Question 1

The overall trend in anthropological theory has been from theories that put human agency at the center of cultural dynamics to paradigms that see evolution as the main force behind cultural change.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False  False

Question 2

Émile Durkheim's focus on social facts illustrates what assumption shared by many anthropologists?

Accepted Answer

A)   Social fact, just like any other fact, can be studied objectively.
B)   Culture is more of an idea in people's heads than a social reality.
C)   Culture is primarily a psychological and individual phenomenon.
D)   Social phenomena studied by anthropologists require study methods that are different from those used by other social scientists.
E)   Psychologists study individuals, but anthropologists study individuals as representative of something more: a collective phenomenon that is more than the sum of its parts. E

Question 3

Which of the following research methods is a distinctive strategy within anthropology?

Accepted Answer

A)   its practice of cross-cultural comparison
B)   the biological perspective
C)   ethnography
D)   the evolutionary perspective
E)   working with skilled respondents C

Question 4

Beyond Morgan's and Tylor's early anthropological work, no major theoretical paradigm in anthropology has embraced the role of evolution in cultural change.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False

Question 5

Since there are so many anthropologists in the United States, the distinction between emic and etic does not apply to American culture.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False

Question 6

In survey research, what term is used to refer to the attributes that vary among the members of a population?

Accepted Answer

A)   unknowns
B)   questionnaires
C)   interviews
D)   variables
E)   random samples

Question 7

Traditional ethnographic research focused on the single community or culture, which was treated as more or less isolated and unique in time and space. However,

Accepted Answer

A)   all such single communities have already been studied, so anthropologists have very limited project choices.
B)   there has been a shift within the discipline toward a recognition of ongoing and inescapable flows of people, technology, images, and information.
C)   the American Anthropological Association still requires its members to strive toward research focused on one single community.
D)   this is no longer true, nor has it ever been true, a fact that renders classic ethnographies historical curiosities and not serious academic works.
E)   there has been a shift within the discipline against the concept of culture and toward the individual as the only true, reliable unit of analysis.

Question 8

This chapter's survey of the major theoretical perspectives that have characterized anthropology highlights all of the following EXCEPT

Accepted Answer

A)   a continuous concern with how to define and study culture.
B)   the theoretical and methodological shift from complexity to models that simplify human diversity.
C)   a continuous concern with scientific fundamentals and whether or not anthropology's research subject is best studied scientifically.
D)   attention to whether or not anthropological data ought to be comparative across time and space.
E)   the discipline's profound commitment to understanding human diversity.

Question 9

Lewis Henry Morgan is well known for his work The League of the Iroquois, considered anthropology's earliest ethnography. This and other of his works illustrate his view of unilinear evolutionism, which is that

Accepted Answer

A)   cultural diversity was actually a sign of the slowing down of cultural evolution.
B)   only the better and more civilized societies could survive.
C)   all societies are on some path toward civilization, but the exact paths vary.
D)   natural selection acts simultaneously on the biological and cultural aspects of human life.
E)   there is one line or path through which all societies have to evolve, and this path involves specific stages that cannot be skipped, ending at the final stage of civilization.

Question 10

Briefly describe the nine characteristic field techniques of the ethnographer. How do they compare with the research techniques you have learned about in courses or readings in other academic disciplines?

Accepted Answer

The answer of Briefly describe the nine characteristic field techniques...

Question 11

Provide a brief account of the history of theory in the discipline. Does this account support the view that much of the history of anthropology has been about the roles and relative prominence of culture?

Accepted Answer

The answer of Provide a brief account of the history...

Question 12

The work of which of the following anthropologists illustrated a renewed interest in cultural change and even evolution (although of a very different sort than Tylor and Morgan had in mind)?

Accepted Answer

A)   Ruth Benedict
B)   Max Gluckman
C)   Victor Turner
D)   Julian Steward
E)   Margaret Mead

Question 13

Ethnographers typically combine emic and etic research strategies in their fieldwork. This means they are interested in applying both

Accepted Answer

A)   local- and scientist-oriented research approaches.
B)   local and bifocal research approaches.
C)   reflexive and salvage approaches.
D)   personal and impersonal research approaches.
E)   the genealogical and survey methods.

Question 14

Morgan and Edward Tylor, both considered among the fathers of anthropology, worked within the paradigm of unilinear evolution.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False

Question 15

Franz Boas is the undisputed father of four-field U.S. anthropology. One of his most important and enduring contributions to anthropology was

Accepted Answer

A)   the field's earliest example of multi-timed and multi-sited ethnography.
B)   providing evidence that both biology and culture are susceptible to evolutionary forces, thus providing a framework for the comparative method.
C)   stressing the relevance of independent invention in human cultural history.
D)   showing that human biology was plastic, and that biology (including race)  did not determine culture.
E)   expanding the local ethnographic focus to include a regional perspective.

Question 16

This chapter's overview of the history of anthropological theory suggests that the discipline has made no important contributions to social theory in general.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False

Question 17

Which of the following is NOT a characteristic field technique of the ethnographer?

Accepted Answer

A)   structured interviewing
B)   life histories
C)   random sampling
D)   working with well-informed informants
E)   the genealogical method

Question 18

Despite the differences among theoretical paradigms of practitioners as varied as Harris (cultural materialism), White (neoevolutionism), Julian Steward (cultural ecology), and Margaret Mead (configurationalism), all of them have what in common?

Accepted Answer

A)   a strong sense of determinism, leaving very little (if any)  room for the exercise of individual human agency
B)   a well-founded suspicion in the claims of science
C)   an embrace of reflexive anthropology
D)   a sense of moral duty to help the people they studied to accelerate their path to civilization
E)   a strong concern for the future of anthropological education

Question 19

Manchester anthropologists Max Gluckman and Victor Turner made conflict an important part of their analysis, distancing themselves somewhat from Panglossian functionalism, the tendency to see things as functioning not just to maintain the system but to do so in the most optimal way possible.

Accepted Answer

A) True 
 B)False

Question 20

Interpretive anthropologists such as Clifford Geertz approach the study of culture as

Accepted Answer

A)   a diachronic phenomenon.
B)   functional puzzles.
C)   a system of meaning.
D)   underlying sets of rules that must be deciphered through the analysis of cultural patterns.
E)   distinct from human psychology.

Exam 3: Method and Theory in Cultural Anthropology

The overall trend in anthropological theory has been from theories that put human agency at the center of cultural dynamics to paradigms that see evolution as the main force behind cultural change.

Émile Durkheim's focus on social facts illustrates what assumption shared by many anthropologists?

Which of the following research methods is a distinctive strategy within anthropology?

Beyond Morgan's and Tylor's early anthropological work, no major theoretical paradigm in anthropology has embraced the role of evolution in cultural change.

Since there are so many anthropologists in the United States, the distinction between emic and etic does not apply to American culture.

In survey research, what term is used to refer to the attributes that vary among the members of a population?

Traditional ethnographic research focused on the single community or culture, which was treated as more or less isolated and unique in time and space. However,

This chapter's survey of the major theoretical perspectives that have characterized anthropology highlights all of the following EXCEPT

Lewis Henry Morgan is well known for his work The League of the Iroquois, considered anthropology's earliest ethnography. This and other of his works illustrate his view of unilinear evolutionism, which is that

Briefly describe the nine characteristic field techniques of the ethnographer. How do they compare with the research techniques you have learned about in courses or readings in other academic disciplines?

Provide a brief account of the history of theory in the discipline. Does this account support the view that much of the history of anthropology has been about the roles and relative prominence of culture?

The work of which of the following anthropologists illustrated a renewed interest in cultural change and even evolution (although of a very different sort than Tylor and Morgan had in mind) ?

Ethnographers typically combine emic and etic research strategies in their fieldwork. This means they are interested in applying both

Morgan and Edward Tylor, both considered among the fathers of anthropology, worked within the paradigm of unilinear evolution.

Franz Boas is the undisputed father of four-field U.S. anthropology. One of his most important and enduring contributions to anthropology was

This chapter's overview of the history of anthropological theory suggests that the discipline has made no important contributions to social theory in general.

Which of the following is NOT a characteristic field technique of the ethnographer?

Despite the differences among theoretical paradigms of practitioners as varied as Harris (cultural materialism) , White (neoevolutionism) , Julian Steward (cultural ecology) , and Margaret Mead (configurationalism) , all of them have what in common?

Manchester anthropologists Max Gluckman and Victor Turner made conflict an important part of their analysis, distancing themselves somewhat from Panglossian functionalism, the tendency to see things as functioning not just to maintain the system but to do so in the most optimal way possible.

Interpretive anthropologists such as Clifford Geertz approach the study of culture as