ipl-logo

Classification Of Anthropology

711 Words3 Pages

“If we mean scientific method-controlled experiments in laboratories with disprovable hypotheses and reproduceable results-lots of us don’t do that. I don’t do that but there’s long been an anthropological line: let’s take the term in its German sense, which just means trying to put order on knowledge. I’m totally comfortable with that-I claim science”. These are the words of Robert Weller, the chair of the College of Arts and Science anthropology department about the ongoing debate on the sense on which anthropology is a science and to what extent [Rich Barlow, BU Today, 18 May 2011]. This has been a long standing debate in the anthropological world and science circles. There has been uncertainty surrounding the classification of anthropology. …show more content…

Note that most anthropological observations are done through experience and ethnology. This throws the profession into turmoil and casts a doubt in upcoming intellectuals as what kind of profession they are in and what is it classified as. However this debate is more centralized around methodology rather the context of the debate which is to what extent is anthropology a science. Exploiting the methodological side of anthropology as to how anthropologists reach their findings does not mean that anthropology should not be acknowledged as a science, rather it should be used to give much credit to this exceptional form of …show more content…

Scientific methods are used in anthropology so one can deduce that to some extent anthropology is a science. Social, biological as well as physical sciences contribute a lot to anthropology making it well rounded science field. This gives further emphasis that anthropology provides knowledge and tools on how to work with people, make findings about the past and in a way mould the future. Furthermore, physical anthropology is a form of a science, anatomy is considered a science, and it falls into this from of anthropology. In a broader sense, this gives much detail as to what extent is anthropology a science. What further proof should be put on the table that indeed anthropology is a science? A science need not be a “natural science” to be classified as a science. By natural science I mean any of the sciences (as physics, chemistry, or biology) that deal with matter, energy, and their interrelations and transformations or with objectively measurable phenomena. This does not entirely define a science, regardless of its magnitude. A science should be relatively close to revealing the unknown and cementing the known, giving sense to the senseless and giving a clear picture of human diversity, and this is what anthropology is about. A subjective and also objective component of

Show More
Related

Summary Of Monique And The Mango Rains

1467 Words | 6 Pages

In Monique and the mango Rains, there are many connections to course concepts. This book connects to the anthropological perspective which includes holism, cross culturalism, and cultural relativism. She also experiences culture shock. This book can be related to the Anthropological Perspective because there are examples of holism, cross culturalism, and cultural relativism thought the book.

Read More

Are Ethnographies Just So Stories? By E. Paul Durrenberger

196 Words | 1 Pages

In “Are ethnographies ‘just so” stories?” by E. Paul Durrenberger, in this article he makes an argument about the form of culture being an artifact, and even science is a form of culture. He first points out the development of how culture came to term of being an artifact. Durrenberger says, “If we want to learn about a culture, we study its artifacts, especially the ones that say something about social relations and the culture itself” (60). This is significant because we can’t just have someone make up a story if they never studied or seen with their own two eyes to prove of what is real or not. The second point that he made is that science is a form of culture.

Read More

Body Ritual Among The Nacirema Analysis

1419 Words | 6 Pages

The Emic method gives a clear and accurate understanding of a culture due to the in-depth interview conducted by the anthropologist. But because there was a lack of information, confusion and strange descriptions of a non-exotic culture there is no way that this “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema” used the Emic method. Because of this it supports the fact that this essay was a Etic inspired

Read More

On The Run By Alice Goffman Sparknotes

576 Words | 3 Pages

The underlying principle of The Interpretation of Cultures is that anthropology is a descriptive science

Read More

Anthropology Questions

586 Words | 3 Pages

Anthropology Questions: 1. Was this crime indicative of the beliefs, morals, and culture of the two aggressors? 2. Were there any scratch marks found on the victim? Were there any fingernails found at the scene of the crime?

Read More

Reality In Plato's Allegory Of The Cave

914 Words | 4 Pages

In essence, non-metaphysical sciences are two-fold; prior or absolute knowledge and knowledge from observation and experiments (Persson 165-181). Theories can be mistaken, are often inconclusive and therefore are not factual. Most tenets of scientific theories are assumptions, hypotheses, and postulations. On the other hand, the human senses are deceptive representations of the mind and are also incomplete. As such, they cannot be trusted to provide accurate information in experiments and

Read More

Critical Thinking: Critical Thinking Questions: Physical Anthropology

761 Words | 4 Pages

Critical thinking questions: physical anthropology textbook 1. Given that you’ve only just been introduced to the field of physical anthropology, why do you think subjects such as skeletal anatomy, genetics, nonhuman primate behavior, and human evolution are integrated into a discussion of what it means to be human? The study of physical anthropology integrates the subjects of skeletal anatomy, genetics, nonhuman primate behavior, and human evolution because anthropologists look to the fossilized remains of hominins to see what their environments were like and what they ate. In addition to these sub fields, anthropologists look to skeletal anatomy to see any evolutionary change or if the hominin had died from any diseases and how old and tall

Read More

Mary Douglass Purity And Danger Summary

1226 Words | 5 Pages

Koume Ono Ritsumeikan University Introduction to Anthropology The most surprising thing to me about reading Mary Douglas anthropology book, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo, is that I was actually fascinated about everything she argues in the book, many things I had questioned about but did not know the answer or simple facts that make you realized how our society structure works. Which is why in these book review paper I will emphasize more in some chapters rather than the book itself in one big paragraph. Mary Douglas, analyses the ideas of pollutions and taboo in different cultures and also different timing (primitive cultures, modern cultures) focusing in the Gestalt psychology. However, one of the things I liked the most about her writing style is that she avoided limited explanations, explained everything in details and giving examples making it easier for the

Read More

Paul Rabinow's Reflections On Fieldwork In Morocco

930 Words | 4 Pages

Paul Rabinow is Professor of anthropology at the University of California, he is born June 21, 1944. Rabinow is a Director of the Anthropology of the Contemporary Research Collaboratory (ARC), and former Director of Human Practices for the Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center (SynBERC). He is perhaps most famous for his widely influential commentary and expertise on the French philosopher Michel Foucault. (Wiki) Paul Rabinow decides to sell everything and move to Morocco to become an anthropologist, two days after the assassination of Robert Kennedy.

Read More

Tale From The Jungle Margaret Mead Analysis

825 Words | 4 Pages

“Tale From the Jungle: Margaret Mead”, youtube videos, which was introduced by Professor Ana, humanities professor, are a six long clip video documentaries of the first anthropology’s discoveries ever brought to public, the Samoan civilization. This ‘Samoan civilization’ anthropology discovery was discovered by Mead Margaret, an American female anthropologist, and later by Derek Freeman, an Australian anthologist. According to Mead Margaret, an American female anthropologist, she believes that humans are influenced by nurture. On the other side, Derek Freeman, an Australian anthologist, opposes Mead Margaret’s idea. He believes that humans are influenced by nature.

Read More

Differences Between Science And Pseudoscience

1410 Words | 6 Pages

Modern science is typically subdivided into the natural sciences, which study the material world, the social sciences which study people and societies, and the formal sciences like mathematics. The formal sciences are often excluded as they do not depend on empirical observations.[5] We have to keep in mind that science helps us describe how the world is, but it cannot make any judgments about whether that state of affairs is right, wrong, good, or bad and individual people must make moral judgments.

Read More

The Importance Of Feminist Anthropology

888 Words | 4 Pages

Feminist anthropology was a reaction to how referring to women in the anthropology field was primarily limited to kinship, marriage, and family structures. Feminist anthropology looks at this disparity as causing a deficiency in fully understanding the significance of women in the overall study of the cultural experience. In the early 1970s, anthropologist Sherry Ortner posed the question "Is female to male as nature is to culture? " (Moberg, 2013, p. 272).

Read More

Ethnography Advantages And Disadvantages

737 Words | 3 Pages

Ethnography has a diverse history , it started off as a by-product of anthropology and eventually developed as its own research method. Definition of anthropology. Bronislaw Malinowski started off his career in antopology and

Read More

Reflective Essay On Anthropology

1192 Words | 5 Pages

If someone was to ask me what anthropology was, prior to this assignment, I would have probably taken an educated guess such as “the study of life”. In a sense that is correct but not entirely accurate. Anthropology is defined as, “The study of human kind in all times and places” (Haviland, Prins, McBride, & Walrath, 2017). After an extensive analyzation of my experiences, I concluded that I don’t practice anthropology in my life enough. In addition, I discovered that my life doesn’t have much diversity in it.

Read More

The Importance Of Cultural Anthropology

1021 Words | 5 Pages

Cultural Anthropology is the study of human beings, their behavior and how patterns in their language, personalities, gender, family, art, politics or rituals learned from being a part of a certain society gives meaning to their existence and affects how they organize their lives. Culture Involves Concepts, Generalizations, Abstractions, Assumptions, and Ideas. The ants are locked into the specifics of their nest-building behavior. It must work the same all the time. If some important variable is different, the ants cannot make specific adjustments.

Read More

More about Classification Of Anthropology

Related Topics

Open Document