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221 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Acculturation
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The exchange of cultural features that results when groups come into continuous firsthand contact; the original cultural patterns of either or both groups may be altered, but the groups remain distinct.
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Achieved status
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Social status that comes through talents, actions, efforts, activities, and accomplishments rather than ascription.
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Adaptive agency
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People's ability and will to reinterpret and tailor global cultural influences to maximize resourceful, safe, and meaningful ways of life at the local level.
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Affinity groups
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Common-interest groups, including families, kin networks, neighborhoods, local communities, political parties, religious affiliations, professional organizations, and groups organized by common culture and cognitive ties.
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Afrocentric
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Orientation of many african americans, emphasizing africa as a cultural center.
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Agape
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Humanitarianism, or love for humanity; as contrasted with eros and philia.
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Age grades
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In the individual's life cycle, the various age phases or caegories, such as infancy, childhood, adolesence, the college years, young adulthood, middle age, and old age.
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Age sets
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Groups uniting all men or women (usually men) born during a certain time span; these groups control property and often have political and military functions.
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Ageism
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Prejudice and discrimination against the elderly.
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Agency
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The active role of individuals in making and remaking culture.
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Androgyny
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Similarities (e.g., in dress, adornment, or body features) between males and females.
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Antimodernism
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The rejection of the modern in favor of what is preceived as an earlier, purer, and better way of life.
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Antiracists
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Those who reject ideas and practives based on presumed innate superiority and inferiority of groups; antiracist strategies include refusal to behave according to one's prescribed racial category and participation in activities to combat racism.
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Ascribed status
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Social status(e.g., race or gender) that people have little or no choice about occupying.
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Asexuality
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Indifference toward, or lack of attraction to, either sex.
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Assimilation
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The merging of groups and their traditions within a society that endorses a single common culture. The process of change that a minority group may experience when it moves to a country where another culture dominates; the minority is incorporated into the dominant culture to the point that it no longer exists as a separate cultural unit.
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Attitudinal discrimination
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Discrimination against members of a group because of preejudice toward that group.
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Berdaches
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Among the Crow Indians, members of a third gender, for whom certain ritual duties were reserved.
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Biological determinism
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Viewing human behavior and social organization as biologically determined.
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Bisexuality
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A person's habitual sexual attraction to, and sexual activities with, persons of both sexes.
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Black English Vernacular (BEV)
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The rule-governed dialect spoken by american black youth, especially in inner-city areas; also spoken in rural area and used in the casual, intimate speech of many adults; also known as ebonics.
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Body mass index
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The ratio of weight (in kilograms) divided by height (in meters squared)
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Bourgeoisie
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One of Marx's opposed classes; owners of the means of production (factories, mines, large farms, and other sources of subsistence).
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Capital
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Wealth or resources invested in business, with the intent of producing a profit.
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Carnival
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A pre-Lenten festival comparable to Mardi Gras in Louisiana, popular in Brazil and in certain Mediterranean and Caribbean societies; features costumed anonymity and a ritual structure of reversal.
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Civil society
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Voluntary collective action around shared interests, goals, and values.
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Class consciousness
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Recognition of collective interest and personal identification with one's economic group, particularly the proletariat; basic to Marx's view of class.
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Cognitive ties
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Social links based on common knowledge and perceptions of reality, on what people know, or on what they think they know.
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Colonialism
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the political, social, economic, and cultural domination of a territory and its people by a foreign power for an extended time.
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Communitas
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Intense community spirit, a feeling of great social solidarity, equality, and experiencing liminality together.
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Complex societies
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Nations that are large and populous, with social stratification and central governments.
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Consecutive (aka serial) monogamy
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Divorce and remarriage, rather that being married to multiple spouses at the same time (polygamy).
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Constructionsism
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Cultural and malleable creations of social categories and institutions.
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Copula deletion
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Absence of the verb, to be; featured in BEV and in diverse languages, including Hebrew and Russian.
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Core values
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Key, basic, or central values that integrate a culture and help distinguish it from others.
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Cultural anthropology
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Or sociocultural anthropology; the field that describes, interprets, and explains similarities and differences among societies and cultures.
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Cultural colonialism
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Internal domination by one group and its culture/ideology over others, such as Russian domination in the former Soviet Union.
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Cultural determinism
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Viewing human behavior and social organization as determined mainly by cultural and environmental factors. Cultural determinists focus on variation rather that universals and stress learning and the role of culture in human adaptation.
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Culteral relativism
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The position that the values and standards of cultures differ and deserve respect. Extreme relativism argues that cultures should be judged solely by thei own standards.
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Cultural rights
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Certain rights that are vested not in individuals but in identifiable groups, such as religious and ethnic minorities and indigenous societies.
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Culture
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Traditions and customs that govern behavior and beliefs; distinctly human; transmitted throug learning.
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Culture pattern
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A coherent set of interrelated culture traits; customs and beliefs that are connected, so that if one changes, the others also change.
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Culture Shock
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Disturbed feelings that often arise when one has contact with an unfamilar culture- either in Northe America or, more usually, abroad. It is a feeling of alienation, or being without some of the most ordinary and basic cues of one's culture of origin.
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Culture trait
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An individual item in a culture, such as a particular belief, tool , or practice.
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Culturelets
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In a multicultural society, multiple centers, eash based on specialized cultural identity, pride, and knowledge, within the nation-state.
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Deaf communities
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Self-constructed groups of deaf people and their families, friends, and interpreters who communicate by sign language as an act of identity.
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Deaf culture
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A group of deaf peopole organized around shared norms, values, needs, interests, and activities.
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Deaf president now
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An event that launced a national campaign for the human rights of deaf people.
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Descent
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Rule assigning social identity on the basis of some aspect of one's ancestry.
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Diaspora
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The offspring of an area who have spread to many lands.
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Differential access
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Unequal access to resources; basic attribute on chiefdoms and states. Superordinates have favored access to suce resources, while the access of subordinates is limited by superordinates.
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Diffusion
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Borrowing between cultures either directly or through intermediaries.
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Diglossia
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The existence of high (formal) and low (familial) dialects of a single language, such as German.
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Discourse
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Talk, speeches, gestures, and actions.
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Discrimination
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Policies and practices that harm a group and its members.
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Domestic
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Within or pertaining to the home.
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Domestic-public dichotomy
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Contrast between women's role in the home and men's role in pblic life, with a corresponding social devaluation of women's work and worth.
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Ebonics
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Another name for Black English Vernacular; derived from ebony and phonics.
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Ecocide
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Destruction of local ecosystems.
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Education
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The acquisition of formal knowledge, normally in a place called a school; tends to be found in nation-states; exposes certin, not all, people in a society to a body of formal knowledge or lore (as contrasted with enculturation, which applies to everyone).
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Enculturation
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The social process by which culture is learned and transmitted across the generations.
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Environmental racism
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The systematic use of institutionally based power by a majority group to make policy decisions that create disproportionate environmental hazards in minority communities.
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Environmentalists
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See Nurturists
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Eros
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Sexual love; the most critical gauge of sexual orientation is one's erotic experiences.
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Essentialism
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Belief in natural and fixed characteristics of human groups.
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Ethnic expulsion
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A policy aimed at removing groups who are culturally different from a country.
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Ethnic Group
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Group distinguished by cultural similarities (shared among members of that group) and differences (between that group and others); ethnic group members share beliefs, values, habits, customs, and norms, and a common language, religion, history, geography, kinship, or race.
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Ethnic minorities
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Indigenous peoples who have moved to urban areas.
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Ethnicity
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Identification with, and feeling part of, an ethnic group, and exclusion from certain other groups because of this affiliation.
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Ethnocentrism
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The tendency to view one's own culture as best and to judge the behavior and beliefs of culturally different people by one't own standards.
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Ethnocide
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Destrction by a dominant group of cultures of an ethnic group.
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Ethnography
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The firsthand, field-based study of a particular culture; usually entails spending a year or more in the field, livig with natives and learning about their customs.
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Etoro
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A Papua New Guinea culture in which males are culturally trained to prefer homosexuality.
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Explanatory approach
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The approach to human biological diversity that strives to discover the causes of specific human biological differences.
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Extradomestic
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Outside the home; within or pertaining to the public domain.
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Family of affiliation
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Refers to psychological ties with people one loves and can count on for emotional, social, and material support; especially useful when an individual's natural family isn't available or adequate in meeting his or her needs.
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Family of orientation
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The nuclear family in which one is born and grows up.
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Family of procreation
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A nuclear family established when one amrries and has children.
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Fictive kinship
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Reciprocal provision of goods and services, including affection, companionship, and shared values, between nonbiologically, nonleagally, but socially related individuals; often with the fiction of kinship ties, for example, honorary aunts and uncles.
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First World
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The democratic West- traditionally conceived in opposition to Second World, ruled by Communism.
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Forced Assimilation
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Use of force by a dominant group to compel a minority to adopt the dominant culture - for example, penalizing or banning the language and customs of an ethnic group.
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Fundamentalism
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Antimodernist movements in various religions.
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Gay
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Or lesbian; stands for a way of life by persons who desire, and have sex with, persons of the same sex (men in this care); as contrasted with homosexual.
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Gender roles
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The tasks and activities that a culture assign to each sex.
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Gender stereotypes
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Oversimplified but strongly held ideas about the characteristics o males and females.
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Gender stratification
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Unequal distribution of rewards (socially valued resources, power, prestige, and personal freedom) between men and women, reflecting their different positions in a social hierachy.
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Generalities
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Culture patterns or traits that exist in some but not all societies.
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Genocide
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The deliberate elimination of a group; for example, through mass murder, warfair, or introduced diseases.
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Gentrification
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The purchase and revitalization of abandoned or low-value homes and neighborhoods by middle- and upper-class people.
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Geriatrics
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The medical specialty focusing on diseases and disabilities associated with aging and on treatment of the elderly.
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Gerontology
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The study of aging and especially of older people.
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Globalization
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The accelerating interdependence of nations in a world system linked economically and through mass media and modern transportation systems.
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Hegemonic reading (of a "text")
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The reading or meaning that the creators intended, or the one that elites consider to be the intended or correct meaning.
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Hegemony
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As used by Antonio Gramci, a stratified social older in which subordinates comply with domination by internalizing its values and accepting its naturalness.
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Heterogeneity
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Biological, social, and cultural differences of groups.
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Heteromorphic
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Varied in shape or appearance.
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Heterosexuality
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A person's habitual sexual attraction to, and sexual activities with, persons of the opposite sex.
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Hidden transcript
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As used by James Scott, the critique of power by the oppressed that goes on offstage (in private) where the power holders can't see it.
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Hijras
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In India, a 3rd gender composed of biological males who have undergone an operation to have their genitals removed; they exaggerate female dress codes and decorum, have certain ritual duties, and work as prostitutes.
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Holistic
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Interested in the whole of the human condition: past, present, and future; biology, society, language, and culture; holism is a key attribute of anthropology.
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Homogeneity
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Biological, social, and cultural similarities of groups.
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Homonyms
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Words that sound the same but have different meanings; for example, bare and bear.
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Homosexual
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A term used to describe sexual desire and activity between persons of the same sex.
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Homosexuality
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A person's habitual sexual attractionto, and sexual activities with, persons of the same sex.
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Human rights
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A doctrine that invokes a realm of justice and morality beyond and superior to particular countries, cultures, and religions. Human rights, usually seen as vested in individuals, would include the right to speak freely, to hold religious beliefs without persecution, and not to be enslaved.
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Humanities
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The fields that study art, narratives, music, dance, and other forms of creative expression.
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Hypervitaminosis D
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A nutritional disorder caused by too much vitamin D; calcium deposits build up in the body's soft tissues and the kidneys may eventually fail.
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Hypodescent
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A rule that automatically places the children of a union or mating between members of different socioeconomic groups in the less-privileged group.
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Ideal culture
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What people say they should do and what they say they do; contrasted with real culture.
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Ideational solidarity
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Social intergration through relations, bonds, and loyalties based on common knowledge.
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Identity
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A psychosocial and political orientation that individuals internalize and that is shared by peoplle united by a common status or experience.
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Identity politics
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Sociopolitical identities based on the perception of sharing a common culture, language, religion, or race, rather than citizenship in a nation-state, which may contain diverse social groups.
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Income
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Earnings from wages and salaries
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Independent invention
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The process by which humans innovate, creatively finding solutions to old and new problems; an important mechanism of cultural change.
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Indigenized
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Modified to fit the local culture.
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Industrial revolution
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The historical transformation (in Europe, after 1750) of traditional into modern societies through indutrialization of the economy.
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Institutional discrimination
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Programs, policies, and arrangements that deny equal rights and opportunities to, or differentially harm, members of particular groups.
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Intellectual property rights (IPR)
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A society's base - its core beliefs and principles. IPR is claimed as a group right - a cultural right, allowing indigenous groups to control who may know and use their collective knowledge and its applications.
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International culture
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Cultureal traditions that extend beyond national boundaries
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Iroquois
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A confederations of indigenous societies in New York State; matrilineal, with communal longhouses and a prominent political, religious, and economic role for women.
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!Kung
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A group of San ("Bushmen") foragers of southern Africa; the exclamation point indicates a click sound in the language.
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Laissez-faire culturalism
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The autonomy that citizens of multicultural societies have to construct cultural identities and lifestyles that foster the well-being of identity groups and their members without interference or regulation by the state.
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Lesbian
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Or gay; stands for a way of life by persons who desier, and have sex with, persons of the same sex (women in this care); as contrasted with homosexual.
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Leveling mechanisms
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Customs and social actions that operate to reduce differences in wealth and thus to bring standouts in line with community norms.
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Libido
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The sex drive
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Liminality
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The critically important marginal or in-between phase of a rite of passage.
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Linguistic relativism
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The notion that all languages and dialects are equally effective as systems of communication.
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Majority groups
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Superordinate, dominant, or controlling groups in a social/political hierarchy.
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Matriarchy
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A society ruled by women; unknown to ethnography.
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Matrifocal
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Mother-centered; often refers to a household with no resident husband-father.
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Matrilineal descent
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A unilineal descent rule in which people join the mather's group automatically at birth and stay members throughout life.
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Matrilocality
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Customary residence with the wife's relatives after marriage, so that children grow up in their mother's community.
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Matrons
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Senior women, as amont the Iroquois.
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Melanin
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A chemical substance manufactured in cells inthe epidermis, or outer skin layer; the melanin cells of darker-skinned people produce more and larger granules of melanin than do those of lighter-skinned people.
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Minority group
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Subordinate groups in a social/political hierarchy, inferior power and less secure access to resources than majority groups have.
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Mobilizing agents
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Politically active individuals and community organizers, including elite members of minority groups, who are often artists and intellectuals with access to major social institutions, especially education and the media.
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Monogamous
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Having only one sexual partner or mate at a time.
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Multicultural paradox
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Principles and practices of homogeneity and heterogeneity, essentialism and constructivism by nationalists to deny human rights to some groups and by multiculturalists to claim them.
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Multicultural society
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The coexistence of culturally-defined groups within a nation-state.
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Multiculturalism
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The view of cultural diversity in a country as something good and desirable; a multicultural society socializes individuals not only into the dominant (national) culture but also into an ethnic culture.
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Multidirectional cultural imperialism
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The reciprocal extension of economic, political, and cultural influence between and across all societies and cultures.
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Multiterritorialization of culture
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The expression in new and diverse places of activities, rituals, ceremonies, and ideas associated with a particular geographic location of inverntion or origin.
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Nation
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Once a synonym for ethnic group, designating a single culture sharing a language, religion, history, territory, ancestry, and kinship; now usually a synonym for state or nation-state.
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Nation-State
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An autonomous political entity; a country, such as the United States or Canada.
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National culture
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Cultural experiences, beliefs, learned behavior patterns, and values shared by citizens of the same nation.
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Nationalities
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Ethnic groups that once had, or wish to have or regain, autonomous political status (their own countries).
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Native anthropologist
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An anthropologist who studies his or her own culture, such as an american working in the United States or a Canadian in Canada.
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Natural selection
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the process by which nature selects the forms most fit to survive and reproduce in a given environment, such as the tropics.
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Naturists
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Thoses who argue that human behavior and social organization are bilogically determined.
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Negritude
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African identity; developed by African intellectuals in Francophone (French-speaking) western Africa.
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Neoliberalism
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Encompasses a set of assumptions and economic policies that have become widespread during the last 25 to 30 years and that are being implemented in capitalist and developing countries, including postsocialist societies.
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Neolocality
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A postmarital residence rule or custom by which a married couple chooses a new place to live rather than residing with or near the parents of either spouse.
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Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs)
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Organized interest or affinity groups with local (e.g., a bowling league), state (e.g., a Michigan lawyer's group), regional (e.g., Sons of Dixie), national (e.g., Young Americans for Freedom), or international (e.g., Save the Children) membership.
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Nuclear family
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Kinship group consisting of parents and children.
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Nurturists
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Those who link behavior and social organization to enviernmental factors. Nurturists focus on variation rather than universals and stress leaning and the rols of culture in human adaptation.
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Orientalism
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A western system of scholarship, thought, and politics that consists of racist and ethnocentric generalizations about the nature and culture of societies and nations in Asia and the Middle East.
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Pantribal sodalities
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Nonkin-based groups that exist throughout a tribe, spanning several villages.
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Particularities
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Distinctive or unique culture traits, patterns, or integrations.
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Patriarchy
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Political system ruled by men in which women have inferior social and political status, including basic human rights.
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Patrilineal descent
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A unilineal descent rule by which people join the father;s group automatically at birth and stay members throughout life.
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Patrilineal-patrilocal complex
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An interrelated constellation of partilineality, partilocality, warfare, and male supremacy.
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Patrilocality
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Customary residence with the husband's relatives after marriage.
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Phenotype
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An organism's evident traits; its manifest biology - anatomy and physiology.
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Philia
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Friendship, the most enduring form of love; born out of hight faculties, as contrasted with eros and agape.
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Plural society
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According to Frederik Barth, a society that features ethnic contrast, ecological specialization of its ethnic groups, and the economic interdependence of those groups.
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Pluralism
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The view that ethnic and racial difference should be allowed to thrice, so long as such diversity does not threaten dominant values and norms.
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Polynesia
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A triangle of South Pacific islands formed by Hawaii to the north, Easter Island to the east, and New Zealand to the southwest.
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Postmodern
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In its most general sense, describes the blurring and breakdown of established canons (rules, standards), categories, distinctions, and boundaries.
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Postmodernism
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A style and movement in architecture that succeeded modernism. Compared with modernism, postmadernism is less geometric, less functional, less austere, more playful, and more willing to include elements from diverse times and cultures; postmodern now describes comparable developments in music, literature, and visual arts.
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Postmodernity
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The condition of a world in flux, with people onthe move, in which established groups, boundaries, identities, contrasts, and standards are reaching out and breaking down.
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Power
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The ability to exercise one's will over others - to do what one wants; the basis of political status.
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Prejudice
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Devaluing (looking down on) a group because of its assumed behavior, values, capabilities, or attributes.
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Prestige
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esteem, respect, or approval for acts, deeds, or qualities considered exemplary.
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Proletariat
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See working class
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Public transcript
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As used by James Scott, the open, public interactions between dominators and oppressed; the outer shell of powere relations.
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Race
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An ethnic group assumed to have a biological basis.
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Racial classification
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A now-rejected approach to the study of human biological diversity, which seeks to assign human beings to categories based on assumed common ancestry.
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Racism
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Discrimination against an ethnic group assumed to ahve a biological basis.
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Real culture
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Actual behavior as observed by the anthropologist; contrasted with ideal culture.
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Refugees
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People who have been forced (involuntary refugees) or who have chosen (voluntary refugees) to flee a country to escape persecution or war.
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Religion
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Belief and ritual concerned with supernatural beings, powers, and forces.
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Rickets
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A nutritional disorder caused by a shortage of vitamin D, so that calcium is imperdectly absorbed in the intestines; causes softening and deformation of the bones.
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Rites of passage
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Culturally defined activities associated with the transition from one place or stage of life to another.
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Rituals
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Behaviors that are formal, stylized, repetitive, and sterotyped, performed earnestly as social acts; rituals are held at set times and places and have liturgical orders.
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Role
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A set of expected (culturally proper) behavior, attitudes, rights, and obligations attached to a particular status.
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Science
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A systematic field of study that aims, through experiment, observation, and deduction, to produce reliable explanations of phenomena with reference to the material and physical world.
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Second World
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The Warsaw Pact nations, including the former Soviet Union, the Socialist and once-Socialist countries of eastern Europe and Asia
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Secret societies
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Sodalities, usually all-male of all-female, with secret initiation ceremonies.
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Serial monogamy
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Marriage of a given individual to several spouses, but not at the same time.
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Sexual dimorphism
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Marked differences in amel and female biology besides the contrasts in breasts and genitals
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Sexual fit
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Combines physical traits with psychosocial sensibilities; this fit, that is, a particular set of characteristics that activates one's libido, reappears in different potential parterns during one's life span.
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Sexual orientations
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The patterned way in which a person views and expresses the sexual component of his or her personality; a person's habitual sexual attraction to, and activities with, persons of the opposite sex (heterosexuality), the same sex (homosexuality), or both sexes (bisexuality). Asexuality refers to indifference towards, or lack of attraction to, either sex.
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Social races
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Groups assumed to have a biological basis but actually perceived and defined in a social context, by a particular culture rather than by scientific criteria.
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Society
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In social science terminology, organized life in groups. In the United States, society has acquired an additional and more restrictive meaning: the "proper" organization of individuals and groups, with people in assigned stations, or places, in the social order.
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Sociocultural anthropology
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Or simply cultual anthropology; the field that describes, interprets, and explains similarities and differences among societies and cultures.
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Sociolinguistics
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Study of relationships between social and linguistic variation; study of language (performance) in its social context.
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Sodalities
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See Pantribal sodalities
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Speech communities
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Self-constructed groups whose members communicate verbally and regularly as an act of identity.
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State (nation-state)
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A complex sociopolitical system taht administers a territory and poulace with substantial contrasts in occupation, wealth, prestige, and power. An independent, centrally organized political unit, a government.
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Status
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Any position that determines where someone fits in society; may be ascribed or achieved.
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Stereotypes
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Fixed ideas, often unfavorable, about what members of a group are like.
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Strategic resources
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Things necessary for life, such as food and space.
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Stratification
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A characteristic of a system with socioeconomic strata; see stratum.
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Stratified
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Class-structured; stratified societies have marked differences in wealth, prestige,and power between social classes.
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Stratum
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One of two or more groups that contrast in regard to social status and access to strategic resources. Each stratum includes people of both sexes and all ages.
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Style shifts
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Variations in speech in different contexts
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Subaltern
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Lower in rank, subordinate, traditionally lacking an influential role in decision making.
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Subcultures
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The diverse cultural patterns and traditions associated with different groups in the same nation; subcultures (a problematic term) may originate in ethnicity, class, region, or religion.
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Superordinate
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the upper, or privileged, group in a stratified system
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Symbol
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Something, verbal or nonverbal, that arbitrarily and by convention stands for something else, with which it has no necessary or natural connection.
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Text
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Something that is creatively "read," interpreted, and assigned meaning by each person who receives it; includes any media-borne image, such as Carnival.
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Third world
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The less-developed countries (LDCs).
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Tropics
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A geographic zone extending some 23 degrees north and south of the equator, between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn.
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Underclass
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The abjectly poor, in north america and throughout the world; people who lack jobs, adequate food, medical care, and even shelter.
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Universals
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Traits that exist in every culture.
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Urbanization
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The transformation of rural or agrarian social organization to organized life in cities.
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Variables
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Attributes (e.g., sex, age, height, weight) that differ from one person or case to the next.
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Vernacular
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Ordinary, casual speech.
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Wealth
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All a person's material assets, including income, land, and other types of property; the basis of economic status.
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Working class
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Or proletariat; those who must sell their labor to survive; the antitheses of the bourgeoisie in Marx's class analysis.
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World view
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Ways in which a people makes sense of its place in the context of the world.
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