* Anthropological “levels” of analysis 1. Micro-level analysis: * Individual to individual, face to face, smallest unit * “Primary relation”, intimate, ends in itself * Actions, relations within larger organization 2. Macro-level analysis: * Large scale, impersonal, subjects don’t appear * Historical, cultural, epochal, institutional * May be called “structural analysis”
* Culture 1. Book Definition: * A system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that the members of a society, use to cope with one another and with their world and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning. 2. Notes: * Leaned, shared, behavior * Not biological or inherited * Its not fixed, rigid, “given” (pure construction) * Like a blueprint or a map, makes our existence possible; anticipated, a “genetic”, expected, a priori, necessarily existing condition which must be present for us to create a world * It is what we “swim” in; we cant live without it
* Parts of Culture 1. Material Culture (what we appropriate): * The physical objects transformed by human laboring activity * Material culture (something we’ve created) 2. Non-Material Culture (what we grasp): * Representational (symbols, signs) * Values (shoulds, oughts, duties) * Beliefs (notions of what exists)
* How Are Those Parts Organized? 1. Material Culture: * How is it distributed? Arranged? What goes where? * Put together following a shared series of rules * Culture imposes physical and meaningful order upon things, how do you organize your stuff? * By substance, utility, etc. 2. Non-Material Culture: * More formal Less formal
Laws
Customs & Tradition
Assumptive Rules
* What Are Cultures Functions? * Our major of adaptation, culture makes our existence possible when we have no instincts or