Cultural Materialism

Cultural materialism argued that the change in culture is due to change in material life of people.
It was developed by Marvin Harris in his book The rise of Anthropological theories
Historical Background: Cultural Materialism emerged as a reaction to structuralism, relativism and idealism.

Basic Premises:

Culture changes according to material needs of man. Culture adapts to meet the material needs for continuation of
existence of mankind.
Use of empirical method on etic perspective is essential in order to understand cultural change holistically.
By focusing on observable, measurable phenomena, cultural materialism presents etic approach of society. The result is
more holistic.
According to materialists, socio-cultural system can be divided into
Infrastructure: Technology and practices used for expanding or limiting the production of basic resources such as clothing,
food and shelter
Structure: It constitutes domestic and political economy.
Domestic economy-Includes family structure, domestic division of labour age and gender role
Political economy- Organization, class, caste, police and military
Superstructure: Consists of ideological and symbolic aspects of society. It includes philosophy,art,music ,
religion,ideas,literature,sports, games, science and values.
Structure and superstructure depends upon infrastructure and any change in the infrastructure will create change in
structure and superstructure.
Cultural Materialism aims to understand the effects of technological, economic and demographic factors on moulding societal
structure and superstructure through strictly scientific methods.
Sacred cow of India: In Hindu religion cow is sacred and must not be killed. Harris argued that taboo of cow slaughter
resulted from economic need to utilize cow as a drought animal rather than as food. But male cows are allowed to starved to
death during famines. Thus change in infrastructure bring change in superstructure.

Societal framework flowchart

Accomplishments:

Making anthropology more scientific

Cultural change can be studies across geography and temporal boundaries.

Criticism:

Structuralists argue that understanding the cultural change lie in emic thought and to idealists an etic view of Culture is full
of irrelevance and ethnocentricism.
Marxists termed it as vulgar materialism
Post modernists also favoured to study culture using particularism and relativism over science.

Symbolic and interpretative Theory

Symbolic anthropology studies the way people understand their surroundings, as well as the actions and utterances of the
other members of their society.
Symbolic anthropology studies symbols and the processes(such as myth and ritual), by which humans assign meanings to
these symbols to address fundamental questions about human social life
Geertz's position illustrates the interpretive approach to symbolic anthropology, while Turner's illustrates the
symbolic approach.
Symbolic anthropology can be divided into two major approaches. One is associated with Clifford Geertz and the other with
Victor W. Turner . David Schneider was also a major figure in the development of symbolic anthropology, however he does
not fall entirely within either of the above schools of thought.
The major difference between the two schools lies in their respective influences.
Geertz was influenced largely by the sociologist Max Weber, and was concerned with the operations of "culture" rather than
the ways in which symbols operate in the social process. Turner, influenced by Emile Durkheim, was concerned with the
 operations of "society" and the ways in which symbols operate within it.

Turner:

Turner considers symbols as mechanisms of social processes wherein, the rituals help individuals adopt to the changing roles
and statuses. Ex: Puberty ceremony guides an individual to take up functions of an adult.
In understanding the symbols, Turner used both external forms of culture(i.e material objects) and belief systems and several
other non material aspects.
He gave emphasis to reporting in the ethnograph, the interpretation of symbols as was done by culture group.
According to him, symbols may not have obvious meaning and outsider cannot interpret them correctly.
In the Zambian societies he analyzed through statistics the variation in the cultural interpretation of the same symbols by the
same culture group.

Study of Ndembu tribe of Zambia:

They worshipped madyitree or fertility tree which is centre of all the ceremonies and rituals
Rituals of rites of passage are associated with the tree
Puberty rituals , marriages, harvest festivals are held under the tree. On most of these occassions specific kinsmen or classes or
lineage or clans are discouraged to takepart.
This indicate social distance, social stratification and practice of avoidance.

Criticisms:

Over emphasized on one particular symbol and considering to be representative of entire culture.
In the context of single symbol as well he failed to provide details of changing significance and meaning of it across time.
His studies can be termed as part studies with limited utility.

Geertz:

Geertz was influenced largely by the sociologist Max Weber, and was concerned with the operations of "culture" rather than
the ways in which symbols operate in the social process.
Geertz defined culture as a historically transmitted pattern of meanings embedded in symbols, by means of which men :
Communicate
perpetuate and 
Develop their knowledge about and their attitude towards life.
Culture is expressed by external symbols that a society uses. So the symbol complex contain pattern of meaning.
Societies use these symbols to explain their world view, value orientation ethos and other aspects of culture. 
Hand shake- not carrying weapon, Glass clink : Not poisoned 
These symbol complexes are in the form of 
Initiation rites
Puppet shows (Japan)
Cock fights(Bali)
These Symbols act as the sources explaining human behaviour. Some symbols reveal feelings of people, some reveal social
relations among people.
For Geertz symbols are "vehicles of 'culture'", meaning that symbols should not be studied in and of themselves, but for
what they can reveal about culture.
He believed that an analysis of culture should "not be an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in
search of meaning"
Observer has to find out and understand the symbols and their real meanings.

Research strategy:

Initially Anthropologist has to do field work followed by description and interpretation of the data. 
The interpretation should be by the Anthropologist himself though he takes the interpretation of the culture group as
well(unlike Turner who takes interpretation of subject and social group).

Interpretation of cockfights in Bali

Interpretation of cockfights reveal many things about society

Social tensions:: Fights are always between different villages, clans and families.
Social status: Cock fights are generally resticted to dominant members of the society.
Personality traits: The colour of attire, dress patterns reveal the personality of individuals present during the cock
fights.
Cognitive Anthropology(Tyler, Conklin)

Historical background: 
The manner in which Anthropologists are conducting Ethnographies was unscientific and no standard way and cannot be
compared with other.
Anthropologists have been using Western concept to understand the indigenous reality which failed miserably. Therefore
there is a need to understand the cultural reality as perceived and lived by local community members.
Cognitive anthropology is the study of relationship between human society and human thought. The
cognitive anthropologists study how people in social group conceive and think about the objects and events which make up
their world .
This is also called Ethnoscience , New Ethnography, Cognitive anthropology etc
Its roots can be traced to Edward Sapir according to whom cultures are abstraction which may different meaning for
different behavior pattern.
The purpose of this new Ethnography is to understand the mental models of culture using the Emic Categories

Premises:

Cognitive approach closely links to psychology

According to them culture is a set of mental models. These models exists in the minds of people and there is a need to
understand these cognitive models.
These mental models reveal how the material phenomena namely things, events, behaviour and emotions are organized in the
minds of human beings.
Every culture has a inbuilt system of logic and therefore every culture is based on logical model and discovery of this
model is important task of Cognitive Anthropologist. 
Cultures differ in this mental models, i.e organisation of material phenomena, events, behvaiour and emotions. Same material
phenomena may be viewed by different cultures differently based on their mental models.
Americans distinguish dew, fog, ice and snow but Koyas of south India calls all of them as Manchu
Koyas distinguish five different kinds of Bamboos whereas Americans know only one type of Bamboo.
Cognitive anthropology is concerned with emic interpretation of meaning i.e. arriving at the meaning a culture has for its
actors.
To understand how meaning is acquired by people i.e learning process.

Methodology:

They developed a scientific and rigorous method of data collection such as metaphysics and narratives.
They also relied on highly structured interviews to find out domains of culture.
It has adopted some theoretical methods and techniques from structuralism and Linguistics.
Importance to Language: They say that people organize and communicate their ideas using language. Therefore meaning
of words,narrations, texts, discourses and behaviours are important.

Criticism:

Critics are of opinion that there is nothing new in new ethnography. Ex: Malinowski has always captured local meaning.
Local point of view is questionable category. Sometimes local communities might be at disagreement.
Cognitive Anthropology can hardly reach at Generalization.

Stephen A Tyler

He argued that there are universal cognitive processes that reflect an inner structure in the human brain as if human brain
contain cognitive structure
These cognitive structures are responsible for understanding the abstract thinking patterns, ideas and symbols. 
Anthropology should be more like philosophy or Mathematics in the sense that it should search for the logical models. He
came up with two concepts Schema and Connectionism
Schema refers to a mental checklist of essential features such as Red, Round and twig for apple. But in reality the human mind
may not refer to all the features but still perceive the schema. He called it as mental prototype which the individual develop on
the basis of prior experiences. 
Connectionism is used to explain non sequential thought processes without involving linguistic categories that is
Connectionism doesn't follow a chronology of thought and doesn't rely on linguistic categories.
Connectionism suggests that knowledge is linked,networked and widely distributed by processing units that work like
neurons. These units are connected and can work simultaneously and therefore it works faster.
 Conclusion:
Information and knowledge need not be based on language
Complex actions are performed rapidly with conscious thought.
Anthropology as a discipline should study appropriate 'Meta linguistic Categories'. So far Anthropologists have been
engaged with 'Pseudo Meta Linguistic Categories' such as Kinship, Economy, Polity and Religion. 

Harold Conklin

He studied Hanunoo Community color Categories to find out how a particular culture classifies the color. It was observed
that color vocabulary influences color classification
Among Hanunoo, the colors are defined on the basis of various criteria
Two important modes of classification are:
More general classification
A detailed and specific level of classification
Level-1 or General Classification: Colors falling with this classification were mutually exclusive. Level -I included four fixed
categories: blackness, whiteness, redness and greenness. 
Level-2 was composed of hundreds of specific colors. There was some disagreement about the membership of certain colors
and inclusion of particular colors could overlap  Ex: Gold vs Orange.
It was unclear where one color began and another left off. All colors of level-II could be collapsed into categories of level-I.
Level -II colors were used when a high degree of detail was required, but generally daily use relied on the use of level-I 
The first level had a cognitive model whereas the later do not. Everybody has their own understanding or model of perception.

Emic and Etic approaches

Emic: It investigates how local people think how they perceive and categorize the world, their rules for behavior, what has
meaning for them and how they imagine and explain things.
Etic: The etic approach tries to understand the society from observations, explanation and interpretation of Anthropologists.
Etic approach realizes that members of cultures are often too involved in what they are doing to interpret their culture
impartially.
Emic Method is used to research topics that dont have too much theory attached to them. Researches disregard theories and
focus on actual incidents and data.
While etic methodology, researchers focuses on an existing theory and try to apply it to a new setting or population to see if
the theory fits

Emic Etic

Primary method of data collection is Interviewing Primary method of data collection is Observation of behaviour

Mere acquaintance of language is necessary, sometimes relied on

Mastering of local language is necessary
interpretaters.

Cross cultural comparisons can be made only after

Cross cultural comparisons can be made directly from the data
converting the native terms into generalized ones

Spend maximum time for data collection Lesser time compared to emic approach

Used by Malinowski, Boas and cultural Personality school Used by Marwin Harris

Criticism: Marwin Harris says members of a cultural group

Criticism: Criticized as being ethnocentric. 
have different opinions 

Post Modernism

Post Modernism refers to a philosophical movement that came after ‘Modernism’. The movement started in the late decades
of 20th century.
 Dr. Rice Durst, Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida are post modernists.

Features:

1. Post Modernists concentrates on the tensions of differences and similarities erupting from Globalization processes
like cross cultural interactions. Interaction of local and Global knowledge.
2. Post Modernists rejected grand, universal schemes or theories which explain other cultures. They challenged them on
The conduct of field work.
The Literary technique used in writings
The validity of Authors interpretations over alternative interpretations.
3. Post modernists are skeptical of authoritative definitions and singular narratives of any events.
4. Post modernists attacked ethnography due to lack of objectivity and scientific methods in ethnography.
5. Anthropological writings do not reflect society being observed, instead the society that Anthropologist belong to has impact
on it.
6. Post modernists believe that there is no absolute truth , everything is relative and every individual constructs his or her
reality according to his culture,environment and experience.
7. Culture is a battle of conflicting interpretations so much that, interpretations from people within the culture group are
different apart from the observer.
8. All interpretations of culture and history are valid and shall be given equal importance when one examines how they are
written.
9. Post modernism supports rationality and self-subjectivity. It considers individual's opinion is supreme.
10. They were skeptical of Science as it studies facts which according to them can be understood and interpreted in more
than one way depending upon the nature and subjectivity of the scientist.
11. Challenged history: History is rendered as an undefined past which is more like a fiction. Thinkers like Foucault said that
history should be written as part of some philosophy and not merely as historical account.
12. Accomplishments:

Being forward looking, they highlighted shortcomings of existing theories.

Methods :

Deconstruction: Find an exception to a generalization in a text and use it to make generalization absurd.
Deny legitimacy of dichotomies as there are always exceptions.
Intutive Interpretation: Interpretation in PM is form of individual understanding as there are endless number of
interpretations.

Criticisms:

For Danniel Dennett, (a philosopher) post modernism leads to multiple interpretations of a single phenomenon contributing
to the confusion and absurdities, which disrespect the historical evidences.
Post Modernists questioned the efficacy of Field work tradition which is not acceptable.