An Introduction to Anthropology 2024

UNIT TWO
1. Human Culture and Ties that Connect Society
1.1.Conceptualizing Culture: What Culture is and What Culture isn’t.
Definition of Culture
The term culture is not used with consistent meanings. It is used with various meanings in
common-sense. Anthropologists and sociologists define culture in different ways. Some of their
definitions have been quoted below:
 The British anthropologist Edward B. Tylor provided a widely accepted and the more
comprehensive definition of culture. He defined culture as “a complex whole which
includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and
habits acquired by man as a member of society”.
 B. Malinowski defined culture “as cumulative creation of man".
 Robert Bierstedt says, “Culture is the complex whole that consists of everything we
think and do and have as members of society.”
Combining these definitions, culture is the common way of life shared by a group of people and
includes all things beyond nature and biology.
Culture, therefore, is moral, intellectual, and spiritual discipline for advancement in accordance
with the norms and values based on accumulated heritage. Culture is a system of learned
behavior shared by and transmitted among the members of the group and passed from one
generation to the other.
1.2. Characteristic Features of Culture
The following are the characteristic features of culture.
a) Culture Is Learned
Culture is not transmitted genetically; rather it is acquired through the process of learning or
interacting with one‟s environment. This process of acquiring culture after we born is called
enculturation - the process by which an individual learns the rules and values of one‟s culture.
b) Culture Is Shared
For a thing, idea, or behavior pattern to qualify as being “cultural” it must have a shared meaning
by at least two people within a society.
c) Culture Is Symbolic
Symbolic thought is unique and crucial to humans and to cultural learning. A symbol is
something verbal or nonverbal, within a particular language or culture that comes to stand for

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something else. There would be no obvious, natural, or necessary connection between the
symbol and what it symbolizes. A symbol‟s meaning is not always obvious. However, many
symbols are powerful and often trigger behaviors or emotional states. For example, the designs
and colors of the flags of different countries represent symbolic associations with abstract ideas
and concepts of nation, freedom etc.
d) Culture Is All-Encompassing
Culture encompasses all aspects, which affect people in their everyday lives. Culture comprises
countless material and non-material aspects of human lives. When we talk about culture it is all
about objects, ideas, activities whether those of traditional, old-time things of the past or those
created lately by man. Culture is the sum-total of human creation (intellectual, technical, artistic,
physical, and moral).
e) Culture Is Integrated
Cultures are not haphazard collections of customs and beliefs. Instead, culture should be thought
as of integrated wholes, the parts of which to some degree interconnected with one another. The
particular culture traits fit into the whole system and, consequently, how they tend to make sense
within that context. A culture is a system; change in one aspect will likely generate changes in
other aspects. For example, changes in production technology may bring change in lifestyles of
the society and ideologies. A good way of describing this integrated nature of culture is by using
organistic analogy. The physical human body comprises a number of systems, all functioning to
maintain the overall health of the organisms, including among others, such system as the
respiratory system, the digestive system, the skeletal system, excretory system, the reproductive
system, and lymphatic system.
f) Culture Can Be Adaptive and Maladaptive
Humans have both biological and cultural ways of coping with environmental stresses. "Cultural
adaptive kits," which contain customary activities and tools that help us in managing everyday
lives. Thus, culture has allowed the global human population size to grow. This ability is
attributed to human‟s capacity for creating and using culture.
Sometimes, adaptive behaviour that offers short-term benefits to particular sub-groups or
individuals may harm the environment and threaten the group's long-term survival. Example:
Automobiles permit us to make a living by getting us from home to workplace. But the by-
products of such "beneficial" technology often create new problems. Chemical emissions
increase air pollution, deplete the ozone layer, and contribute to global warming. This is called
many cultural patterns appear to be maladaptive in the long run.

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g) Culture is Dynamic
There are no cultures that remain completely static year after year. Culture is changing
constantly as new ideas and new techniques are added as time passes modifying or changing the
old ways.
1.3. Aspects/Elements of Culture
Two of the most basic aspects of culture are material and nonmaterial culture.
1.3.1. Material culture
Material culture consists of human-made objects such as tools, furniture, automobiles, buildings,
dams, roads, bridges, etc. It includes technical and material equipment.
2.3.2. Non – Material Culture
Non-material culture consists of the words people use or the language they speak, the beliefs
they hold, values and virtues they cherish, habits they follow, rituals and practices that they do
and the ceremonies they observe. It also includes customs, attitudes and outlook, belief, ways of
acting, feeling and thinking. Some of the non-material cultures are listed as follows:
i. Values
Values are the standards by which members of a society define what is good or bad, beautiful, or
ugly. Values are a central aspect of the non-material culture of a society and are important
because they influence the behavior of the members of a society.
ii. Beliefs
Beliefs are cultural conventions that concern true or false assumptions, specific descriptions of
the nature of the universe and humanity‟s place in it. Values are generalized notions of what is
good and bad whereas beliefs are more specific. “Education is good” is a fundamental value in
American society, whereas “Grading is the best way to evaluate students” is a belief that reflects
assumptions about the most appropriate way to determine educational achievement.
iii. Norms
Norms are shared rules or guidelines that define how people “ought” to behave under certain
circumstances. Norms are generally connected to the values, beliefs, and ideologies of a society.
Norms vary in terms of their importance to a culture, these are:
a) Folkways: Norms guiding ordinary usages and conventions of everyday life. Folkways
are norms that are not strictly enforced, such as not leaving your seat for an elderly
people inside a bus/taxi. They may result in a person getting a bad look.
b) Mores: are much stronger norms than folkways. Mores are norms that are believed to be
essential to core values and we insist on conformity. A person who steals, rapes, and kills

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has violated some of society‟s most important mores. Punishment may be ostracism,
vicious gossip, public ridicule, exile, loss of one‟s job, physical beating, imprisonment,
commitment to a mental asylum, or even execution.
1.4. Cultural Unity & Variations: Universality, Generality & Particularity of Culture
1) Universality: when the cultural traits that spans or found in every culture. E.g., some
kind of family, incest taboo, exogamy and use of languages and tools.
2) Generality: generalities are cultural traits that occur in many societies but not all of
them. Societies can share the same beliefs and customs because of borrowing, domination
(colonial rule) or independent innovation of same cultural trait e.g., farming and nuclear
family.
3) Particularity: Trait of a culture that is not widespread. These are cultural traditions,
which are unique to only few societies. Cultural particulars include the specific practices
that distinguish cultures from one another. For example, all people become hungry but
the potential food sources defined as edible varies across cultures for example donkey
meat in Ethiopia.
1.5. Evaluating Cultural Differences: Ethnocentrism, Cultural Relativism & Human
Rights
A. Ethnocentrism
It refers to the tendency to see the behaviors, beliefs, values and norms of one's own group as the
only right way of living and to judge others by those standards. Ethnocentrism led us to operate
on the premise that our own society‟s ways are the correct, normal and better ways for acting,
thinking, feeling and behaving. It is a cultural universal. Alien cultural traits are often viewed as
being not just different but inferior, less sensible, and even "unnatural”.
Ethnocentrism results in prejudices about people from other cultures and the rejection of their
"alien ways." It can prevent us from understanding and appreciating another culture. When there
is contact with people from other cultures, ethnocentrism can prevent open communication and
result in misunderstanding and mistrust. This would be highly counterproductive for
businesspersons trying to negotiate a trade deal, professionals who work in areas other than their
own or even just neighbors trying to get along with each other.
The positive aspect of ethnocentrism has to do with the protection that it can provide for a
culture. By causing a rejection of the foods, customs, and perceptions of people in other cultures,
it acts as a conservative force in preserving traditions of one's own culture. It can help maintain
the separation and uniqueness of cultures.

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B. Cultural relativism
We need to examine one‟s behavior or culture as insiders, seeing it within the framework of their
values, beliefs, and motives. The concept of cultural relativism states that cultures differ, so that
a cultural trait, act, or idea has no meaning but it‟s meaning only within its cultural setting.
Cultural relativism suspends judgment and views about the behavior of people from the
perspective of their own culture. A culture must be studied in terms of its own meanings and
values. Cultural relativism describes a situation where there is an attitude of respect for cultural
differences rather than condemning other people's culture as uncivilized or backward.
Respect for cultural differences involves:
 Appreciating cultural diversity.
 Accepting and respecting other cultures.
 Understand every culture and its elements in terms of its own context and logic.
 Accepting that each body of custom has inherent dignity and meaning as the way of life
of one group which has worked out to its environment, to the biological needs of its
members, and to the group relationships.
 Knowing that a person's own culture is only one among many; and
 Recognizing that what is immoral, ethical, and acceptable in one culture may not be so in
another culture.
C. Human rights
In today's world, human rights advocates challenge many of the tenets of cultural relativism.
Many anthropologists are uncomfortable with the strong form of cultural relativism that suggests
that all patterns of culture are equally valid. What if the people practice slavery, violence against
women, torture, or genocide? Human rights: rights based on justice and morality beyond and
superior to particular countries, cultures, and religions. The idea of human rights challenges
cultural relativism by invoking a realm of justice and morality beyond and superior to the laws
and customs of particular countries, cultures, and religions.
Human rights include the right to speak freely, to hold religious beliefs without persecution, and
to not be murdered, injured, enslaved or imprisoned without charge. Such rights are seen as
inalienable (nations cannot abridge or terminate them) and international (larger than and superior
to individual nations and cultures). A doctrine of universal human rights, which emphasizes the
rights of the individual over those of the community, would condemn such killings.
Anthropologists respect human diversity. Most ethnographers try to be objective, accurate, and
sensitive in their accounts of other cultures. However, their objectivity, sensitivity and a cross-
cultural perspective got nothing to do with ignoring international standards of justice and
morality.
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1.6. Culture Change

Some of the shared behaviors and ideas that were common at one time are modified or replaced
at another time.
Culture change can occur as a result of the following Mechanisms:
i. Diffusion: The source of new cultural elements in a society may also be another society that
cultural elements are borrowed from another society and incorporated into the culture of the
recipient group is called diffusion.
 Diffusion is direct when two cultures trade with, intermarry among, or wage war on one
another.
 Diffusion is forced when one culture subjugates another and imposes its customs on the
dominated group.
 Diffusion is indirect when items or traits move from group A to group C via group B without
any firsthand contact between A and C. In this case, group B might consist of traders who
take products from a variety of places to new markets. Or group B might be geographically
situated between A and C, so that what it gets from A eventually winds up in C, and vice
versa. In today's world, much international diffusion is indirect culture spread by the mass
media and advanced information technology.
ii. Acculturation is the exchange of cultural features that results when groups have continuous
firsthand contact. The cultures of either or both groups may be changed by this contact. This
usually happens in situations of trade or colonialism.
iii. Invention-the process by which humans innovate, creatively finding solutions to problems is
a third mechanism of cultural change. People in different societies have innovated and changed
in similar ways, which is one reason why cultural generalities exist. One example is the
independent invention of agriculture in the Middle East and Mexico. Thus, in both Mexico and
the Middle East, agriculture led to many social, political, and legal changes, including notions of
property and distinctions in wealth, class and power.
iv. Globalization: encompasses a series of processes, including diffusion and acculturation,
working to promote change in a world in which nations and people are increasingly interlinked
and mutually dependent. Promoting such linkages are economic force, political forces, modem
systems of transportation, and communication. Within nations and across their borders, the
media spread information about products, services, rights, institutions, lifestyles, and the
perceived costs and benefits of globalization. Emigrants transmit information and resources
transnationally, as they maintain their ties with home (phoning, faxing, e-mailing, making visits,
and sending money).

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1.7.Ties That Connect: Marriage, Family and Kinship

1.7.1. Marriage:
Almost all known societies recognize marriage. Marriage is defined as a sexual union between a
man and a woman, in which children born to the woman are considered the legitimate offspring
of both parents. The main purpose of marriage is to create new social relationships, rights and
obligations between the spouses and their kin, and to establish the rights and status of children
when they are born. In traditional simple societies, marriage is often more of a relationship
between groups than between individuals. In industrial societies, it is more of individual matter.
The idea of romantic love is less common in traditional (non-industrial) societies.
Frequently, anthropologists have debated whether families and the institutions of marriage are
universals. One interesting case is that the Nayar of Southern India did not have marriage in the
conventional sense of the term. Although teenage Nayar girls took a ritual husband in a public
ceremony, the husband took no responsibility for the woman after the ceremony, and frequently
he never saw her again. Thus, the Nayar do not have marriage according to our definition in that
there is no economic cooperation, regulation of sexual activity, cohabitation, or expectation of
permanency.
1.7.1.1. Rules of Marriage
Societies also have rules that state whom one can and cannot marry. Every society has
established for itself some type of rules regulating mating. The most common form of
prohibition is mating with certain type of kin that are defined by the society as being
inappropriate sexual partners. This prohibition among mating having a certain category of
relatives is known as incest taboo. The most universal form of incest taboo involves mating
between members of the immediate (nuclear) family: mother-sons, father-daughters, and brother-
sisters. But, for political, religious, or economic reasons, members of the royal families among
the ancient Egyptians, Incas and Hawaiians were permitted to mate with and marry their siblings.
Marriage is an important institution without which the society could never be sustained.
2.7.1.2. Mate Selection: Whom Should You Marry?
There are certain strict rules and regulations.
a) Exogamy:
This is the rule by which a man is not allowed to marry someone from his own social group.
Such prohibited union is designated as incest which is often considered as sin.
Reasons for the practice of exogamy got approval are:
 A conception of blood relation prevails among the members of a group. Therefore,
marriage within the group-members is considered a marriage between brother and sister.

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 Attraction between a male and female gets lost due to close relationship.
 There is a popular idea that a great increase of energy and vigor is possible in the progeny
if marriage binds two extremely distant persons who possess no kin relation among them.
 Kottak claimed also that exogamy has adaptive value, because it links people into a wider
social network that nurtures, helps, and protects them in times of need pushing social
organization outward, establishing and preserving alliances among groups.
b) Endogamy:
A rule of endogamy requires individuals to marry within their own group and forbids them to
marry outside it due to religion, class/caste and others.
c) Preferential Cousin Marriage:
A common form of preferred marriage is called preferential cousin marriage and is practiced in
one form or another in most of the major regions of the world. Kinship systems based on
lineages distinguish between two different types of first cousins, these are:
Cross Cousins: - are children of siblings of the opposite sex- that is one‟s mother‟s brothers‟
children and one‟s father‟s sisters‟ children.
The most common form of preferential cousin marriage is between cross cousins because it
functions to strengthen and maintain ties between kin groups established by the marriages that
took place in the preceding generation.
Parallel Cousins: - When marriage takes place between the children of the siblings of the same
sex, it is called parallel cousin marriage. Children of siblings of the same sex, namely the
children of one‟s mother‟s sister and one‟s father brother. The mate may come either from one‟s
father‟s brother‟s children or mother's sister‟s children.
A much less common form of cousin marriage is between parallel cousins, the child of one‟s
mother‟s sister or father‟s brother. Since parallel cousins belong to the same family, such a
practice can serve to prevent the fragmentation of family property.
d) The Levirate and Sororate
Another form of mate selection that tends to limit individual choice is those that require a person
to marry the husband or widow of a deceased kin.
The levirate: - is the custom whereby a widow is expected to marry the brother (or some close
male relative) of her dead husband. Usually, any children fathered by the woman‟s new husband
are considered to belong legally to the dead brother rather than to the actual genitor. Such a
custom both serves as a form of social security for the widow and her children and preserved the
rights of her husband‟s family to her sexuality and future children.

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The sororate, which comes into play when a wife dies, is the practice of a widower‟s marrying
the sister (or some close female relative) of his deceased wife. If the deceased spouse has no
sibling, the family of the deceased is under a general obligation to supply some equivalent
relative as a substitute.
For example, in a society that practice sororate, a widower may be given as a substitute wife the
daughter of his deceased wife‟s brother.
2.7.1.3 Number of spouses
Societies have rules regulating whom one may/may not marry; they have rules specifying how
many mates a person may/should have.
 Monogamy:- the marriage of one man to one woman at a time.
 Polygamy: - marriage of a man or woman with two or more mates. Polygamy can be of
two types:
 Polygyny:- the marriage of a man to two or more women at a time.
 Polyandry:- the marraige of a woman to two or more men at a time
 Fraternal polyandry: two or more brothers‟ marriage one woman as their wife. Nepal,
Burma and India practice it.
 Marriage of a man with two or more sisters at a time is called sororal polygyny whereas
co-wives are not sisters; the marriage is termed as non - sororal polygyny.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Polygamous marrige
 Having two/more wives is often seen as a sign of pristige.
 Having multiple wives means wealth, power, and status both for the polygnous husband,
wives and children.
 It produces more children who are considered valuable for future economic & poltical assets.
 Economic advantage: It encourages to work hard (more cows, goats..) for more wives
 The Drawbacks of Polygyny:Jealousy among the co-wives who fequently compete for the
husband‟s attenttion.
2.7.1.4. Economic Consideration of Marriage
Most societies view as a binding contract between at least the husband and wife and, in many
cases, between their respective families as well. Such a contract includes the transfer of certain
rights between the parties involved, rights of sexual access, legal rights to children, and rights of
the spouses to each other‟s economic goods and services. Often the transfer of rights is
accompanied by the transfer of some type of economic consideration.

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1. Bride Price: - It is also known as bride wealth, is the compensation given upon marriage by
the family of the groom to the family of the bride.
2. Bride Service: - When the groom works for his wife‟s family, this is known as bride service.
3. Dowry: - A dowry involves a transfer of goods or money in the opposite direction, from the
bride's family to the groom‟s family.
2.7.1.5. Post-Marital Residence Rule
Refers to, the rules that the newly married couple lives after the marriage ritual are governed.
 Patrilocal Residence: - the married couple lives with or near the relatives of the husband‟s
father.
 Matrilocal Residence: - the married couple lives with or near the relatives of the wife.
 Avunculocal: - The married couple lives with or near the husband‟s mother‟s brother.
 Ambilocal/Bilocal Residence: - When couple has a choice of living with relatives of the
wife or husband.
 Neolocal Residence: - The Married couple forms an independent place of residence away
from the relatives of either spouse.
1.7.2. Family
Family is the basis of human society. It is the most important primary group in society, and it is
universal. It is the most permanent and most pervasive of all social institutions. The interpersonal
relationships within the family make the family an endurable social unit. Anthropologists have
identified two fundamentally different types of family structure:
1. The Nuclear Family: - Consisting of husband and wife and their children, the nuclear family
is a two-generation family formed around the conjugal or marital union. Even though the unclear
family, to some degree, is part of a larger family structure, it remains relatively autonomous and
independent unit. Thus, in everyday economic support, childcare, and social interaction are met
within the nuclear family itself rather than by a wider set of relatives.
In nuclear family, married couple live apart from either set of parents (neolocal residence), nor is
there any particular obligation or expectation for the married couple to care for their aging
parents as well as parents are not actively involved in mate selection for their children.
2. The Extended Family
In societies based on extended families, blood ties are more important than ties of marriage.
Extended families consist of two or more families that are linked by blood ties.
In the case of a patrilineal extended family, the young couple takes up residence in the
homestead of the husband‟s father, and the husband continues to work for his father, who also
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runs the household. Moreover, most of the personal property in the household is not owned by
the newlyweds but is controlled by the husbands‟ father.
It is important to point out that in extended family systems; marriage is viewed more as bringing
a daughter into the family than acquiring a wife. In other words, a man‟s obligations of
obedience to his father and loyalty to his brothers are far more important than his relationship to
his wife and the wife often comes under the control of her mother-in-law, who allocates chores
and supervises her domestic activities. As geographical mobility is more likely associated with
nuclear family than with extended family, there is a rough correlation found between extended
family system and an agricultural way of life.
2.7.2.1. Functions of Marriage and Family
1. Biological Function: The institution of marriage and family serves biological (sexual and
reproductive) function. Sexual cohabitation between spouses automatically leads to the birth of
off-springs. The task of perpetuating the population of a society is an important function of a
family. Society reproduces itself through family.
2. Economic Function: Marriage brings economic co-operation between men and women and
ensures survival of individuals in a society. With the birth of off-springs, the division of labor
based on sex and generation come into play. In small scale societies, family is a self-contained
economic unit of production, consumption, and distribution.
3. Social Function: Marriage is based on the desire to perpetuate one‟s family line. In marriage,
one adds not only a spouse but most of the spouse‟s relatives to one‟s own group of kin. This
means the institution of marriage brings with it the creation and perpetuation of the family, the
form of person-to-person relations and linking one‟s kin group to another kin group.
4. Educational and Socialization Function: The burdens of socialization of newborn infants
fall primarily upon the family. In addition, children learn an immense amount of knowledge,
culture, values prescribed by society, before they assume their place as adult members of a
society. The task of educating and enculturating children is distributed among parents. Moreover,
family behaves as an effective agent in the transmission of social heritage.
1.7.3. Kinship
Kinship is the method of recognizing relationship. In any society every adult individual belongs
to two different nuclear families. The family in which he/she was born and reared is called
‘family of orientation‟. The other family to which he/she establishes relation through marriage
is called ‘family of procreation’. Kinship is a structured system of relationships where
individuals are bound together by complex interlocking and ramifying ties.
The relationship based on blood ties is called “consanguineous kinship”, and the relatives of
this kind are called „consanguineous kin‟. The desire for reproduction gives rise to another kind

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of binding relationship. “This kind of bond, which arises out of a socially or legally defined
marital relationship, is called affinal relationship”, and the relatives so related are called
‘affinal kin’.
2.7.4. Descent
Descent refers to the social recognition of the biological relationship that exists between the
individuals. The rule of descent refers to a set of principles by which an individual traces his
descent. In almost all societies kinship connections are very significant. An individual always
possesses certain obligations towards his kinsmen, and he also expects the same from his
kinsmen. Succession and inheritance are related to the rule of descent.
There are three important rules of decent:
1. Patrilineal descent: When descent is traced solely through the male line. A man‟s sons and
daughters all belong to the same descent group by birth, but it is only the sons who continue the
affiliation. Succession and inheritance pass through the male line.
2. Matrilineal descent
When the descent is traced solely through the female line. At birth, children of both sexes belong
to mother‟s descent group, but later only females acquire the succession and inheritance.
Therefore, daughters carry the tradition, generation after generation.
3. Cognatic Descent: In some societies, individuals are free to show their genealogical links
either through men or women. Such society connected with the kin-group of father and others
with the kin group of mothers. There is no fixed rule to trace the succession and inheritance.

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