ANTHROPOLOGICAL

THEORIES

THE SELF- EMBEDDED IN THE

CULTURE
ANTHROPOLOGY
 Anthropology is the scientific study of humans and human
behavior and societies in the past and present.

 Anthropology, that is to say the science that treats of man,

is divided ordinarily and with reason into Anatomy, which
considers the body and the parts, and Psychology, which
speaks of the soul
 FIELDS OF ANTHROPOLOGY
SOCIOCULTURAL
 Sociocultural anthropology draws
together the principle axes of cultural
anthropology and social anthropology.
Cultural anthropology is the
comparative study of the manifold ways
in which people make sense of the world
around them, while social anthropology
is the study of the relationships among
individuals and groups.
 The study of kinship and social
organization is a central focus of
sociocultural anthropology, as kinship is
a human universal.
BIOLOGICAL
 Biological anthropology and physical
anthropology are synonymous terms to
describe anthropological research
focused on the study of humans and non-
human primates in their biological,
evolutionary, and demographic
dimensions. It examines the biological
and social factors that have affected the
evolution of humans and other primates,
and that generate, maintain or change
contemporary genetic and physiological
variation.
 ARCHEOLOGICAL
 Archaeology is the study of the
human past through its material
remains. Artifacts, faunal remains,
and human altered landscapes are
evidence of the cultural and
material lives of past societies.
Archaeologists examine this
material remains in order to deduce
patterns of past human behavior and
cultural practices.
LINGUISTIC
 Linguistic anthropology seeks to
understand the processes of human
communications, verbal and non-
verbal, variation in language across
time and space, the social uses of
language, and the relationship
between language and culture.
HISTORICAL THEORIES

SYNCRETISM
RELATIVISM
EVOLUTIONISM PRIMITIVISM

POSTMODERNISM
Diffusionism

Diffusionism refers to the diffusion or transmission of cultural

characteristics or traits from the common society to all other
societies. They criticized the Psychic unity of mankind of
evolutionists. They believed that most inventions happened
just once and men being capable of imitation, these
inventions were then diffused to other places. According to
them all cultures originated at one point and then spread
throughout the world. They opposed the notion of progress
from simple to complex forms held by the evolutionists. They
also held that primitive or modern is also a relative matter
and hence comparative method is not applicable. They looked
specifically for variations that gradually occurred while
diffusion took place.
British school of Diffusionism

 G.Elliot Smith
 William J Perry
 W.H.R Rivers.
They held the view that all cultures originated only in
one part of the world. Egypt was the culture center of the
world and the cradle of civilization. Hence human culture
originated in Egypt and then spread throughout the world.
They pointed to the Pyramid like large stone structures and
sun worship in several parts of the world.
German School of Diffusionism

 Friedrich Ratzel
 Leo Frobenius
 Fritz Graebner
 William Schmidt.
There approach was through the analysis of culture complexes
identified geographically and studied as they spread and developed
historically. It has both time and space dimensions. The first dimension
of space was explained in terms of culture circles and the second
dimension of time was explained in terms of culture strata.
ANIMISM
 from latin word “anima” meaning breath, spirit, life
 Is a religious belief that objects, places and creatures all possess a
distinct spiritual essence. Potentially, animism perceives all things—
animals, plants, rocks, rivers, weather systems, human handiwork and
perhaps even words—as animated and alive.
 The idea of animism was developed by anthropologist Sir Edward
Tylor.
-in which he defined it as "the general doctrine of souls and other
spiritual beings in general". According to Tylor, animism often includes
"an idea of pervading life and will in nature“, a belief that natural
objects other than humans have souls.
EVOLUTIONISM
 is a term used (often derogatorily) to denote the theory of evolution. Its
exact meaning has changed over time as the study of evolution has
progressed. In the 19th century, it was used to describe the belief that
organisms deliberately improved themselves through progressive
inherited change (orthogenesis). The teleological belief went on to
include cultural evolution and social evolution. In the 1970s the term
Neo-Evolutionism was used to describe the idea "that human beings
sought to preserve a familiar style of life unless change was forced on
them by factors that were beyond their control".
FUNCTIONALISM

 Functionalism considers a culture as an interrelated whole, not a

collection of isolated traits. Like a human being has various organs that
are interconnected and necessary for the body to function correctly, so
society is a system of interconnected parts that make the whole
function efficiently. The Functionalists examined how a particular
cultural phase is interrelated with other aspects of the culture and how
it affects the whole system of the society; in other words, cause and
effect.
 The roots of functionalism are found in the work of
sociologists Herbert Spencer and Émile Durkheim.
POSTMODERNISM

 The postmodern approach challenges the “dominating and bullying

nature of science and reason” and focuses on “…splitting the truth, the
standards, and the ideal into what has been deconstructed and into what
is about to be deconstructed, and denying in advance the right of any
new doctrine, theory, or revelation to take the place of the discarded
rules of the past” (Cooke 2006: 2014).
 Postmodernists claim that it is impossible for anyone to have objective
and neutral knowledge of another culture. This view comes from the
notion that we all interpret the world around us in our own way
according to our language, cultural background, and personal
experiences. In other words, everybody has their own views based on
his or her social and personal contexts.
STRUCTURALISM
 Structural anthropology is a school of anthropology based on Claude
Lévi-Strauss idea that immutable deep structures exist in all cultures,
and consequently, that all cultural practices
have homologous counterparts in other cultures, essentially that all
cultures are equitable.
 For example every part of the country have different belief in marriage
but share the same goal that is to unite a man and a woman.
MARXISM AND ANTHROPOLOGY
 is an anthropological theory used to study different cultures around the
world. It is based largely on the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich
Engels, both German philosophers who lived in the nineteenth century.
 focuses on the ways material factors cause social transformation
 This includes studying the forces of production and their relationship
to social organization.
 The idea is that economic relationships are based on power, and
ultimately lead to class struggle. Basically, it is the study of social
class, class conflict, economics, production and distribution, and their
relationship to social change within a community.
SYNCRETISM
 Syncretism is defined as any attempt to reconcile
disparate—and sometimes opposite—beliefs and practices.
It represents a blending of schools of thought and is often
associated with establishing analogies between two or
more discrete or formerly separate traditions. Most
academic studies of syncretism focus on the blending of
religion and myths from various cultures. Viewed
positively, syncretism seeks underlying unity in what
appears to be multiplicity and diversity.
 In syncretism, different traditions blend and become one.
RELATIVISM
 The word has two meanings, the first moral and political, the second
methodological. Methodologically, cultural relativism means that while the
anthropologist is in the field, he or she temporarily suspends ("brackets") their
own esthetic and moral judgements. The aim is to obtain a certain degree of
"understanding" or "empathy" with the foreign norms and tastes. Morally and
politically, cultural relativism means that we respect other cultures and treat
them as "as good as" one's own. During fieldwork one frequently discovers
that this is not as easy as it may sound.
 The German philosopher Kant strongly propagated that human beings are not
capable of assimilating knowledge of the world directly or without a medium.
He believed that all our experiences are universally structured perceptions, in
accordance to the concerning time and space. The idea of cultural relativism is
best understood as ethnocentrism or the group being the center of everything,
including the rostrum for judging other groups.
PRIMITIVISM
 primitivism is an interest in or study of societies and cultures that have
an ostensibly less developed notion of technological, intellectual, or
social progress. Primitive societies defined thus are those that have not
progressed to a state of technological advancement and are therefore
perceived as antecedent to the industrialized economies of the West.
While more recent definitions of primitivism in literature, visual arts,
and anthropology have emphasized the temporal relationship between
primitive societies and modernity.
Thank you!