Kottak Ch. 3, Culture: Is Shared, Learned, Adaptive, Maladaptive....

What a great conversation and inquiry in the 4:10 section today! The 2:30 Section wasn't bad either but 4:10 rocked my world with their questions. Come on, great ones! Do it up!

Questions like:

• What is cultural and what is not?
  
• Is hunger cultural or biological?
  
• Is hearing cultural and/or biological? Is seeing cultural?? Thanks Liping for your inquiry with me after class ended.

So let's keep it going? If you are not the symbol of your name (Kyra) and that name is not intrinsic or natural to you? What does that information make available to you about who you are, could be or want to be??

What could you then play with about who you are?? What cultural processes that we are reading about could you use to play with??

Cultural Anthropologists are Hacking Cultures

Next class, just before spring break, we have visitors: A hacker and a simplicity expert

Joshua Klein is a fervent hacker of all things, including wet, pulpy systems like animals and people and the way they behave.
• Josh’s TED talk The Amazing Intelligence of Crows
http://www.wireless.is/about.php

Bill Jensen: "80% of what you need, you've already got!" & "Everything you do uses a portion of someone else's life."
• One of Bill’s videos: Making it Easier to Get Things Done
http://www.simplerwork.com/about_us.htm

Cultural Anthropology: Quoted from http://www.aaanet.org/about/WhatisAnthropology.cfm

"In North America the discipline's largest branch, cultural anthropology, applies the comparative method and evolutionary perspective to human culture. Culture represents the entire database of knowledge, values, and traditional ways of viewing the world, which have been transmitted from one generation ahead to the next — nongenetically, apart from DNA — through words, concepts, and symbols."

"Cultural anthropologists study humans through a descriptive lens called the ethnographic method, based on participant observation, in tandem with face-to-face interviews, normally conducted in the native tongue. Ethnographers compare what they see and hear themselves with the observations and findings of studies conducted in other societies. Originally, anthropologists pieced together a complete way of life for a culture, viewed as a whole. Today, the more likely focus is on a narrower aspect of cultural life, such as economics, politics, religion or art." [For your mini-ethnographies: even narrower units of observation are expected]

"Cultural anthropologists seek to understand the internal logic of another society. It helps outsiders make sense of behaviors that, like face painting or scarification, may seem bizarre or senseless. Through the comparative method an anthropologist learns to avoid "ethnocentrism," the tendency to interpret strange customs on the basis of preconceptions derived from one's own cultural background. Moreover, this same process helps us see our own society — the color "red" again — through fresh eyes."

We can turn the principle around and see our everyday surroundings in a new light, with the same sense of wonder and discovery anthropologists experience when studying life in a Brazilian rain-forest tribe. Though many picture cultural anthropologists thousands of miles from home residing in thatched huts amid wicker fences, growing numbers now study U.S. groups instead, applying anthropological perspectives to their own culture and society.

For example, why do Americans have customized urinals like the one to the left? Or what drives the popularity of the video game Grand Theft Auto? Other cultures would surely see these as senseless. But an ethnographer is interested, willing to be interested, in how it makes senses to its users through the ethnographic method.

Use the ethnographic method as often as possible from here on out.

Ch. 8 Gender: Mindblowing TED Talks on Women & Gender Roles

The author of this week's ethnography in C&C Nancy Scheper-Hughes writes "I argue that a high expectancy of child death is a powerful shaper of maternal thinking and practice." in "Mother Love" an article appearing in New Internationalist in 1994. This quote makes sense if you have read Chap. 5 in C&C already.

I am not arguing that mother love [in Alto do Cruziero/Brazil], as we understand it, is deficient or absent in the threatened little human community of Bom Jesus. Rather, the course of mother love is different, shaped by overwhelming economic and cultural constraints. The discussion attempts to overcome the distinctions between ‘natural’ and ‘socialized’ affects, between ‘deep’ private feelings and ‘superficial’ public sentiments – to show how emotion is shaped by political and economic context as well as by culture. It can be understood as a ‘political economy’ of the emotions.

Although gender has tended to be discussed relative to women only it really is a dynamic shaped in relationship to the other sex. Male to female and female to male.

For instance, while the United States still lacks gender equality, women's roles are no longer restricted to the domestic sphere in many places around the world. But women are still vulnerable esp in economic downturns according to representatives of the UN in a report on International Women's Day (March 6):

Yakin Ertürk, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, its Causes and Consequences, ... marked the Day with a statement underscoring the importance for men and women to join forces in this time of economic turmoil.

“The scale and impact of the current crisis is still largely unknown, but it is expected that women and girls in both developed and developing countries will be particularly affected by job cuts, loss of livelihoods, increased responsibilities in all spheres of their life, and an increased risk of societal and domestic violence,” said Ms. Ertürk.

She highlighted the World Bank’s prediction of 53 million more people being driven into poverty in developing countries this year, bringing the total number of those living on less than $2 a day to over 1.5 billion.

“Studies have shown that violence against women intensifies when men experience displacement and dispossession related to economic crises, migration, war, foreign occupation or other situations where masculinities compete and power relations are altered in society,” added Ms. Ertürk.

Ms. Pillay noted, however, that there is a new generation of powerful women growing up around the world with a strong sense of their identity and strength.

“They say ‘no’ to harmful practices such as early marriage, female genital mutilation and sexual harassment. They want to go to school and get an education. They want to be lawyers, doctors, judges and members of parliament. They want to change the world.

These two recently released TED Talks feature two remarkable women transforming ordinary conversations about who women are, what is possible from both disability and ability, and what strange and unpredictable things they can inspire.

ASSIGNMENT: Watch BOTH videos and write a comment. ALSO read other people's comments.

Ch. 2- Culture: What We Are

Thursday the world celebrates the 150th birthday of Charles Darwin the author of the Origin of the Species. Do you believe in evolution? Why or why not?

Chapter 3 is about how humans adapt to this world. Culture is our access to adapting to who we are and what we are and can be. Here are the objectives of the chapter:

• Understand the defining attributes of culture. In particular, you should understand what it means that culture is learned, shared, symbolic, all-encompassing, and integrated; the relationship between culture and nature; and how culture can be both adaptive and maladaptive.
• Identify the different levels of culture and why it is important to distinguish between them.
• Understand the relationship between culture and individuals.
• Distinguish between ethnocentrism and cultural relativism and how both relate to human rights and anthropological research.
• Know the differences between cultural universalities, generalities, and particularities, and be able to provide examples of each.
• Understand the mechanisms of cultural change.
• Know what globalization is, the forces that are bringing it about, and its effects on local communities.

This video is a sort of reflexive ethnography of Western society and culture. Irony and humor are often useful in bringing out hidden social constructs. So check it out:

What we are; Dance Monkeys Dance by Ernest Cline - www.ernestcline.com



Many people believe in evolution. Some do not. Perhaps life is not about our beliefs per se but rather about what we can discover about ourselves from such explorations. The humor of Ricky Gervais' Introduction To The Bible (1/2) makes fun on Darwin, if you like.


I'd love to hear what struck you, what thought or ideas from Chapter 3 struck you as new or different from your previous ways of thinking. Everyone should comment on the chapter once a week or blog at least once a week.

PS. Check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNF_P281Uu4

Five Genders in Indonesia from National Geographic

Your Final Project: Mini-Ethnography incl. an Interview

Don't forget to watch the video on ethnographic interviewing before next class Oct 16th. [Click on the index card and discover the INDEXED blog]


STAYING ON COURSE
Meeting once a week can lead to a pitfall -- being disoriented about our course of actions.
Remember to

1. Read the Kottak chapter for the week and read the Conformity and Conflict Chapter assigned and write a 250-500 response each week (exceptions are in the schedule).
   
2. Take the online quiz when indicated on the schedule
3. Prepare for your group's presentation -- the assignments are on the blog
4. Begin to consider an aspect of life/culture you would like to study through participant-observation for your final project -- a mini-ethnography. We will do some exercises and actually draft your proposal during class on Thu Oct 16th. You will revise it and set up an interview the next week. A deadline will be announced in class.
   

ABOUT INDIVIDUALS & CULTURE
Consider we are interviewing individuals but from an anthropological perspective, individuals are a reflection of larger cultural phenomena. The interview will be used to gain insight into the emic worldview of a specific culture through the individual/interviewee. As the ethnographer, you will have to determine the framing of what you learn--this is the etic viewpoint, applying anthropologial concepts and thinking, choosing what captures your attention and it may or may not be what the interviewee thinks is interesting about his/her own culture.

Here's a excerpt from Chapter 3 - Culture of the Kottak to get you thinking about what you will be studying.

Culture and the Individual: Agency and Practice (from Kottak Ch.3)

• People use their culture actively and creatively, rather than blindly following its dictates. Cultures are dynamic and constantly changing.
• Culture is contested—that is, different groups in society struggle with one another over whose ideas, values, goals, and beliefs will prevail.
• Common symbols may have radically different meanings to different individuals and groups in the same culture.
• Ideal culture consists of what people say they should do and what they say they do, whereas real culture refers to their actual behavior.
• Agency refers to the actions that individuals take, both alone and in groups, in forming and transforming cultural identities.
• Practice theory recognizes that individuals within a society or culture have diverse motives and intentions and different degrees of power and influence.
  1. Practice theory focuses on how individuals influence, create, and transform the world they live in.
• Culture shapes how individuals experience and respond to external events, but individuals also play an active role in how society functions and changes.

GETTING STARTED/BRAINSTORMING A POSSIBLE PROJECT:

• Who would you love to meet from NYC and why? Call or email about an interview for a course at Baruch College.
• What cultural event or institution do you already participate in that you could study? Who would be a great key cultural consultant?
• What matters to you regarding family, gender, ethnicity, nationality, religion, social stratification, or the world? Is there an institution, an event, or a person whom would make a great key cultural consultant on how things work?
  
• Who is a person you already know whom you admire and why? Consider interviewing them on their life from an anthropological view. (i.e., How did you become a successful stock broker on Wall Street as a woman? This would explore gender and business.)
  

ANTHRO IN REVIEW: Research Process, Ethnocentrism & Government

Check out these short videos by Studio4Learning that offer overviews of some key concepts, themes or practices like the research process:

Research Process-- Framing the Research Question



Cultural Relativism & Ethnocentrism




American Government: Types of Government

Memes vs. Genes: The Shakers as a model of Family, Gender and Religion

The Shakers, a Protestant religious denomination officially called The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, originated in Manchester, England in 1772, have only 4 surviving members in Maine today. This means they are practically extinct as a culture -- a perfect example of ethnocide. Why are they nearly extinct? Because they believe in celibacy. Yet they have survived through proselytizing and adopting orphans. What a contrast to the nuclear family in America, what a different relationship to gender organization they have and what a religion (one that teaches ideas that have a negative impact on their "genetic fitness" as Philosopher Dan Dennett said of the Shakers--see his Ted Talk "Ants, terrorism, and the awesome power of memes" http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/116 .)

The name "Shakers," originally pejorative, was derived from the term "Shaking Quakers" and was applied as a mocking description of their rituals of trembling, shouting, dancing, shaking, singing, and glossolalia (speaking in strange and unknown languages). They were taught that their demonstrations of shaking and trembling were caused by sin being purged from the body by the power of the Holy Spirit, purifying the worshipper. Often when they sing their "Shaker songs" they stomp insistently through the performance to perhaps shake out sin.


Regarding gender organization, villages are divided into groups or "families". Each house is divided so that men and women do everything separately. They use different staircases and doors, and sit on opposite sides of the room.

Though nearly extinct as a culture, many Americans are very familiar with Shaker furniture. From Wikipedia: "One of the major attributes of the Shakers was to build. This combined with their dedication to hard work and perfection has resulted in a unique range of architecture, furniture and handicraft styles. They relied on their own skills and natural resources for all these as well as for providing for their family. Shakers designed their furniture with care, believing that making something well was in itself, "an act of prayer." They never fashioned items with elaborate details or extra decorations, but only made things for their intended uses. The ladder-back chair was a popular piece of furniture. Shaker craftsmen made most things out of pine or other inexpensive woods and hence their furniture was light in color and weight."

Here is an article from 2004 on the Shakers in the Boston Globe "The Last Ones Standing":

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2006/07/23/the_last_ones_standing/

Culture Mix

Dominican Republic's culture comes from African, Taino, and European cultures. One aspect of our culture which we practice during celebration is the dance of "Los Palos." Los Palos is a African originated dance where the music is said to posses your soul and leads to you move a certain way. My family just does it for fun.

I must admit, it is pretty strange and scary when you are just watching it, as opposed to doing it. Many of my Russian friends have joined my family in this dance, so they can vouch for the fact that it's just fun.

Rape and Culture

I read an article in the Times magazine entitled Rape and Culture. After reading it, I wanted to join the women who picketed in front of the courts and let judge Archie Simonson feel my rage. Very few things make me take action but this was ridiculous. Here is the first paragraph:

Two judges raise the question of the victim's responsibility "I'm trying to say to women stop teasing. There should be a restoration of modesty in dress and elimination from the community of sexual-gratification businesses," declared Dane County Judge Archie Simonson, 52. "Whether women like it or not they are sex objects. Are we supposed to take an impressionable person 15 or 16 years of age and punish that person severely because they react to it normally?" Voicing such sentiments, Judge Simonson let a convicted 15-year-old Madison, Wis., defendant off last May with a wrist-tapping probated sentence in the rape of a 16-year-old coed in a high z school stairwell. As a result, Simonson this week is running against five other candidates in the first judicial-recall election in the U.S. in three decades.

To his supporters, Simonson's remarks reflected a troubled quest for proper justice in an era notable both for its sexual liberation and the use of sex as a sales device. But feminists were outraged.

----

The way our culture sees women now has inarguably changed. Here is an example of how our gender has to be forced to watch themselves in case they might give off the wrong message, where if they happen to do so and get raped, it's there fault. Apparently rape is not the issue, the woman is. Furthermore, WE ARE SEX OBJECTS?! This is a judge. A person who guides our laws and sets precedents. This is the precedent for our future, this is a legal definition of women's gender role in our current society; Sex Objects.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,915435,00.html

Not quite fitting in

Sometimes is hard to fit in with your own culture due to small but powerful distinctions. For example: I am from the Dominican Repblic. My Castilian dialect of Spanish sets me apart from my fellow Dominicans who speak the Dominican dialect of Spanish. This forced me to change the way I speak to fit in.

The following is a poem by Michael Ellison called "Light Skin Did"

It is about him being a light skin African American and the issues he came across because of this.

CH. 3 - Culture: Recipe for culture from Natalie's Group

FROM NATALIE:

Hey guys! I wanted to post the poem I read in class for any of you who enjoyed it and wanted to read it again. Me and my group members had an awesome time writing it. We thought it was straight to the point and made you think. We would like to hear what people in the class had to think about the poem. For instance, what they liked, or maybe didn't like about it. Enjoy!


"Recipe for culture"

by Group 5

Culture is integrating
and forever changing.
As individuals or as part of a group,
our core values are all part of the soup.

The different types of soups represent the difference in our lives
As people, as groups, and how we civilize.

Oh, how women have come so far
From housekeeping, to office working,
these are examples of how were integrating.

From slavery to unity
How things have changed
We've come together
but still kept our names.

All these recipes for different soups
What are your ingredients?
THINK.
Now, sit in your groups.

From Exploring Culture to Exploring Language and Communication

In class last week (2-21-08), we began to unravel the slide show I created in an earlier post on whiteness and we were supposed to share what each group came up with relative to the specific sections of the chapter on CULTURE in the Kottak. We will complete this on Tuesday (especially looking forward to the poem created by Natalie's group!).

From our round-robin impromptu exercise--standing in a circle free associating about "Culture is__________" one by one, we learned a lot about culture with 100% participation in the class. Great teamwork and great being in the moment to make it happen. Thanks!

So ultimately you should be noticing how culture is shared, symbolic, all-encompassing, and integrated. We should be sure to explore how culture is maladaptive and make sure everyone gets that. Here's a question to begin that inquiry and the group that had this section can chime in on the blog and in class:

Is culture always helpful?
Answer: No. Cultural practices can be maladaptive in the long-term. One example is that our own culture prizes consumerism and consumption, the use of the automobile, and climate-controlled living spaces. However, the technologies used to achieve these comforts may be causing environmental damage which is detrimental to us in the long-term. (see The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard).

Some things about the modern classroom can be maladaptive in the long run. Can you think of any? Here's a quote that suggests perhaps an alternative for the classroom:

We aim for a broadened view of cultural socialization that considers its mechanisms and implications for education. Here, we follow the observations of Moll (2000): 'We are moving toward a more dynamic, processual notion: that cultural life consists of multiple voices, of unity as well as discord, including an imperfect sharing of knowledge; of intergenerational misunderstanding as well as common understandings; of developing both adaptive and maladaptive practices while discarding others—in short, of human actions that are always creative in the face of changing circumstances. . . . [I]t might be more realistic to say “that people live culturally rather than they live in culture.' (p. 330) Cultural socialization can be defined as how people learn to “live culturally.” (Italics added). From “Every Shut Eye Ain’t Sleep”: Studying How People Live Culturally by Carol D. Lee, Margaret Beale Spencer, and Vinay Harpalani in Educational Researcher, Vol. 32, No. 5, pp. 6–13

How do you think certain practices we have used between teachers and students for a long time might be maladaptive?

How has our avoidance of talking about whiteness contributed to both an adaptive and a maladaptive practice over time?

Culture, Race and Universal Human Rights

Hi Folks,
Over the weekend I have been thinking about our conversation about whiteness and my slide show and thought I needed to sure up my awareness of what the American Anthropological Association is providing on its website about the issue of race as a social construct. I found some invaluable links. [CLICK ON ANY IMAGE FOR MORE ABOUT IT]

One is to the PBS website for the video we've been watching a segment of over the last two weeks: Race: The Power of Illusion. We've been watching the episode titled "The Difference Between Us" talking about genetics and difference. On that site was a great site I expect you to visit. It is called IS RACE REAL? Read the ten facts there and check out RACE - The Power of an Illusion . Race Timeline | PBS to see how the definitions of whiteness, Indianness, Asianness, and Blackness have changed since the 1700s. Check out this part of the site recreating the "doll test" among black children about their racial preferences.

Kottak's Chapter 3 on Culture reveals the complex ways anthropologists view the concept and practice of culture. On p. 52-53, Kottak discusses Human and Cultural Rights. I took a few of the items in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights from the U.N. that I thought might be interesting inside our ongoing conversation about whiteness, culture and the practice of doing anthropology--namely participant-observation (I'll say a bit more about Malinowski than how I left it "useful failures"), ethnography, emic-etic approaches, and working with cultural consultants.

Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

Article 4.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

For more on white privilege from whites themselves take a look at this blog

Prof. G's Whiteness as Social Construct Slide Show

I know this exercise in creating a white museum (see previous post) has been difficult, uncomfortable and a bit baffling for many of you. As I reflect on how it is going, I am realizing that my presentation of it (as a professor who is not white) and the way I set you up (not as well as I would have liked in hindsight) was filled with troubling concerns. It looks like I am trying to entrap you into racist ideas and thinking. This much be disconcerting so early in the semester for many of you.

I promised this class would be a safe space to learn and grow in. I want you to be ready, willing and able to embrace and be empowered by ANY communication by the end of this course. Perhaps I've failed at bit at preparing you just yet. In any case, this is an important exercise that will set us up our conversations not about whiteness but about the nature of culture found in Chapter 3.

Yes, we need a definition of whiteness to complete this exercise though there are perhaps many we can come up with. That's the art of exploring the unknown, i.e., learning. To get to the unknown, we must empty ourselves of all we already know. Then discovering new things becomes available rather than replicating the past as if that's learning (sharing what you already think is known or true--that's just the first step). Additionally, we also need to define CULTURE to get at the heart of what this course in cultural anthropology is about and how it will become useful for you in the future. I gave you one definition--the learned ways of thinking, feeling, believing and behaving and now you've read about the value of working with a key cultural consultant (formerly called "informants" but the term evoked spying on your own culture/community).

So, I invite you to check out my emic slide show, my virtual white museum. I invite you and your group to create your own emic collaboration on whiteness as a slide show. That way we'll have 6 slide shows from the body of the class to compare. What different stories of whiteness can we tell or will the be the same? You game?? You can tell it from ANY perspective, from ANY point of view, from how far we come, what is no longer, from the view of minorities or from people considered white but view themselves as a particular ethnicity, or from religions, from sports, or from eye color and shape. Anything that tells a story about what we already know about whiteness. A local view of whiteness. We will explore and distinguish the difference between emic and etic in class. Prof. G