Deck 1: What Is Anthropology

Question 1

Which of the following is not a distinctive feature of four-field anthropology?

A)It has an holistic approach.
B)It has a broad cross-cultural comparison.
C)It is the study of human biology, culture, and language.
D)It is a science and a humanity.
E)It has an exclusive focus on contemporary cultures.

Answer 1

It has an exclusive focus on contemporary cultures.

Question 2

President Barack Obama's mother, Dr.Ann Durham, was a(n)

A)primatologist.
B)cultural and applied anthropologist.
C)biological anthropologist.
D)medical anthropologist.
E)archaeologist.

Answer 2

cultural and applied anthropologist.

Question 3

Why is it important to understand that human racial categories are based upon perceptions of phenotypic features and not on genotypes?

A)Because racial categories are internationally standardized
B)Because race is socially constructed, not biologically determined
C)Because race should be determined by skeletal measurements, especially cranial capacity
D)Because genealogies cannot be used in the study of human kinship
E)Because racial genotypes are more accurate

Answer 3

Because race is socially constructed, not biologically determined

Question 4

What are the four main subdisciplines of anthropology?

A)Medical anthropology, ethnography, ethnology, and cultural anthropology
B)Archaeology, biological anthropology, applied linguistics, and applied anthropology
C)Biological anthropology, linguistic anthropology, cultural anthropology, and archaeology
D)Genetic anthropology, physical anthropology, psychological anthropology, linguistic anthropology
E)Primatology, ethnology, cultural anthropology, and paleopathology

Question 5

Ethnology is

A)the study of human speech sounds.
B)the comparative, generalizing aspect of cultural anthropology.
C)the most important subfield of anthropology.
D)the study of ancient ethnic groups.
E)a synonym for ethnography.

Question 6

Anthropology's comparative, biocultural perspective

A)allows the inclusion of both biological and cultural approaches to comment or solve a particular issue or problem.
B)is the reason it has traditionally studied nonindustrialized societies.
C)is insignificant, since evolution is studied by biological anthropologists while culture is studied by cultural anthropologists.
D)is a product of the participant observation approach.
E)places it in the humanities.

Question 7

Some populations like the Polynesians, the San, or the people of northern India have phenotypes that do not fit neatly into "standard" racial categories.This suggests that

A)it is best to classify humans into a large number of racial categories.
B)phenotypical variation between human populations involves gradual shifts across different geographic zones, rather than sharp breaks indicative of discrete races.
C)these populations must have originated sometime before the major racial groups originated.
D)traditional concepts of race need to be reworked so that they are more exclusive.
E)there has been a lot of gene flow in the time since the origin of the three major human races.

Question 8

What is the term for the processes by which organisms cope with environmental forces and stresses?

A)Ethnology
B)Ethnography
C)Cultural resource management
D)Adaptation
E)Phenotype

Question 9

Today, rather than attempting to classify humans into racial categories, biologists and anthropologists are

A)denying the existence of any biological variation among humankind.
B)attempting to create new categories based only on blood type.
C)confident that earlier racial classifications are still valid.
D)trying to verify anthropometric data from the turn of the century.
E)seeking to explain why specific biological variations occur.

Question 10

Why do human populations living in temperate, northern climates generally have light skin color?

A)It helps to prevent rickets.
B)It exists in a balanced polymorphism.
C)It helps to prevent sickle-cell anemia.
D)It helps to protect against skin cancer.
E)It protects against hypervitaminosis D.

Question 11

The study of interactions among past living things in a past environment is

A)paleoanthropology.
B)paleoecology.
C)garbology.
D)social archaeology.
E)adaptive anthropology.

Question 12

The tendency of people living in the Peruvian Andes to develop a voluminous chest and lungs for life at very high altitudes provides an example of a(n)

A)genetic adaptation
B)long-term physiological adaptation
C)short-term physiological adaptation
D)cultural adaptation
E)archeological adaptation

Question 13

The pressurized cabin of an airplane flying at high altitude provides an example of a(n)

A)genetic adaptation
B)long-term physiological adaptation
C)short-term physiological adaptation
D)cultural adaptation
E)archeological adaptation

Question 14

What distinction does Kottak draw between culture and society?

A)Culture is the result of higher education, whereas society is shared by all people.
B)People share society-organized life in groups-with other animals, but culture is distinctly human.
C)Culture is genetically programmed, whereas society is transmitted through social learning.
D)People attain culture through international travel but society is the social environment of their native land.
E)Society rests more upon certain features of human biology than culture does.

Question 15

What term refers to an organism's evident traits, its "manifest biology"?

A)Phoneme
B)Genotype
C)Biological circumscription
D)Phenotype
E)Hereditary inequality

Question 16

Which of the following statements about anthropology is not true?

A)Anthropology is the exploration of human diversity in time and space.
B)Anthropology studies the whole of the human condition.
C)Anthropologists focus in part on the diversity that arises through human adaptability.
D)Anthropology's biocultural approach entails finding evolutionary explanations for all human behaviors.
E)Anthropology offers a comparative, cross-cultural perspective to the study of the human condition.

Question 17

Biological anthropologists study all of the following except

A)ancient languages.
B)human biological plasticity.
C)primates.
D)hominid evolution.
E)human genetics.

Question 18

What do anthropological archaeologists study?

A)Language
B)Race
C)Biological adaptation
D)Modern cultural diversity
E)Material remains

Question 19

Which of the following plays a role in determining skin color?

A)The Hb^S allele
B)Ultraviolet radiation
C)Sickle-cell anemia
D)Lactose intolerance
E)Lactose tolerance

Question 20

Ethnography is

A)the firsthand, personal study of local settings.
B)the process by which culture is learned and transmitted across generations.
C)the study of interrelationships among all living things in an environment.
D)a policy aimed at removing groups that are culturally different from a country.
E)the cross-cultural comparison of cultural data.

Question 21

Linguistic anthropologists study how languages vary in time and space, and how language and culture influence each other.

Question 22

Ethnography involves the collection of data that become the basis for an account of a particular community, society, or culture.

Question 23

Anthropology is a holistic discipline in that it

A)has traditionally focused on nonindustrial societies.
B)deals with human culture.
C)does not attempt to make generalizations about humanity.
D)now focuses on industrial societies.
E)studies human biological, cultural, and linguistic variation across both time and space.

Question 24

Cultural resource management is an example of applied

A)ethnology.
B)biological anthropology.
C)archaeology.
D)linguistic anthropology.
E)ethnography.

Question 25

An anthropologist is studying ethnic-religious conflict in contemporary Sri Lanka.She or he is most likely a(n)

A)cultural anthropologist.
B)linguistic anthropologist.
C)paleoanthropologist.
D)archeological anthropologist.
E)biological anthropologist.

Question 26

Discuss some of the problems underlying phenotype-based racial classifications.

Question 27

Anthropologists would agree that a comparative, cross-cultural approach is unnecessary as long as you are diligent in your work.

Question 28

Anthropology is unique in that it is both holistic and cross-cultural.

Question 29

Discuss anthropology's dual identity as a member of both the social sciences and the humanities.What advantages may be found in this dual identity? Use the anthropological approach to the study of "race" to substantiate your answer.

Question 30

Which of the following causes neural tube defects?

A)An overproduction of vitamin D
B)An underproduction of vitamin D
C)A diet rich in fatty fishes
D)The Hb^S allele
E)The destruction of folate

Question 31

What kinds of work would applied anthropologists pursue? Provide one example for each subfield.What aspects of anthropology make it uniquely valuable in application to social problems?

Question 32

The use of anthropological findings, concepts, and methods to accomplish a desired end is known as

A)applied anthropology.
B)economic anthropology.
C)conceptual anthropology.
D)sociobiology.
E)participant observation.

Question 33

Anthropologists use the term society to refer to customs and traditions passed from generation to generation through learning.

Question 34

Anthropologists study only non-Western cultures.

Question 35

What is racial classification? How does the modern anthropological approach to the study of human biological diversity differ from racial classification?

Question 36

What themes and interests unify the subdisciplines of American anthropology? In your answer, refer to historical reasons for the unity of anthropology in the United States.

Question 37

Why are there differences in skin pigmentation among human populations around the world?

Question 38

Ethnomusicology is one of the main four subfields of anthropology.

Question 39

Define both ethnography and ethnology.Discuss the importance of both and their relationship in anthropology.

Question 40

What are the four primary types of human adaptation? Why has their interrelationship been particularly important for the human species?

Question 41

Natural selection is the process by which the forms least fit to survive and reproduce in a given environment do so in greater numbers than others in the same population.

Question 42

Culture is not itself biological, but it rests on certain features of human biology.

Question 43

Folate aids in the production of sperm.

Question 44

Racial classifications do not accurately represent the wide diversity of skin colors and other biological traits present among human populations.

Question 45

The term enculturation refers to the process through which children learn culture.

Question 46

The experience of hyperventilation upon reaching a high altitude environment illustrates a long-term physiological adaptation to high altitude.

Question 47

Higher amounts of melanin in the skin inhibit the body's ability to manufacture vitaminD.

Question 48

Academic anthropology refers to the use of anthropological knowledge and methods to identify and solve social problems.

Question 49

Rickets is caused by an overabundance of vitamin D in the body.

Question 50

The destruction of folate is caused by UV radiation.