Anthropological points of view?

Question

what are they? i need to know

Answer 1

I think you referring to theoretical perspectives, or orientations. I will try to explain them the best I can in simple terms. Forgive me if I I forget a few or make mistakes. They are quite complicated, and just one can differ when two notable anthropologists see similiarly but disagree in one area. They all attempt to explain human variation across cultures. I don't think contemporary anthropologists adhere strictly to one.

Early evolution: culture generally evolves in a uniform and progressive manner. Societies pass through stages and arrive at the same end.

Diffusionist: Cultures borrow from more complicated cultures. "Higher" civilizations spread their culture outward.

Historical particulism: Depends on collecting as much data as possible and eventually the laws of human variation

Psychological: want to know how psychological processes and factors influence variation

Functionalism: looks for the function some aspect of a society plays in maintaing a cultural system

Neoevolutionary: energy harnessed per capita is the main driving force of cultural change

Structuralism: culture is a surface representation of underlying patterns in the human mind

Ethnoscience: believes that analysis of data, particularly words used to describe activities, formulate rules for the culture

Cultural Ecology: cutural traits are adaptive to the environment

Political Economy: focuses on external political and economic factors

Feminist (of course): tries to understand how the lives of men and women differ

Interprative: goal of anthropology is to understand how what it means to be a person living in a specific culture rather than to explain variation

Postmodernists: all knowledge is shaped by political pwers

Uhhh... yeah.