Anthropology Exam 4 Review PDF

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EXAM 4 Industrial Ag and Production  Most energy from mechanization o Replaces human/animal energy o Increases return per unit of land and labor Industrialism and Energy  Can produce more goods more quickly  But spending more energy. In production of food than it generated in terms of calories/unit land

Energy use in the U.S.  Using human muscle power to produce our current energy needs by bicycle generators like this (woman on bike)  Can produce enough energy to power a large screen TV for 2 hours  Would require 690 people pedaling bikes for each person in the US Industrial Production  Among advantages of such a system are a greater specialization, productivity of labor and efficiency U.S. farmers as % of population  1910-35% of U.S. were involved in agriculture production (farming)  2008- 1.9% Modern economics is in terms of:  Capital and Profit “Economic” organization  “Economics” is rooted in study of west o Supply and demand o Rational economic individual o Profit-seeking Rational Economics  “Economics” not in same sphere as social and ritual interaction  For most societies, this is not the case  Economics is embedded

3 economic subsystems

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Production Exchange Consumption and discard

125,000 426000 cell phones equal to the number retired in the US every day 106,000 aluminum cans # used in the US every 20 seconds in the US in 2004 Forms of Exchange  Reciprocity  Redistribution  Market One more dominant, but usually all present today Reciprocity theoretically equivalent exchanges of goods and services b/w two equal parties Inuit people have a saying …. “gift make slaves… like whips make dogs”

Generalized- no expectation of immediate return; “no balances”  Typically family or close friends Balanced- expectation of return within a specified amount of time  Likely more distant people socially Negative- “barter”, trying to get a lot and give little  Typically with strangers/outsiders

Kula Ring (Melanesia):  Exchange Netword o Specific trading partners on different islands o Balanced reciprocity of kula items  Kula items have names and history attached to them  Item give owners prestige o Shell necklace- soulava o Shell arm band-mwali  Kula established and solidified relationships for exchange of necessary goods  Never traded for each other o Different spheres of exchange  Do these exchanges for good social form  Exchange of friendship like how you bring a desert to a dinner aprty

Ultimate Dictator  Ultimatum Game: o “prosper” and “responder” o Anonymous; only played once  Machiguenga (Amazon, forager/hort)? o 15% tops offered to responder, responder never rejects offer  US College Students? o 42-48% of pot offered: rejected 30% of the time  Key+ kin- based societies, negative reciprocity among unknown people Redistribution  Assembling large quantities of goods that are then given away to producers and nonproducers alike o Difficult in pre-societies  Center person accrues prestige by trying to encourage people to produce beyond their individual needs Ongka’s Big Moka  Redistribution can be a leveling mechanism or means of amassing power  What was it for Ongka? Redistribution and Risk  Redistribution moves goods from where they are available, to where they are not o Can reduce risk if environment is varied Market  People exchange things for money o Not for other things  Governed by suppy and demand o Production for exchange  Requires surplus production o Implies specialization Market replaions are  Impersonal  Fleeting  Competitive  Non-social Commodity  Anything exchanged via markets o Anything you can buy or sell  Is everything a commodity?

Podolefsky’s Question  After decades of pacification and peace in the papa new Guinea highlands, why did intergroup warfare return in the 1970s? What limits/constrains violence in PNG?  Marriages o People with relatives in both groups take lead in settling disputes  Trade o People from different groups intermarry for access to goods o Also meet women in other groups because of travel for trade o Trade axe heads and salt  Men marry women from other groups to maintain trade connections  Kin ties link groups in networks Steel axes changed everything  you don’t need interpersonal social direct relationships to exchange for a lot of these goods and creating social relationships between people  Once you have a steele axe it will last you a while Model for Podolefsky-stone axes  Ideology- marry enemies 

Social organization- many marriage-trading relationships

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Economy/technology- stone axes

Model for Podolefsky-steel axes  Ideology- marry friends 

Social organization- groups isolated no trade, no relationships--war

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Economy/technology- steel axes

Political Organization  How power is embedded and distributed o Permanent and centralized?  Maintenance of social order  About “who gets what”

Dimensions of social inequality  Wealth

o Economic resources  Power o Achieve goals against will of others  Prestige o Social esteem a society confers  Egalitarian o As many positions of prestige as people capable of filling them o Prestige from personal qualities  Rank o Fewer positions of prestige than people capable of filling them o NO high wealth/power differences  Stratified o Differential access to wealth. Power,, and prestige o Institutionalized inequality Social Class  Segment of a population whose members share similar lifestyles and levels of wealth, power, and prestige  No absolute boundaries between classes Example US  Upper Class  Upper-middle  Working class  Working poor  Underclass Caste  Close social class o Membership determined by birth and fixed for life o Not based on personal achievement or wealth Hindu Caste Society  Social boundaries strictly maintained o Caste endogamy  Varnas- caste groups associated with occupations o Jatis more important  Outlawed by constitution in 1949  Dalit (harijans)- “Untouchables”. Out-of-caste  Changes in urban society, but caste structure still strong Political Organization Typology  Band

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Tribe Chiefdom States “ideal Types”

Locus? Or Loci? Of Power  Uncentralized political systems o Bands and tribes  Centralized political systems o Chiefdoms and states Bands  Basic political unit; highly egalitarian o Informal situational “leadership”  Decisions by consensus- disgruntled leave  Conflict resolution by social means o Informal sanctions, shame, and conflict  If they do not get along with eachother they will join another band or strike out on their own as long as resources are available Tribes  Kin-Based societies  Populations in hundreds and more  Achieved leadership o NOT permanent or centralized o “Big Men” in papua new guinea  Yanomamo village headman

“ I against my brother; I and my brother against my cousin; I, my brother and my cousin against the neighbors; all of us against the foreigners.”- Bedouin proverb Tribal Dispute Resolution  Disputes, especially homicide, can quickly escalate within tribal societies  Nuer: leopard-skin “chiefs” act as neutral mediators “Hrizontal” Intergration  Age-grade o Same sex and approx.. age o Share a set of duties and privileges

Ariaal  Three age-grades for each sex (14 years)

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o Males + boys, warriors, elders o Females+ young girls, adolescent girls, married women Each grade

Chiefdoms are kin-based  Social ranking o Lineages and individuals’ different levels of prestige  Centralizes leadership o Organizes people socially and politically o Chief and assistant have authority to make decisions Patrilineal lineage ranking

Unlike bands/tribes  Chiefs and assistants = political offices o Permanent leadership positions that must be filled upon death or retirement o Unrelated to personal qualities o (ascribed) Today, entire world is governed by states States  Centralized political systems with capacity and legitimate authority to: o Make laws o Use force o Maintain social order Political Hierarchy  Permanent political offices  Offices can be ascribed (kingdoms) OR  Offices can be achieved (democracies) States  Kinship not main organizational principle o State membership replaces kinship  Membership determines: o Rights o Obligations State Subsystems  Population control o Who is and who is not a member

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o Fixing of boundaries Judiciary o Private issues now a public concern o Make statements about norms Enforcement o Maintain sovereignty o State maintains its authority Fiscal o State activities need to be supported o Who and where people are to tax

What is religion?  Organized system of ideas about supernatural reality o Associated beliefs and myths o Ceremonial practices and rituals o Prayers, songs, offerings, sacrifices, and symbols Roy Sullivan aka Spark Ranger  Struck by lightning 7 times and survived Functions of religion  Reduce anxiety  Provide notions of right/wrong  Maintenance of social solidarity  Life cycle rituals (e.g. baptism, Bar Mitzvah) Religious forces and beings  Supernatural takes variety of forms o Ghosts, souls o God, gods o Impersonal forces Animism  ALL physical objects have spirit, essence, soul  Latin anima (soul, vital principle) o Tylor= most ancient religious belief o Worshiping goddess- clay impression, idus Valley, c. 2000 BC o Dreamtime  Spirits have identifiable characteristics  Interact with humans and can be pleased or irritated by human actions Spirited away- movie has animistic belieifs

Animism in Africa  Sub-saharan Africa greatest concentration today  100+ ,million animists in world today  Other areas south east Asia  Native north america Animatism  Supernatural power not part of Animatism: Mana  Melanesia and Polynesia  Impersonal force/quality o Resides in people, animals and objects  Chiefs and nobels possess mana o Used to “taboo” certain things  Helps explain why certain people “do better” than others Religious Organization (following Wallace 1966)  Shamanic  Communal  Olympian  Monotheistic  General link of religious “type” and sociopolitical org

Shamanic Religions  Typical of foraging and horticultural groups o Animistic beliefs  Practices and rituals are personalized  Shaman- part time religious practitioner o Mediated between ordinary people and supernatural beings and forces Shamanism  Personally effective o People have t “by-in” to their ability o Make themselves unique (dress, actions)  Not formally taught in their rituals  You buy into the fact that theyre effective o They don’t practice their form like another guy does o It is personal to them Communal Religions  Food-producing tribes and chiefdoms o Rituals for benefit of (part of) group as a whole

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Polytheistic o Gods/Spirits- some control over nature  Reflects food production  Altering natural world to meet your needs  You don’t have a series of spirits that are reflective of all individual things in nature, but have some sort of control over aspects of nature or social world  Invested more greatly with each other and control over nature  Number of different rituals that involves group as a whole

Rites of intensification  Prepare group for pronounces changes o Harvest end/start, deaths and funerals, etc.  Reinforce group solidarity values, social and political relationships  Brings people together and reinforces their position in society  Demonstrate who have responsibility of enacting different parts of ritual Rites of Passage  Mark culturally important transitions between social and biological life phases o e.g. child/adult, single/married, civilian/soldier  typically two parts  (1) process & (2) ritual or ceremony  Van Gennep’s stages o Separation o Transition o Incorporation  Tumer: o Transition = liminality o Characterized by sense of communitas Olympian Religions  Polytheistic: ranked and powerful deities o Reflects state- hierarchical and bureaucratic  Full-time religious specialists (priests) o Formally trained, personal qualities irrelevant  Regularly scheduled rituals- group is focus Aztec Religions  Hundreds of gods and goddesses  Each ruled one or more activities or aspects of nature e.g. fire, rain  Creator/ high gods: o Hiutzilopochtli  War and rising sun

o Tlaloc  Rain and water o Quetzalcoatl  Wind and knowledge o Tezcatlipoca  Night and material things Monotheism  One supremely powerful God  Mirrors state- strong central leader o Encourages people to maintain status quo in this life in order to get a better life in the next Global capitalist system  Increasingly interconnected  Global and rapid movement of people ideas goods and innovations  Divisions between rich and poor nations

World Systems Theory  World economy, must be understood as a single unit  Wealthy nations maintain wealth and power by unequal relationships Core   

Strongest and most powerful nations o Often superior military forces Capital intensive, high-technology goods o Dominated by manufacturing and finance Examples: Europe, USA, japan, China(?)

Periphery  “weak” states  Low-income, largely agricultural countries  Produce cheap goods for world market o Destroys national market  Examples : much of Africa, asia, latin America Semi-periphery  Semi-industrialized, middle-income countries  Profit from periphery and yield profits to core  Examples: Brazil, Mexico, Nigeria, Taiwan?, South Korea?, India?, China?? Gini-coefficient

Distribution of wealth across a population Using GDP- per person doesn’t tell us about distribution- who gets what? GDP Applied anthropology  Use of anthro to identify, assess and solve social problems  Promote manage and assess programs aimed at influencing human social conditions Development anthropology  Focuses on cultural dimensions of economic development  Who Development  Former colonies need to “act” like developed nations  Foreign aid+ modernization o IMF & World Bank Development Programs  To get money, countries must agree to certain conditions  Structural adjustment programs Structural adjustments  Focus on exports (including resoursed),  Cur social programs (austerity) o Balance budgets, don’t overspend,  Free trade- lift import/export restrictions  Removing price controls and state subsidies o For things like health care or foods Development Fallacies  Over innovation o Too much change  Underdifferentation o Assumption that “under”-developed cultures are the same Domestication of wood in Haiti  Gerald F. Murray, U of Florida  Agency for international development  Project 1981-1985  Interested in how Haitian people gained access to production resources  2015 per capital GDP= $731  GDP by sector (2002)

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Agriculture- 27% Industry- 14% Services – 52% Indirect and important taxes- 7%

How did swidden + overpopulation create problems for Haiti? Early AID Solution  Educate people- conservation ideas  Tel them to plant trees and not cut the m down  “or else”  Nobody trusted the govt o Think they will take trees or land  Problem: official reward “institution building” Murrays Plan  Design culturally appropriate project o Ethnographic knowledge and local needs  Plan o Trees that mature quickly o Free, small seedlings (not trees) from nursery o Inter-crop w/ trees: 4th year, cut and sell trees  Farmers own trees o Word through NGOs, not government Why it worked  Understand ethnographic reality o What counts as a cash crop  Fruit trees but not trees for wood o How people produce food o land ownership rules  cant assume everyone understands the world in the same way

what re the board reasons why murray’s project worked and what it was aimed to do?

Medial Anthropology  Study Disease and illness in cultural context  Disease- scientifically defined ailment  Illness- ailment as experiences and perceived by sufferer o Subjectivity of illness Three Theories of Illness  Naturalistic o Explain illness in impersonal terms  Personalistic o Illness via sorcerers, witches, ghosts, etc.  Emotionalistic o Emotional experiences case illness (e.g. susto) Kuru   

First recorded in early 20th century o Witchcraft accusations Interdisciplinary team to help in 1950s o Discovered that infected mostly women and children Why? Number of explanations o Hereditary? o Environmental toxins?

“Laughing” Sickness  Initial symptoms= tremors and loss of coordination inability to walk death Kuru  

Rare, transmissible disease; attacks brain o Long incubation period Belongs to a class of infectious diseases called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) o Prion diseases

What was going on?  Connection between Kuru and funerary cannibalism  Fore- most sacred resting place for deceased is within bodies of loved ones o Deceased’s remains cooked and distributed o Women and children (lower social status) – more likely to ingest brain (seat of infectious agent)

o Women and Result?  PNG outlawed cannibalism in the 60’s  Incidents of kuru gradually decreased  1996-2004 – 11 kuru deaths o 34-41 year long incubation period HIV in Haiti  Paul Famer- Medical Doctor and Anthropologist Farmer’s Questions  Why is rural HIV unexpected?  How does poverty affect ones risk of becoming infected with HIV? What cultural and economic factors influence AIDS distribution in Haiti? Main causes are:  Poverty  Inequality  Lake Peligre was created by a dam that flooded a once fertile valley Structural Violence  Increasing poverty in rural Haiti o People are landless and unemployed  Serial monogamy o Women with HIV at a higher rate than average rate o Women with dependent children but no mates look for support o With men with access to income- soldiers and truck drivers  No functioning public health system...