Ch. 13 Group 2

Front 1

Age grades

Back 1

permanent age categories in a society through which people pass during the course of a lifetime.

Front 2

Age organizations

Back 2

a type of social organization found in East Africa and among certain Native American groups, wherein people of roughly the same age pass through different levels of society together; each ascending level, based on age, carries with it increased social status and rigidly defined roles.

Front 3

Age set

Back 3

a group of people roughly the same age who pass through various age grades together.

Front 4

Ancestor worship

Back 4

the worship of deceased relatives; these souls are considered supernatural beings and fully functioning members of a descent group.

Front 5

Coercive theory of state formation

Back 5

the argument that the state came into existence as a direct result of warfare.

Front 6

Corporate lineages

Back 6

kinship groups whose members engage in daily activities together

Front 7

Council of elders

Back 7

a formal control mechanism composed of a group of elders who settle disputes among individuals in a society.

Front 8

Crime

Back 8

harm to a person or property that is considered illegitimate by society.

Front 9

Degradation ceremonies

Back 9

deliberate and formal societal mechanisms designed to publicly humiliate someone who has broken a social norm.

Front 10

Deviance

Back 10

the violation of a social norm.

Front 11

Ghost invocation

Back 11

the practice of a living person (typically an elder) calling forth the wrath of ancestor-gods against an alleged sinner.

Front 12

Ghostly vengeance

Back 12

the belief that ancestor-gods (ghosts) will punish sinners.

Front 13

Hydraulic theory of state formation

Back 13

the notion that early state systems of government arose because small-scale farmers were willing to surrender a portion of their autonomy to a large government entity in exchange for the benefits of large-scale irrigation systems.

Front 14

Intermediaries

Back 14

mediators of disputes among individuals or families within a society

Front 15

Law

Back 15

cultural rules that regulate human behavior and maintain order.

Front 16

Leopard-skin chief

Back 16

an intermediary found among the Nuer of the African Sudan.

Front 17

Moots

Back 17

informal hearings of disputes for the purpose of resolving conflicts, usually found in small-scale societies.

Front 18

Nation

Back 18

a group of people who share a common identity, history, and culture.

Front 19

Negative sanctions

Back 19

punishment for violating the norms of a society.

Front 20

Oath

Back 20

a declaration to a god to attest to the truth of what a person says.

Front 21

Ordeal

Back 21

a painful and possibly life-threatening test inflicted on someone suspected of wrongdoing to determine guilt or innocence.

Front 22

Pan-tribal mechanisms

Back 22

mechanisms such as clans, age grades, and secret societies found in tribal societies that cut across kinship lines and serve to integrate all the local segments of the tribe into a larger whole.

Front 23

Political coerciveness

Back 23

the capacity of a political system to enforce its will on the general population.

Front 24

Political integration

Back 24

the process that brings disparate people under the control of a single political system.

Front 25

Positive sanctions

Back 25

a mechanism of social control for enforcing a society’s norms through rewards.

Front 26

Public opinion

Back 26

what the general public thinks about some issue

Front 27

Rebellion

Back 27

an attempt within society to disrupt the status quo and redistribute the power and resources.

Front 28

Revolution

Back 28

an attempt to overthrow the existing form of political organization, the principles of economic production and distribution, and the allocation of social status.

Front 29

Sanctions

Back 29

any means used to enforce compliance with the rules and norms of a society

Front 30

Socialization

Back 30

teaching young people the norms in a society.

Front 31

Social norms

Back 31

expected forms of behavior

Front 32

Song duel

Back 32

a means of settling disputes over wife stealing among the Inuit involving the use of song and lyrics to determine one’s guilt or innocence.

Front 33

Specialized political roles

Back 33

assignment and training of people who will carry out very specific tasks such as law enforcement, tax collection, dispute settlement, recruitment of labor, and protection from outside invasions.

Front 34

Supernatural belief systems

Back 34

a set of beliefs in forces that transcend the natural, observable world.

Front 35

Voluntaristic theory of state formation

Back 35

the theory that stable systems of state government arose because people voluntarily surrendered some of their autonomy to the state in exchange for certain benefits.

Front 36

Warfare

Back 36

institutionalized, armed conflict between nation-states or other politically distinct groups.

Front 37

Witchcraft

Back 37

an inborn, involuntary, and often unconscious capacity to cause harm to other people.