Understanding Culture, Society and Politics

Understanding
culture, society
and politics
Module 2
PERSPECTIVES
OF
ANTHROPOLOG
Y AND
SOCIOLOGY
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6bgYDKhCo8
LESSON 1: CONCEPT OF
ANTHROPOLOGY
Anthropology is
derived from two
Greek words
antropos (human)
and logos (study).
LESSON 1: CONCEPT OF
ANTHROPOLOGY
•“the study of people - their origins, their
development, and contemporary variations,
wherever they have been found on the face of
the earth”
•Another key element that makes anthropology
holistic is its research time frame.
THE FOLLOWING ARE THE
SUBDISCIPLINES OF
ANTHROPOLOGY:
Applied anthropology
Through the applications of theories and
approaches of the discipline, this
subdiscipline attempts to solve contemporary
problems.
Applied anthropology
For example, they may work in local
communities helping to solve problems
related to health, education or the
environment.
SUBDISCIPLINES OF
ANTHROPOLOGY:
Archaeology
It examines the remains of ancient and
historical human populations to promote an
understanding of how humans have adapted
to their environment and developed.
SUBDISCIPLINES OF
ANTHROPOLOGY:
Cultural anthropology
This promotes the study of a
society’s culture through their belief
systems, practices, and possessions.
SUBDISCIPLINES OF
ANTHROPOLOGY:
Linguistic anthropology
It examines the language of a group
of people and its relation to their
culture.
SUBDISCIPLINES OF
ANTHROPOLOGY:
Physical anthropology
Views into the biological
development of humans and their
contemporary variation.
Physical anthropology
Practical applications of physical
anthropological data include, for example,
using estimates of the probabilities that
children will inherit certain genes to counsel
families about some medical conditions.
Anthropology key strength as a discipline of social
science is its holistic approach to the study of
humans. It is holistic in the sense that it studies the
following:
•Humans, both as biological and social creatures;
•Human behavior from the time the species existed to
the time that it will desist;
•Human behavior from all regions of the world;
•All forms of human actions and beliefs.
LESSON 2: CONNECTION OF
ANTHROPOLOGY TO CULTURE
Cultural anthropology deals with culture in all

of its myriad and delightful forms. It attempts to
define what culture is, to work out how it
interacts with both people and the other cultures
around it, and how it changes over time.
The branch of anthropology that focuses
on the study of culture is “cultural
anthropology.” So, anthropology and
culture are interrelated to each other.
Anthropology study human
actualization and culture is the factor of
that actualization.
LESSON 3: UNDERSTANDING SOCIETY
The product of human interactions as humans

subscribe to the rules of their culture is called
society. In general information of society,
quote as organization that caters to a human’s
need for belongingness in a group.
PERSPECTIVE ON SOCIETY
SOCIOLOGIST:
•Society is an exchange of gestures that involves

the use of symbols.—George Herbert Mead
•Society as a social organism possessing a
harmony of structure and function.—August
Comte
SOCIOLOGIST:
•Society as the complex of organized associations

and institutions with a community.—George
Douglas Cole
•Society is a total complex of human relationships
in so far as they grow out of the action in terms
of means-end relationship. —Talcott Parsons
SOCIOLOGIST:
•Society as a reality in its own right. Collective
consciousness is the key importance to society, which
society cannot survive without. —Emile Durkheim
•Society as a system of usages and procedures of authority
and mutual aid of many groupings and divisions of
controls to human behavior and liberties. —Robert
Maclver and Charles Page
SOCIOLOGIST:
•Society as a collection of individuals united

by certain relations or mode of behavior that
marks individuals off from others who do
not enter into these relations or who differ
from them in behavior. —Morris Ginsberg
1. Structural
functionalism
Sociological 2. Conflict theory
perspectives 3. Symbolic
interactionism
LESSON 4: aspects of culture
Some of the major characteristics of culture:
•culture is dynamic, flexible, and adaptive;

•it is shared and contested;
•it is learned through socialization or enculturation;
•it is composed of patterned social interactions; integrated
and, at times, unstable;
•it is transmitted through socialization or enculturation; and
it requires language and other forms of communication
DYNAMIC, •Cultural behaviors allow
people to fit into and adapt to
FLEXIBLE, their respective environments.
AND •Some cultures through
experience have developed
ADAPTIVE diverse ways in adapting to
their environment, which is
even tantamount to their
survival in the planet.
•This concept means that
SHARED various members of a society
AND or group commonly share
ideas, activities, and artifacts.
CONTESTED
•Since culture is extragenetic,
its transmission is not simply
automatic but largely depends
on the willingness of people to
give and receive it.
LEARNING •Behavior patterns that constitute a
THROUGH specific culture are not genetically or
biologically determined.
SOCIALIZATION
OR •Through the process of socialization
ENCULTURATIO or enculturation, the child eventually
acquires the prevailing attitudes and
N
beliefs, the forms of behavior
appropriate to the social roles he or
she occupies, and the behavior
patterns and values of the society
into which he or she is born.
PATTERNE The patterns of social
D SOCIAL interaction may be viewed:
•as inherent characteristics of
INTERACT the participants merely given
IONS the opportunity to be exposed;
or
•as "emergent" in the sense
that they arise in the
interaction as a product
INTEGRAT
•For a society or group,
ED AND AT ideas, activities, and
TIMES artifacts are not only
UNSTABLE shared; their arrangement
more or less fit together
and interlock to form a
consistent whole.
SOCIALIZ
ATION •Acquired through learning,
OR cultural ideas, activities, and
artifacts are handed down
ENCULTU from generation to
RATION generation as a super
organic inheritance, which
means it is inherently passed
on through generations.
FORMS
•Language is the most
OF important means of cultural
COMMUN transmission, the process by
which one generation passes
ICATION culture to the next. Through
the unique power of language,
people gain access to
centuries of accumulated
wisdom.
LESSON 5:
ETHNOCENTRISM
AND CULTURAL
RELATIVISM
•Anthropology examines and
provides explanations for the
existence of different cultural
patterns as well as the similarities
and differences between different
cultures. In their studies of various
cultures, anthropologists have
adopted two major views with
regard to how cultures should be
considered in comparison to others.
The relativistic approach The ethnocentric approach
considers cultures as equal. is the belief that one's native
This view holds that there culture is superior to other
are no "superior" and cultures. Ethnocentric
"inferior" cultures, and each societies tend to have a
is unique in its own way. negative view of other
countries and people.
Ethnocentrism
•diminishes or invalidates
"other" ways of life and creates
a distorted view of one's own
•this could affect individual
behavior and relationships with
other cultures
xenocentrism
•some societies that have the
tendency to consider their culture as
inferior to others
•Another manifestation of
xenocentrism and colonial mentality
is the preference of Filipinos to
speak in English or other European
languages.
CULTURAL RELATIVISM
•a tool, a suspense of your
own personal viewpoints and
cultural bias temporarily to
try to understand the
conditions of a particular
cultural practice or problem
points 1. Cultural Relativism does not mean
ABOUT anything a culture or group of people
believe is true.
CULTURA 2. It does not mean that anything a culture
does is good or moral.
L 3. Cultural Relativism doesn’t mean that
RELATIVI cultures can’t be compared.

4. Cultural Relativism is important to
SM: anthropology and one of the things that
makes anthropology unique because it
is a tool, a method for attempting to see
things from a multiplicity of viewpoints
so as to better understand them.
Sociology relates culture with the
overall context of social order. There
are different sociological
perspectives that explain this order:
The importance of
understanding cultural
relativism is to know one's
own culture. Understanding
this perspective of cultural
relativism leads to the view
that no culture is superior
than another culture and the
Thank you!

Understanding Culture, Society and Politics

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Understanding Culture, Society and Politics

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Understanding

Cultural anthropology deals with culture in all

The product of human interactions as humans

•Society is an exchange of gestures that involves

•Society as the complex of organized associations

•Society as a collection of individuals united

•culture is dynamic, flexible, and adaptive;

RELATIVI cultures can’t be compared.

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