ANTH 380 Midterm study guide

ANTH 380/Traditional Cultures
Midterm Review Sheet
Fall 2013

Typologies and Dichotomies

Readings: Joseph Gusfield”: Tradition and Modernity: Misplaced Polarities in the Study of Social Change; Francis Hsu – Rethinking the Concept "Primitive; Robert Redfield: The Folk Society; Gerald Berreman: Scale and Social Relations (pages 225-237). Stanley Knick: Traditional Culture and Modern Culture: Man's Fall From Grace.

Be familiar with the foundations (both factual & theoretical) for Elman Service’s evolutionary typology of band, tribe, chiefdom, state (handouts on evolutionary typologies).
What are some of the fallacies that Gusfield identifies for the traditional/modern dichotomy?
What does Francis Hsu say about the concept of “primitive” and its relevance for anthropology?

Subsistence and Economics

Readings: Marshall Sahlins: The Original Affluent Society; Susan Kent: Sharing in an Egalitarian Kalahari Community. Michael Coy: Tugen Monopoly: Capitalism and Conflict in the Mountains of Kenya. George Dalton: Traditional Production in African Primitive Economies. Bronislaw Malinowski: The Primitive Economics of the Trobriand Islanders and Kula: The Circulating Exchange of Valuables in the Archipelagoes of Eastern New Guinea; George Foster: Peasant Society and the Image of Limited Good. (skim).

Why does Sahlins suggest that hunters and gatherers may have been the original affluent society? Why was that such a big deal?
What is entailed in foraging and what are some of its typical characteristics?
What is entailed in pastoralism and what are some of its typical characteristics?
What is entailed in horticulture and what are some of its typical characteristics?
What is entailed in agriculture and what are some of its typical characteristics?
What do anthropologists mean when they speak of an economy?
What was involved in the formalist-substantivist controversy in economic anthropology?
What kinds of things does Malinowski have to say about economics of the Trobriand Islanders (including the Kula exchange)? Why do you think I asked you to read his stuff in light of the formalist-substantivist debate?
How can/does ownership/allocation of resources vary across different modes of production?
How does division of labor vary across different modes of production?
What are the major modes of exchange identified by economic anthropologists and how do they vary in distribution between different sociopolitical types? (look under the link below on economy if you are stuck).
As an overview/review I highly recommend http://anthro.palomar.edu/subsistence/default.htm
As an overview/review I highly recommend http://anthro.palomar.edu/economy/default.htm
Subsistence and economics handout from class
Horticulture handout from class

Marriage, Kinship, Descent, Family

Readings: Kinship and Social Organization Tutorial Kinship: An Introduction Kinship & Family (a PDF file of the PPT presentation from class)

What do anthropologists mean when they speak of kinship? What are possible functions of kinship?
How/why does the universal incest taboo constitute the most fundamental rule of exogamy in human culture?
What do anthropologists mean by marriage? What functions does marriage perform? What forms can it take on? What transactions frequently accompany marriage and why?
Why is monogamy the norm even in those 80% of human societies which permit men to have multiple wives?
What kinds of different types of kin have been identified by anthropologists?
Why is kinship so important in traditional societies/cultures?
What is descent and what are the primary ways of tracing it? What functions do descent principles perform? What types of descent groups exist in traditional societies?
What distinguishes nuclear from extended families and what types of circumstances tend to favor each type?
As an overview/review I highly recommend http://anthro.palomar.edu/kinship/default.htm
As an overview/review I highly recommend http://anthro.palomar.edu/marriage/default.htm

Gender and Age

Readings: Ernestine Friedl: Society & Sex Roles; Holly Matthews: "We Are Mayordomo": A Reinterpretation of Women's Roles in the Mexican Cargo System.
Ann Foner & David Kertzer Transitions Over the Life Course: Lessons from Age-Set Societies. Mursi: Age and Age Sets

What differentiates sex from gender?
What does it mean to say that humans are a sexually dimorphic species?
What types of general patterns exist cross-culturally in the gendered division of labor and what types of explanations have been offered for these recurring patterns?
Why is it particularly important to examine gender in foraging/hunting and gathering societies and what types of patterns have been found?
In “Society and Sex Roles" what types of factors does Ernestine Friedl suggest affect gender stratification?
What are age sets and age grades? What functions do they perform? In what types of societies are they found?
In Transitions Over the Life Course: Lessons from Age Set Societies, what similarities did Foner and Kertzer find in age-based societies and those such as our own?
As an overview/review I highly recommend http://anthro.palomar.edu/status/stat_3.htm

The Dobe Ju/’hoansi

What are the most important features of the Dobe environment and how do the Ju/’hoansi adapt to them?
Understand the basics of Ju/’hoansi social organization, including the 3 types of kinship that Lee identifies.
How do Ju/’hoansi deal with aging in their society? How/why is this changing? What is complaint discourse?
How do the Ju/’hoansi deal with conflict and what is the role of hxaro in this process?
How do Ju/’hoansi conceive of the supernatural in their world view? Who are the //gangwasi and what is n/um?
Who are the neighbors of the Ju/’hoansi and how have their relations to these people changed over time?
What kinds of changes have been occurring since Richard Lee began his research in the Dobe area in the 1960s? How are the Ju/’hoansi dealing with these factors?
As far as Ju/'hoansi kinship goes you may want to look at www.wannabe-anthropologist.com/wba_writing_dobe.php
Ju/'hoansi multiple choice quiz

The Yanomamo

What kinds of problems/issues does Chagnon discuss in Doing Fieldwork Among the Yanomamo?
Be familiar with details of the cultural ecology of the area in which the Yanomamo live and how this affects how they make a living as well as things such as settlement patterns (e.g., village size and patterns of movement).
Be familiar with what Chagnon calls the "ideal model of Yanomamo society" and the reality of life as it exists "on the ground".
Why does Chagnon say "the comparative simplicity of Yanomamo material culture contrasts sharply with the richness and ingenuity of their beliefs about the cosmos, the soul, the mythical world, and the plants and animals around them"?
Be familiar with the patterns of alliance formation and the reasons behind the need for such alliances.
Be familiar with the patterns of violence and warfare Chagnon documents and possible reasons for this.
What kinds of changes have the Yanomamo experienced over the past 40 years or so that Chagnon has been studying them? Why does he distinguish between gradual and catastrophic change?
Yanomamo multiple choice quiz

Videos

To Find the Baruya Story (study guide can be found at http://jablonko-baruya.pacific-credo.fr/ )
A Kalahari Family (the clip we watched can be found at www.der.org/films/a-kalahari-family.html )
The Kwegu ( film synopsis at www.therai.org.uk/film/volume-ii-contents/the-kwegu/ )
The Mursi: Nitha (details about the Mursi can be found at http://www.mursi.org/ Two short video clips can be found at www.survivalinternational.org/films/mursicattle and
www.survivalinternational.org/films/mursiritual
The Feast ( Synopsis at http://www.der.org/films/bitter-melons.html Study guide at http://der.org/resources/study-guides/the-feast.pdf )
Bitter Melons (Synopsis at http://www.der.org/films/bitter-melons.html Study guide at http://www.der.org/resources/study-guides/bitter-melons-study-guide.pdf)
The Highland Maya (in 3 parts; about the cargo/fiesta system in Central America that is described in Holly Matthews' article We Are Mayordomo)