclusion taken to extremes (Eid: Muslims in Paris). Millenarian Movements (Cargo cults are revitilisation movements, characterised by syncretism, when old and new religous ideas are combined). Food given to appease the spirits of sewing machines by the Maya of San Lucas, Guatemala, while reciting Catholic prayers, as an example of syncretism. |
Cargo cults:
p. 250-251 |
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Modernisation & development Modernity is relevant to all societies. However, societies differ in terms of their access to aspects of this modernity and the rhythm of change that they undergo |
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Rice mills in Indonesia: problems of predicting the outcome of development programs. Guinea pigs in Ecuador: the importance of understanding the local culture. more on Globalisation, Localisation, Tourism and Development Bedouins: result of movement from desert camps to settlement in towns (urbanisation). The intrusion of the state. The shift from caste to class (Sripuram). |
Development:
p. 255-256 |
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Globalisation Globalisation is the spread of common symbols and structures across national and other social boundaries. Globalisation and the worldwide uniformity it tends to generate are always countered by locialisation, which redefines globalising forces in terms of the local context |
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Globalisation: Localisation: Tourism. Culture as a commodity. Authenticity (Baudrillard): the Tharu of Nepal. Vueltas in the Canary Islands. more on Globalisation, Localisation, Tourism and Development Millenarian Movements (religious cults and political movements). Paco and Waco. Evans-Pritchard: time and space. Mary Douglas: GRID/GROUP. |
Globalisation:
p. 294-302 |
In an essay, the first time you refer to a society you should always say who they are, where they are located and give the 'ethnographic present'. If you know who wrote about that society, say who that was as well.
Here are most of the societies we have discussed. Remember, it is perfectly acceptable to quote from your own experience in any society you are familiar with, including the USA.
Bedouins (Gender, domination & resistance, transformation, globalisation). Egypt, 1980s (Lila Abu-Lughod)
Rosie the Riveter (Social construction of gender). USA, 1940s (Connie Field)
Sripuram (Politics, caste & class). South India,1960s (Béteille)
Trobriand Islands (Kula, gifts as constraints on behaviour, localisation). Melanesia, 1910s (Malinowski)
The Kwakiutl (Potlatch, ecological adaptation, gifts as defining status). N.W. Pacific Coast of N. America, 1900s (Boas)
The Yanomamö (Social organisation, kinship, cosmology). Venezuela, 1960s (Chagnon)
The Kaguru (Hyena & Rabbit, matrilineage). Tanzania, 1950s (Beidelman)
Eid: Muslims in Paris (Ethnicity). Paris, France, 1990s (Anne-Marie Brisebarre)
In Search of Respect (Cultural capital). El Barrio, New York City, 1995 (Bourgois)
Paco (Cargo Cults). Melanesia, 1930-40s (Worsley)
Waco (Branch Davidians). Waco, Texas (1990s)
The Mundurucú (Bitter manioc). Brazil, 1950s (Murphy)
The Kpelle (Hot knife ordeal). Liberia, 1960s (Gibbs)
The Azande (Witches, the poison oracle). Sudan, 1930s (Evans-Pritchard)
The Tharu (Tourism). Village of Pipariya, Nepal , 1990 (Guneratne)
Vueltas (Tourism and gender construction). Canary Islands, 1990s (Macleod)
Trobriand Islands (Localisation: Cricket). Melanesia, 1975 (Jerry Leach)
Credit cards in Ghana (Localisation). Ghana, 1990 (Parish)
Rice Mills in Indonesia (Development). Telukpinang, Indonesia, 1970s (New York Times)
Guinea Pigs in Ecuador (Development). Ecuador, 1992 (Archetti)
The Maya of San Lucas (Sewing machines, ritual, syncretism). Guatemala, 1994 (Boremanse)
The Nyoro (Dispute settlement). Uganda, 1950s (Beattie)
Women and community identities (Modernisation without Westernisation). India, 1990s (Rajan)
Some anthropologists and their ideas you should know about:
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Durkheim |
Durkheim thought society was like an organism (this is called the 'organismic analogy'). The parts of society were like the organs of the body. Only if all the parts worked together, could society survive (like the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys etc.).
Durkheim was concerned with solidarity, the feeling people have of belonging to a group. He wanted to know where this feeling came from. He thought that ritual created solidarity in two ways.
Rituals which promote mechanical solidarity. These rituals require all the participants to perform the rituals in the same way at the same time, such as all kneeling in prayer together, or all eating a piece of the wedding cake. He saw this as being important in societies where there were no division of labour, except those based on sex and age (i.e. in the Yanomamö all adult men are the same as all other adult men, all adult women are the same as all other adult women).
Rituals which promote organic solidarity. In these rituals, different participants have different roles (the priest who marries you, the two people who get married, the father of the bride, the best man, the bridesmaids etc.). He saw this as being important in societies where there was division of labour. In such a society, what is in one group's interests may be not in the interest of some other group. Through participating in the ritual together, members of each group learn that they are mutually dependent, like the organs of the body.
For Durkheim it was more important that people perform the rituals together and less what they actually did in the rituals (for example Jews put their hats on in a place of worship, while Christians take theirs off, but the effect is the same on the people who do it).
Durkheim also noted that when people come together to participate in religious rituals, what they express through prayers etc. correspond to a set of values. He therefore saw rituals as reaffirming the values of the group. He said that worshiping God was really worshiping society; that it was easier to persuade people that God wanted them to do things than it was to persuade them that society wanted them to do things. In this sense, religion contributes to 'social control'.
Because of this people do not behave selfishly (which is rational), but altruistically (which is irrational). Behaviour is therefore normative (follows social norms reinforced by ritual) rather than instrumental (only looking out for yourself).
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Van Gennep |
Van Gennep saw rituals as marking changes in rights and obligations. These so called transition rituals occur at each of the steps of a person's life: name-giving (not birth), 'rite of passage' or puberty rite (child to adult), marriage (unmarried to married), funeral (not death). Note that a person's rights are not lost upon death, but only when the funeral takes place. The presence of the community is always required at a transition ritual, because rights and obligations are between the individual and the community.
Van Gennep saw transition rituals as having three steps: a rite of segregation (the person is removed from their community), the transition ritual itself (the R & O are ambiguous during this step), and a rite of aggregation (the person is returned to their community with new R & O).
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Malinowski |
Malinowski invented the word 'functionalist'. He always looked for the function of something. He wanted to know what useful things any social event accomplished, even if the participants thought they were doing something else entirely.
He also recognised that all societies have the same problems even if they find different solutions to these problems. In the U.S.A., business which involves delayed payment for goods or services is made possible by contracts drawn up by lawyers. In the Trobriand Islands, the ritual exchange of vaygu'a (armbands and necklaces travelling in opposite directions) serves the same ends: creating a climate of mutual trust where complex business transactions can be carried out.
The rights and obligations of U.S. citizens is defined in the U.S. Constitution. In societies which have no writing, Malinowski said these R & O are defined in the myths. M*A*S*CH: myth-as-social-charter. A good example is the R & O of mother's brother and sister's son (the avunculate in a matrilineal society) in the story of Rabbit & Hyena. In all societies, including those with written constitutions, myths (movies, CDs, TV etc.) provide popular definitions of what is a 'proper person'.
Famous as the ethnographer of the Trobriand Islanders.
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Bloch |
Bloch believed that rituals make the social structure visible. He also thought that rituals were always about showing inequality.
Mauss
Mauss wrote a book about gifts (called 'Essai sur le don'). He said that we all have an obligation to give gifts, to accept gifts and to give return gifts. He noted that gifts are never given arbitrarily, they are always given on defined occasions. By accepting a gift, we accept the social obligations that go with it; this is why gifts bind individuals and groups together and constrain their behaviour. Gifts define status differences because they symbolise the obligations that are part of the R & O which are associated with each differentiated social position (see below).
Radcliffe-Brown
R-B took Durkheim's ideas and systematised them. He called his way of analysing society 'Structural-Functionalism'. (Remember Radcliffe-hyphen-Brown invented Structural-hyphen-Functionalism').
In R-B's scheme, a 'social structure' is a set of differentiated social positions (statuses) and the R & O which links them in a network of relationships. People fulfil the R & O which are associated with each status when they perform the role which is the visible expression of that status. (e.g. 'students', 'teachers', 'heads of departments', 'principals', 'cleaners', 'kitchen staff', and 'security guards' are all differentiated social positions in UNIS; they all have different R & O and all perform different roles which allows the school to function as an educational institution.)
Smaller social structures (teachers and students performing their respective roles in a class) are part of larger social structures (all the classes, administrative meetings, Board of Trustee meetings etc.) which are part of even larger social structures (all classes and all meetings taking place in all schools and universities of New York State) which are part of the largest of all social structures which is the whole society.
In R-B's scheme, the function of any social structure is the contribution it makes to maintaining the social structure above it.
The ultimate function of all social structures is therefore the contribution it makes to maintaining the society as a whole. (See how this is consistent with Durkheim's organismic analogy: the function of your heart is that it pumps the blood round your body and this keeps your body alive.)
Among R-B's ideas, one is that social control comes about through both diffuse and organised sanctions, where sanctions can be positive (rewards) or negative (punishments).
'Judges', 'prosecutors', 'defense lawyers', and 'court clerks' are differentiated social positions. Because they are linked by R & O and perform their roles in a law court, this is a social structure. Along with other social structures (the supreme court, the police force etc.) they are part of legal institutions, which contribute to social control, without which society could not exist. Note that an institution is not a building, it is a set of inter-related statuses. A prison itself is not a social institution, but the 'prison governor', 'prison guards' and other prison personnel perfoming their roles in a prison is the institution.
One important idea is that different people can occupy a particular status in turn , but the status (differentiated social position) itself doesn't change. (Many different people have occupied the status of 'Director' of UNIS over the years, but the status of 'Director' has been here as long as UNIS existed).
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Lévi-Strauss |
L-S was trying to understand how we conceptualise the world, rather than how anything is useful. He said we understood things in contrasting pairs: binary oppositions, such as Nature/Culture, Life/Death, Male/Female, Earth/Sky etc.
Each of these pairs represents some unresolvable intellectual puzzle. Myths 'debate' these puzzles by showing us the two sides of the argument. Stories (i.e. myths) about wolves who become human or humans who become bears are debates about N/C, but we will never be able to conclude that we are only natural or only cultural.
Myths to L-S are never about historical events (although historical figures who once actually existed sometimes occur in myths). What is conserved in the myth is the unresolvable dilemma, everything else gets lost or changed as the myth is passed down from generation to generation. Myths tell us about how the mind deals with the world, not about the world.
In the story about Hyena & Rabbit, L-S would note that Hyena (a creature that eats carrion/dead meat) is the opposite in every way possible from Rabbit (a vegetarian) as animals. They therefore, as a pair, make perfect symbols for contrasting human characters, such as behaviour which is impulsive anti-social and self-destructive (Hyena) versus behaviour which is patient, follows social rules, and self-preserving (Rabbit). The animal symbols help us to conceptualise (organise our thinking about) behaviour in our human world.
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Evans-Pritchard |
'The meaning of things are located in social activities'.
E-P said that ideas of space and time are not the same for everyone. We think of spaces in which we do things as larger than spaces we never visit. We think of the time between events in the past as being greater when it is important for us to remember them for reasons to do with our actions in the present.
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Mary Douglas |
Mary Douglas took E-Ps ideas further by showing how the degree of social differentiation (GRID) and intensity of group membership (GROUP) influence perception and behaviour.
GRID is about wearing uniforms, saluting, having access only to some spaces, special ways of addressing people of different status, needing an appointment to speak to someone etc.
GROUP is about how difficult it is to cross the 'boundary' between the group and the outside world both for those inside and outside the group.
Cult members/ terrorist groups follow a cycle from LOW GRID, LOW GROUP to HIGH GRID, LOW GROUP to LOW GRID HIGH GROUP and back again, as they band together under a charismatic leader who prophesies the imminent arrival of the millenium.
In LOW GRID, time is compressed (a function of the degree of social differentiation: events are believed to happen swiftly which in reality take a long time). In HIGH GROUP, space is compressed (a function of the strength of the group boundary: places outside the boundary are thought of as being closer). The result is that those in the LOW GRID, HIGH GROUP quadrant can believe that the social order can be inverted by a single act.
With a few exceptions, millenarian movements, religious cults and terrorist groups invariably fail in their objectives. This leads to either an abandonment of the charismatic leader or, when the boundaries are strong enough and the leader charismatic enough, to mass suicide.
Max Weber
Was interested in power, the ability to determine the behaviour of others.
He saw power as due to a combination of the attributes of the powerful and the beliefs and values of the powerless. The attributes of the powerful are
1. Control of resources
2. Authority = power legitimised by myth & ritual
3. Charisma
However, none of these create power unless we desire those resources, believe in the legitimacy of the authority, or respond to the charisma.
You may ask why myth and ritual legitimise power? Max Weber's answer was that 'man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun.'
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Karl Marx |
Marx believed that the position you occupy in society (i.e. the social class or caste you belong to) affects how you view the world. Ideology (he called this 'false consciousness') is genuinely held beliefs about the world which nevertheless justify privilege and unequal access to resources. Marx also believed that he himself could view the world with 'true consciousness' as a declassé intellectual.
While this seems logical if you a member of the upper classes or a higher caste, how come the masses at the bottom also accept an ideology of inequality? Marx's answer was that the upper classes were the dominant class and could project their ideology on the lower classes because they controlled the media (formerly this was called religion, now it's called owning a TV network, a radio station and a dozen newspapers).
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Boas |
Boas opposed ethnocentric thinking. He advocated 'culural relativism' which recognises that different cultures construct and assign meanings according to different, but no less logical, systems of ideas.
Famous as the ethnographer of the Kwakiutl.
If you think of any questions you would like to ask about any of this or anything else, e-mail me at bkahn@unis.org