Cultural Anthropology, 11th Edition
- Book Review,
by Carol R. Ember, Melvin Ember
Book Description
This comprehensive volume reflects recent anthropological research and controversial developments, while integrating features in each chapter to spark and maintain reader interest. A focus on applied anthropology discusses the history and types in the United States and shows how the work of applied anthropologists is playing more of a role in the planning of possible solutions to various global social problems—including AIDS, disasters, homelessness, crime, family violence, and war. This book offers an introduction to anthropology, cultural variation, and using applied anthropology and medical anthropology to address global social problems. For individuals interested in exploring the far-reaching aspects of anthropology.
From the Back Cover
This comprehensive volume reflects recent anthropological research and controversial developments, while integrating features in each chapter to spark and maintain reader interest. A focus on applied anthropology discusses the history and types in the United States and shows how the work of applied anthropologists is playing more of a role in the planning of possible solutions to various global social problems—including AIDS, disasters, homelessness, crime, family violence, and war. This book offers an introduction to anthropology, cultural variation, and using applied anthropology and medical anthropology to address global social problems. For individuals interested in exploring the far-reaching aspects of anthropology.
About the Author
Carol R. Ember started at Antioch College as a chemistry major. She began taking social science courses because some were required, but she soon found herself intrigued. There were lots of questions without answers, and she became excited about the possibility of a research career in social science. She spent a year in graduate school at Cornell studying sociology before continuing on to Harvard, where she studied anthropology primarily with John and Beatrice Whiting. For her Ph.D. dissertation she worked among the Luo of Kenya. While there she noticed that many boys were assigned "girls' work;" such as babysitting and household chores, because their mothers (who did most of the agriculture) did not have enough girls to help out. She decided to study the possible effects of task assignment on the social behavior of boys. Using systematic behavior observations, she compared girls, boys who did a great deal of girls' work, and boys who did little such work. She found that boys assigned girls' work were intermediate in many social behaviors, compared with the other boys and girls. Later, she did cross-cultural research on variation in marriage, family, descent groups, and war and peace, mainly in collaboration with Melvin Ember, whom she married in 1970. All of these cross-cultural studies tested theories on data for worldwide samples of societies. From 1970 to 1996, she taught at Hunter College of the City University of New York. She has also served as president of the Society of Cross-Cultural Research and was one of the directors of the Summer Institutes in Comparative Anthropological Research, which were funded by the National Science Foundation. She is now executive director at the Human Relations Area Files, Inc., a nonprofit research agency at Yale University. After graduating from Columbia College, Melvin Ember went to Yale University for his Ph.D. His mentor at Yale was George Peter Murdock, an anthropologist who was instrumental in promoting cross-cultural research sand building a full-text database on the cultures of the world to facilitate cross-cultural hypothesis testing. This database came to be known as the Human Relations Area Files (HRAF) because it was originally sponsored by the Institute of Human Relations at Yale. Growing in annual installments and now distributed in electronic format, the HRAF database currently covers more than 370 cultures, past and present, all over the world. Melvin Ember did fieldwork for his dissertation in American Samoa, where he conducted a comparison of three villages to study the effects of commercialization on political life. In addition, he did research on descent groups and how they changed with the increase of buying and selling. His cross-cultural studies focused originally on variation in marital residence and descent groups. He has also done cross-cultural research on the relationship between economic and political development, the origin and extension of the incest taboo, the causes of polygyny, and how archaeological correlates of social customs can help us draw inferences about the past. After four years of research at the National Institute of Mental Health, he taught at Antioch College and then Hunter College of the City University of New York. He has served as president of the Society for Cross-Cultural Research and has been president since 1987 of the Human Relations Area Files, Inc., a nonprofit research agency at Yale University.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Ethnographic fieldwork is the basis of most theory and research on human culture. To emphasize its importance, we have added "Portraits of Culture" as a box feature in this edition. We introduce the new set of boxes in the first chapter, and every other chapter has an extract from a "portrait" of a different culture. These extracts come from a series of original ethnographic articles that we specially commissioned for supplementary reading. The entire series, with other specially commissioned series (on "Research Frontiers in Anthropology" and "Cross-Cultural Research for Social Science"), is now available from Prentice Hall on a CD-ROM (see Supplements). Other major changes in this edition include expanded coverage of globalization and its consequences (see the revised chapter, now called "Culture Change and Globalization") and a new section on terrorism in the chapter on global social problems. Other changes are outlined below in the description of each chapter. In updating the book, we try to go beyond descriptions, as always. We are interested not only in what humans are and were like; we are also interested in why they got to be that way, in all their variety. When there are alternative explanations, we try to communicate the necessity to evaluate them logically as well as on the basis of the available evidence. Throughout the book, we try to communicate that no idea, including ideas put forward in textbooks, should be accepted even tentatively without supporting tests that could have gone the other way. HIGHLIGHTS OF THE CHAPTERS PART I: INTRODUCTION TO ANTHROPOLOGY CHAPTER 1: WHAT IS ANTHROPOLOGY? Chapter 1 introduces the student to anthropology. We discuss what we think is special and distinctive about anthropology in general, and about each of its subfields in particular. We outline how each of the subfields is related to other disciplines such as biology, psychology, and sociology. We direct attention to the increasing importance of applied anthropology. There are four boxes. The first three focus on an individual anthropologist and her or his work. The fourth box highlights an entirely new series of boxes that are found in all subsequent chapters. Called "Portraits of Culture," these new boxes include extracts from original ethnographic portraits that we commissioned for a series titled with the same name. Although we cannot here include all of the portraits in the series, the entire series is on a CD-ROM that can be obtained from Prentice Hall (see Supplements). CHAPTER 2: THE CONCEPT OF CULTURE This chapter introduces the concept of culture. We first try to convey a feeling for what culture is before dealing more explicitly with the concept and some assumptions about it. A section on cultural relativism puts the concept in its historical context and discusses recent thinking on the subject. We discuss the fact that individual behavior varies in all societies and how such variation may be the beginning of new cultural patterns. The first box, which is new, describes an ethnographer's initial shock at finding out that same-sex public affection in her place of fieldwork has completely different meanings from what it has in North America. The second box, which asks whether Western countries are ethnocentric in their ideas about human rights, incorporates the debate within anthropology about cultural relativism. The third box discusses an applied anthropologist's view of why Bedouin are reluctant to settle down. CHAPTER 3: THEORY AND EVIDENCE IN CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY In this chapter we focus first on those theoretical orientations that remain popular in cultural anthropology. Then we discuss what it means to explain and what kinds of evidence are needed to evaluate an explanation. We end with a discussion of the major types of study in cultural anthropology—ethnography, ethnohistory, within-culture comparisons, regional comparisons, and worldwide cross-cultural comparisons. We have expanded the discussion of fieldwork by showing how an ethnographer can select knowledgeable informants to help understand a culture. The first box explores the differences between scientific and humanistic understanding and points out that the different approaches are not really incompatible. The second box uses a research question about the Abelam of New Guinea to illustrate how different theoretical orientations suggest different types of answers. In the third bob, we have two purposes. One is to give a feeling for the experience of fieldwork; the second is to use the Mead-Freeman controversy to explore the issue of how we can know that an ethnographer is accurate. The last box, which is new, discusses how an ethnographer did historical research on the Miskito of Nicaragua. PART II: CULTURAL VARIATION In most of the chapters that follow, we try to convey the range of cultural variation with ethnographic examples from all over the world. Wherever we can, we discuss possible explanations of why societies may be similar or different in regard to some aspect of culture. If anthropologists have no explanation as yet for the variation, we say so. But if we have some idea of the conditions that may be related to a particular kind of variation, even if we do not know yet why they are related, we discuss that too. If we are to train students to go beyond what we know now, we have to tell them what we do not know, as well as what we think we know. CHAPTER 4: COMMUNICATION AND LANGUAGE We begin by discussing communication in humans and other animals. After an updated discussion of human nonverbal communication we describe the debate about the degree of difference between human and nonhuman primate language abilities. We discuss the origins of language and how creoles and children's language acquisition may help us understand the origins. Then we move on to descriptive linguistics and the processes of linguistic divergence. After discussing the interrelationships between language and other aspects of culture, we end with the ethnography of speaking and the differences in speech by status, gender, and ethnicity. We have expanded the discussion of interethnic or intercultural communication, indicating how linguists can play a role in helping people improve their cross-cultural communication. The first box, which is new, deals with Haitian Creole. The second discusses the problem of language extinction and what some anthropologists are doing about it. To stimulate thinking about the possible impact of language on thought, we ask in the third box whether the English language promotes sexist thinking. CHAPTER 5: GETTING FOOD Chapter 5 discusses how societies vary in getting their food, how they have changed over time, and how such variation seems to affect other kinds of cultural variation—including variation in economic systems, social stratification, and political life. We include a discussion of "market foragers" to emphasize that most people in a modern market economy are not in fact producers of food. The first box deals with the change from "Man the Hunter" to "Woman the Gatherer," and we raise the question of whether either view is accurate. Although it is commonly thought that industrialization is mainly to blame for negative developments in the environment, our second box deals with the negative effects in preindustrial times of irrigation, animal grazing, and overhunting. Our third box, which is new, explores how the agricultural Han Chinese adapted to moving into drier land more suited to pastoralism. CHAPTER 6: ECONOMIC SYSTEMS Chapter 6 discusses how societies vary in the ways they allocate resources (what is "property" and what ownership may mean), convert or transform resources through labor into usable goods, and distribute and perhaps exchange goods and services. We have expanded and updated the discussions of land use amongst pastoralists, we discuss the effects of political systems (including colonialism) on land ownership and use, and we have expanded the discussion of food sharing. There is a discussion of why children in some foraging societies do more work than in others. The first box addresses the controversy over whether communal ownership leads to economic disaster. The second box, which is new, discusses the distribution of work among the Yanomamo. After the discussion of commercialization, the third box illustrates the impact of the world-system on local economies, with special reference to the deforestation of the Amazon. CHAPTER 7: SOCIAL STRATIFICATION: CLASS, ETHNICITY, AND RACISM This chapter explores the variation in degree of social stratification and how the various forms of social inequality may develop. We discuss "race," racism, and ethnicity and how they often relate to the inequitable distribution of resources. We have added new material on how egalitarian societies work hard to prevent dominance, and on the controversy about whether pastoral societies with individual ownership of animals are egalitarian. We have extensively revised the boxes and text to provide up-to-date information on the degree of inequality in the world as well as in the United States. The first box, which is new, discusses social stratification in a foraging society—the Tlingit of southern Alaska. The second box discusses social stratification on the global level—how the gap between rich and poor countries has been widening, and what may account for that trend. The third box discusses possible reasons for disparities in death by disease between African Americans and European Americans. CHAPTER 8: SEX, GENDER, AND CULTURE In the first part of Chapter 8 we discuss how and why sex and gender differences vary cross-culturally; in the second part we discuss variation in sexual attitudes and practices. We explain how the concepts of gender do not always involve just two genders. We emphasize all the ways women contribute to work, and how conclusions about contributions by gender depend on how you measure "work." We include new material on female hunting and what impact it has on theories about division of labor. In the first box, we discuss research on why women's political participation may be increasing in some Coast Salish communities of western Washington State and British Columbia, now that they have elected councils. A second box examines cross-cultural research about why some societies allow women to participate in combat. The new box discusses the Andean Mestizo belief that a long period of breastfeeding is detrimental to girls. CHAPTER 9: MARRIAGE AND THE FAMILY After discussing various theories about why marriage might be universal, we move on to discuss variation in how one marries, restrictions on marriage, whom one should marry, and how many one should marry. We close with a discussion of variation in family form. We have added new research on why bride price varies, the relationship between population density and marriage distance, and we have expanded our coverage of polygyny from women's perspectives. The new box on the Yapese of Micronesia conveys the unimportance of marriage ceremonies in some societies. To introduce topics regarding the husband-wife relationship that are only beginning to be investigated, the second updated box discusses variation in love, intimacy, and sexual jealousy. The third box, in the section on family organization, discusses why one-parent families are on the increase in countries like ours. CHAPTER 10: MARITAL RESIDENCE AND KINSHIP In addition to explaining the variation that exists in marital residence, kinship structure, and kinship terminology, this chapter emphasizes how understanding residence is important for understanding social life. One of the boxes discusses the possible relationship between neolocality and adolescent rebellion. The new second box is on the importance of the mother's brother among the Cherokee of the southeastern United States. The last box is on how variation in residence and kinship affects the lives of women. CHAPTER 11: ASSOCIATIONS AND INTEREST GROUPS We discuss the importance of associations in many parts of the world, particularly the increasing importance of voluntary associations. There is a section on rotating-credit associations. We discuss how they work to provide lump sums of money to individuals, how they are especially important to women, and how they become even more important when people move to new places. The first box addresses the question of whether separate women's associations increase women's status and power; the second box discusses why street gangs develop and why they often become violent. The new last box discusses the role ethnic associations play in Chinatowns in the United States. CHAPTER 12: POLITICAL LIFE: SOCIAL ORDER AND DISORDER We look at how societies have varied in their levels of political organization, the various ways people become leaders, the degree to which they participate in the political process, and the peaceful and violent methods of resolving conflict. We discuss how colonialization has transformed legal systems and ways of making decisions, how conflicts may be resolved peacefully, and how cross-cultural research casts doubt on the notion that wars in the non-Western world are fought over women. We have added new material on the causes of widespread political participation. The new box discusses the Iroquois confederacy. The second box deals with how new local courts among the Abelam of New Guinea are allowing women to address sexual grievances. The third box deals with the cross-national and cross-cultural relationship between economic development and democracy. CHAPTER 13: PSYCHOLOGY AND CULTURE Chapter 13 discusses some of the universals of psychological development, some psychological differences between societies and what might account for them, how people in different societies conceive of personality differently (e.g., the concept of self), and how knowledge of psychological processes may help us understand cultural variation. We have added two new sections that identify some larger processes that may influence personality. One is on the importance of the settings that children are placed in. The second is on how native theories ("ethnotheories") about parenting vary by culture. The first box, which is new, discusses whether adolescence is a meaningful concept in Morocco. The second box discusses the idea that women have a different sense of themselves than men have, and therefore a different sense of morality. The third box, referring to a comparison of preschools in Japan, China, and the United States, discusses how schools may consciously and unconsciously teach values. CHAPTER 14: RELIGION AND MAGIC After discussing why religion may be culturally universal, we discuss variation in religious belief and practice with extensive examples. We discuss revitalization movements and how humans tend to anthropomorphize in the face of unpredictable events. We have added a discussion of why women may predominate in possession trances. The first box discusses research on New England fishermen that suggests how their taboos, or "rituals of avoidance," may be anxiety reducing. The second box, which is new, discusses shamanism among the Sierra Otomi of Mexico. The last box discusses the emergence of new religions and points out that nearly all the major churches or religions in the world began as minority sects or cults. CHAPTER 15: THE ARTS After discussing how art might be defined, we discuss variation in the visual arts, music, and folklore, and review how some of those variations might be explained. In regard to how the arts change over time, we discuss the myth that the art of "simpler" peoples is timeless and how arts have changed as a result of European contact. We address the role of ethnocentrism in studies of art with a section on how Western museums and art critics look at the visual art of less complex cultures. One box discusses how art varies with different kinds of political systems. The second box, dealing with universal symbolism in art, reviews recent research on the emotions displayed in masks. The last box, which is new, portrays dance performance among the Nimpkish of North America's northwest coast. CHAPTER 16: CULTURE CHANGE AND GLOBALIZATION This chapter is considerably revised and has an entirely new section on globalization. We have added new research on societies that have increased innovation over time, on societies that have deliberately introduced culture changes, on what may predict the acculturation of immigrant groups in North America, and on what may predict ethnogenesis. After discussing the ultimate sources of culture change—discovery and innovation—we discuss some of what is known about the conditions under which people are likely to accept innovations. We discuss the costs and benefits of innovations, external and internal pressures for culture change, globalization, ethnogenesis, and the likelihood of cultural diversity in the future. The first box, which is new, describes how culture change has been selective among the North Alaskan Eskimo. The second box examines culture change in Communist China—what has changed because of government intervention and what has persisted nevertheless. To convey that culture change often has biological consequences, the last box discusses obesity, hypertension, and diabetes as health consequences of modernization. PART III: USING ANTHROPOLOGY CHAPTER 17: APPLIED AND PRACTICING ANTHROPOLOGY This chapter discusses the types of jobs outside of academia, the history and types of applied anthropology in the United States, the ethical issues involved in trying to improve people's lives, the difficulties in evaluating whether a program is beneficial, and ways of implementing planned changes. We point out how applied anthropologists are playing more of a role in planning, rather than as peripheral advisers to change programs already in place. We have expanded the forensic anthropology section to include how cultural anthropologists can be involved. The first two boxes show how anthropologists have been able to help in business and in reforestation. The last box, which is new, discusses the ways that the Taos of New Mexico have resisted some kinds of change. CHAPTER 18: MEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY This chapter discusses cultural understandings of health and illness, the treatment of illness (particularly from a biocultural rather than just a biomedical point of view), political and economic influences on health, and the contributions of medical anthropologists to the study of various health conditions and diseases. Those conditions and diseases include AIDS, mental and emotional disorders, the folk illness susto, depression, and undernutrition. The first box, which is new, discusses the Saraguros' (of Ecuador) belief that experience and emotion have an equal footing with infection and contagion as risk factors for illness. The second box deals with why an applied medical project didn't work; the third box deals with eating disorders and the cultural construction of "beauty." CHAPTER 19: GLOBAL SOCIAL PROBLEMS In this chapter we discuss the relationship between basic and applied research, and how research may suggest possible solutions to various global social problems, including natural disasters and famines, homelessness, crime, family violence, and war. A new section discusses terrorism. The sections on family violence and war have been updated. There are three boxes; the last one is new. One is on global warming and our dependence on oil. The second is on ethnic conflicts and whether or not they are inevitable. The last one touches on how war has endangered the Abkhazian culture of the Northwest Caucasus. CONTINUING FEATURES BOXES IN EACH CHAPTER Research Frontiers and Current Issues. These boxes deal with research or research controversies in depth or examine topics students may have heard about in the news. Research examples include variation in love, intimacy, and sexual jealousy in the husband-wife relationship, the increase in single-parent families, and the universality of emotions expressed in masks. Examples of current issues in the news are whether inequality between countries is increasing and whether ethnic conflicts are ancient hatreds. Examples of topics that are currently the subject of debate in the profession are science versus humanism and human rights versus cultural relativity. New Perspectives on Gender. These boxes involve issues pertaining to sex and gender, both in anthropology and everyday life. Examples include sexism in language, separate women's associations and women's status and power, and morality in women versus men. Applied Anthropology. These boxes deal with some of the ways anthropologists have studied or applied their knowledge to health and other practical problems. Examples are deforestation in the Amazon, preventing the extinction of languages, and eating disorders. READABILITY We derive a lot of pleasure from trying to describe research findings, especially complicated ones, in ways that introductory students can understand. Thus, we try to minimize technical jargon, using only those terms students must know to appreciate the achievements of anthropology and to take advanced courses. We think readability is important, not only because it may enhance the reader's understanding of what we write, but also because it should make learning about anthropology more enjoyable! When new terms are introduced, which of course must happen sometimes, they are set off in boldface type and defined. GLOSSARY TERMS At the end of each chapter we list the new terms that have been introduced; these terms were identified by boldface type and defined in the text. We deliberately do not repeat the definitions at the end of the chapter to allow students to test themselves against the definitions provided in the Glossary at the end of the book. CRITICAL QUESTIONS We also provide three or four questions at the end of each chapter that may stimulate thinking about the implications of the chapter. The questions do not ask for repetition of what is in the text. We want students to imagine, to go beyond what we know or think we know. SUMMARIES AND SUGGESTED READING In addition to the outline provided at the beginning of each chapter, there is a detailed summary at the end of each chapter that will help the student review the major concepts and findings discussed. Suggested reading provides general or more extensive references on the subject matter of the chapter. A COMPLETE GLOSSARY AT THE END OF THE BOOK As noted above, important glossary terms for each chapter are listed (without definitions) at the end of each chapter, so students can readily check their understanding after they have read the chapter. A complete Glossary is provided at the back of the book to review all terms in the book and serve as a convenient reference for the student. NOTES AT THE END OF THE BOOK Because we believe firmly in the importance of documentation, we think it essential to tell our readers, both professional and student, what our conclusions are based on. Usually the basis is published research. References to the relevant studies are provided in complete notes by chapter at the end of the book. BIBLIOGRAPHY AT THE END OF THE BOOK All of the references cited throughout the book are collected and listed at the end of the book. SUPPLEMENTS FOR THE INSTRUCTOR: Instructor's Resource and Testing Manual. This essential instructor's tool includes chapter outlines, resources and discussion questions, paper topics and research projects, web resources, and film resources and over 1,600 questions in multiple-choice, true/false and essay formats. All test questions are page-referenced to the text. Prentice Hall Custom Test. Prentice Hall's testing software program permits instructors to edit any or all item in the Test Item File and add their own questions. Other special features of this program, which is available for Windows and Macintosh, include random generation of an item set, creation of alternative versions of the same test, scrambling question sequence, and test preview before printing. Anthropology Transparencies, Series IV. Taken from graphs, diagrams, and tables in this text and other sources, over 50 full-color transparencies offer an effective means of amplifying lecture topics. Videos. Prentice Hall is pleased to offer two new video series. The Changing American Indian in a Changing America: Videocases of American Indian Peoples, and Rites of Passage: Videocases of Traditional African Peoples. In addition, a selection of high quality, award-winning videos from the Filmmakers Library collection is available upon adoption. Please see your Prentice Hall sales representative for more information. Anthropology Central. Available exclusively to adopters of Cultural Anthropology, 11/E,Strategies in Teaching Anthropology, first edition. See your Prentice Hall sales representative for more information. FOR THE STUDENT: Study Guide. Designed to reinforce information in the text, the study guide includes chapter outlines and summaries, glossary term definition exercises, and self-test questions keyed to the text. Interactive Anthropology CD-ROM. In the back of every new copy of Cultural Anthropology, 11/E, you will find a CD-ROM that provides an exciting learning experience. Ethnographies, interactive simulations and exercises, a complete map atlas and reference resources, all help to illustrate the concepts described in the book. Companion Website. In tandem with the text, students can now take full advantage of the World Wide Web to enrich their study of anthropology through the Ember Companion Website. This resource correlates the text with related material available on the Internet. Features of the Website include chapter objectives, study questions, as well as links to interesting material and information from other sites on the Web that can reinforce and enhance the content of each chapter. Address: www.prenhall.com/ember. The New York Times/Prentice Hall Themes of the Times. The New York Times and Prentice Hall are sponsoring Themes of the Times, a program designed to enhance student access to current information relevant to the classroom. Through this program core subject matter provided in the text is supplemented by a collection of timely articles from one of the world's most distinguished newspapers, The New York Times. These articles demonstrate the vital, ongoing connection between what is learned in the classroom and what is happening in the world around us. To enjoy a wealth of information provided by The New York Times daily, a reduced subscription rate is available. For information, call toll-free: 1-800-631-1222. Prentice Hall and The New York Times are proud to cosponsor Themes of the Times. We hope it will make the reading of both textbooks and newspapers a more dynamic, involving process. Anthropology: Evaluating Online Resources. This guide provides a brief introduction to navigating the Internet and teaches students how to be critical consumers of online resources. It includes references related specifically to the discipline of anthropology as well as access to the Research Navigator™ website. Research Navigator™. The easiest way for students to start research assignments or research papers, Research Navigator™ comes complete with extensive online help on the research process as well as three exclusive databases: The New York Times Search by Subject Archive ContentSelect™ Academic Journal Database powered by EBSCO "Best of the Web" Link Library Access to Research Navigator™ is available via an access code that is found on the inside front cover of The Evaluating Online Resources guide. If you do not have a copy of this guide, an access code for Research Navigator™ can be purchased from the Prentice Hall online catalog at www.prenhall.com. New Directions in Anthropology. This new CD-ROM is available from Prentice Hall and includes all the articles in the three original series Portraits of Culture: Ethnographic Originals; Research Frontiers in Anthropology (edited with Peter N. Peregrine; and Cross-Cultural Research for Social Science. Altogether these articles and ethnographies give students an in-depth look at fieldwork, the research process, research controversies, social problems, and comparative and cross-cultural perspectives. The articles are in pdf format so that students can readily download any assigned articles on their own computers. The CD-ROM is optionally available from Prentice Hall shrink-wrapped with this text. It is also available as a stand-along publication.
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