Deck 3: The Idea of Culture

Question 1

Theoretical perspective is critical in anthropology because:

A)Theory does not tolerate diverse opinions.
B)It allows us to explore different perspectives.
C)Anthropology must be similar to other sciences.
D)Not every researcher is capable of understanding culture.
E)Anthropology is a democratic science.

Answer 1

It allows us to explore different perspectives.

Question 2

An anthropological perspective that focuses on culture as the principal force in shaping the typical personality of a society is called:

A)Sociobiology.
B)Culture and personality theory.
C)Personification theory.
D)Structuralism.
E)Symbolic anthropology.

Answer 2

Culture and personality theory.

Question 3

A child raised outside of human society and culture would be:

A)Entirely normal except for a lack of language.
B)Rapidly able to participate in normal culture once allowed a chance.
C)Innocent,unable to lie,cheat,or dissemble.
D)Craftier,more logical,and more violent than a cultured individual.
E)Completely unable to understand culture.

Answer 3

Completely unable to understand culture.

Question 4

Social birth refers to:

A)The biological act of giving birth through social ritual.
B)The ceremonial transition from childhood to adolescence.
C)The spiritual awakening of an individual through the completion of his or her designated rite of passage.
D)The point where a person is considered a human being and a member of human society.
E)The event where women collectively give birth in a social setting.

Question 5

Anthropologists study symbols because:

A)They can represent an entire constellation of ideas and emotions.
B)They only hold meaning when in tactile form,such as a flag.
C)They have single,unique meanings that are easily learned.
D)They reflect the concerns of particular individuals in culture.
E)They are highly complex and members of a culture are unable to understand them without help from anthropologists

Question 6

Anthropologists consider that all of the following are characteristics of culture except:

A)Practiced by as few as one individual.
B)Patterned and integrated.
C)In some way adaptive.
D)Made up of learned behaviors.
E)Involving symbols.

Question 7

Structural anthropology is largely concerned with:

A)The ways in which people build houses and public buildings.
B)The ways that biology and culture interact.
C)The ways in which different parts of a single culture affect each other.
D)The ways in which members of different cultures classify and understand their environments.
E)Underlying patterns of thought common to all humanity.

Question 8

Anthropologists who are interested in the ways in which people in different cultures classify their world often use a theory called:

A)Structuralism.
B)Interpretive anthropology.
C)Ethnoscience.
D)Functionalism.
E)Sociobiology.

Question 9

Pierre Bourdieu coined the term habitus to mean:

A)Behavior that is acquired through individual and social experience.
B)Actions that are repeated within sacred rituals.
C)Places where humans reside.
D)Excess material goods that are discarded.
E)Modes of experience that individuals create without tradition.

Question 10

Which of the following best defines the concept of enculturation?

A)It is the process of being born and raised within a human society.
B)It is a ritual in which the individual is formally introduced to society.
C)It is the process of learning to be a member of a particular cultural group.
D)It is the outcome of two cultures coming into contact and adapting to each other.
E)It is the sum of all behaviors that an individual learns in childhood.

Question 11

In which society are some children believed to be born chichuru (spirit children)if they have physical abnormalities?

A)Western Brazil.
B)Northeastern Ghana.
C)Northern Africa.
D)Eastern South America.
E)Southwestern Europe.

Question 12

The Ju'hoansi people of Nambia are an example of how the spread of AIDS is influenced by:

A)Environmental conditions.
B)Government prevention programs.
C)Economic conditions.
D)An increase in sex work.
E)Religious extremism.

Question 13

Ethnographic research on the spread of HIV/AIDS has shown that:

A)Ideas about disease transmission are not affected by cultural views.
B)NGOs have no interest in understanding how the cultural sphere interacts with human health and economic systems.
C)Governments are providing information on disease prevention that is non-biased and unaffected by cultural practices.
D)Behavior does not play a role in disease transmission.
E)Cultural systems and values can impact efforts to improve human health.

Question 14

Anthropologists consider that the concept of humanness and the recognition of human status is:

A)A biological designation.
B)A sociological achievement.
C)A cultural designation.
D)Patterned and integrated throughout cultures.
E)A cultural universal.

Question 15

The theory of sociobiology views a culture as:

A)The visible expression of genetic coding.
B)As a way for members of society to understand who they are.
C)The mechanism that drives individuality and self-expression.
D)The result of little other than its own history.
E)A result of the sum total of personalities that makes it up.

Question 16

Ethnobotany is:

A)The study of the way members of different cultures classify plants.
B)The study of the dietary habits of members of different cultures.
C)The use of words from other languages to describe plants in North American forests.
D)The method that anthropologists use to discover what is edible in any culture.
E)The study of the way members of different cultures understand health,sickness,and healing.

Question 17

Some anthropologists argue that football is so popular in America because:

A)It is more violent than other sports.
B)It is easier to show commercials during football games than during other sorts of sports.
C)People are willing to pay more money for football tickets than for those of other sports.
D)It manipulates dangerous and controversial themes in American culture.
E)Members of the team are more equal in football than in other sports.

Question 18

All of the following are characteristics that are emphasized in Inuit enculturation except:

A)Violence.
B)Cooperation.
C)Emotional restraint.
D)Physical acuity.
E)Independence.

Question 19

All of the following are characteristics of cultural symbols except:

A)They contain condensed meanings.
B)They are used to create meaning.
C)They can be both objects and ideas.
D)They are used to store information.
E)They are easily defined.

Question 20

One of the earliest definitions of human culture is that "complex whole which includes knowledge,belief,art,law,morals,customs,and any other capabilities acquired by man as a member of society." Who introduced this definition?

A)Margaret Mead.
B)Pierre Bourdieu.
C)Sir Edward Tylor.
D)Franz Boas.
E)Bronislaw Malinowski.

Question 21

The ability of humans to change their behavior in response to environmental demands is called:

A)Adaptation.
B)Plasticity.
C)Productivity.
D)Mimicry
E)Environmental determinism

Question 22

Norms are best described as:

A)Symbolic meanings about values and beliefs.
B)Values held only by older members of a society.
C)Ideas people in a society share about the way things ought to be done.
D)Behaviors present in large hierarchical societies but absent in small egalitarian societies.
E)The same as laws in most societies.

Question 23

Which of the following would a materialist be likely to study in trying to understand the events of 9/11?

A)Economic situations in the Middle East.
B)The material objects used in the attack.
C)How the Middle East perceives the United States.
D)The history of Islam.
E)How the attacks fit into the larger pattern of culture.

Question 24

Norms and values are both:

A)Controlled entirely by the dominant culture.
B)Timeless and unchanging because they are encoded in law and government.
C)Constantly changing and open to re-negotiation.
D)The result of substantial agreement between members of the dominant culture and members of sub-cultures.
E)Timeless and unchanging because they are encoded in religion and mythology.

Question 25

All of the following are adaptive aspects of a Karen house except:

A)It is made of bamboo.
B)It is raised about 6 feet off the ground.
C)It has a peaked roof.
D)It does not contain a kitchen.
E)It has a place for water containment on the verandah.

Question 26

From the perspective of ecological functionalism,the Hindu taboo on eating beef is:

A)Irrational.
B)Symbolic of other types of relationships in society.
C)Adaptive to the long-run conditions of drought and crop shortages in India.
D)Based on a conscious understanding of ecological anthropology by Indians.
E)Maladaptive in India,considering the large numbers of people who do not have enough to eat.

Question 27

Today,most anthropologists agree that culture is:

A)A system of environmental adaptation.
B)The way that humans lend meaning to the world.
C)Largely a creation of anthropology with no real meaning in society at large.
D)A mental template for organizing and understanding the world.
E)Anthropologists do not agree on a single meaning of culture.

Question 28

Karen houses are generally:

A)Built by men but owned by women.
B)Built with adobe brick.
C)Built without windows.
D)Built with their main living floor two or three feet below ground level.
E)Built in the shade under trees.

Question 29

The process of movement of culture traits from one society to another is called:

A)Innovation.
B)Invention.
C)Diffusion.
D)Reintegration.
E)Sublimation.

Question 30

Conflict is likely to be found:

A)Only in large scale industrialized societies.
B)Only in societies that have capitalist economic systems.
C)Only in societies that have a social hierarchy and separation into classes or castes.
D)Only in societies that claim to have principles of equality but do not follow them.
E)In all sorts of societies.

Question 31

Transculturation is:

A)The movement of people from one culture to another.
B)The result of the conquest of one culture by another.
C)A political program aimed at creating a single world culture.
D)The notion that cultural traits are transformed as they are adopted and new cultural forms result.
E)The idea that people should be raised simultaneously in at least two cultures.

Question 32

Pure cultures,free from outside influence:

A)Have never existed.
B)Existed until the 15th century in many parts of the world.
C)Are more common in Africa than in other parts of the world.
D)Have fewer traits than those in frequent contact with the outside.
E)Tend to be much more ethnocentric than other cultures.

Question 33

The change in the biological structure or lifeway of an individual that allows for better survival is called:

A)Adaptation.
B)Environmental determinism.
C)Biological manipulation.
D)Natural selection.
E)Plasticity.

Question 34

Which of the following theoretical perspectives most takes account of issues of conflict and struggle within cultures?

A)Functionalism.
B)Structuralism.
C)Neo-Marxism.
D)Ecological functionalism
E)Symbolic anthropology.

Question 35

As culture traits move from one society to another:

A)Their meanings tend to remain unchanged.
B)They tend to lose their meanings.
C)Their meanings tend to change.
D)They lose their logical integration into culture.
E)They tend to become less and less important to the society in which they originated.

Question 36

Cultural adaptation differs from biological adaptation in that the former:

A)Allows humans to respond to problems on a relatively immediate basis.
B)Has no relationship to the demands of the natural environment.
C)Plays only a small role in human behavioral change.
D)Has no connection with human biological differences.
E)Does not help human populations reproduce and expand their numbers.

Question 37

Research on the degree to which people within a single culture share knowledge has shown that:

A)Within a single culture,most people agree on most things most of the time.
B)Large,hierarchical cultures have much disagreement,but small cultures have little.
C)Small cultures have much disagreement,but large,hierarchical cultures have little.
D)Cultures show increasing amounts of disagreement after they reach their culture climax.
E)Substantial amounts of disagreement are present in all cultures.

Question 38

When we compare dominant and sub-cultures within a society,it is clear that:

A)Dominant cultures are more powerful than sub-cultures.
B)Dominant cultures are inferior to sub-cultures.
C)Most members of sub-cultures are between the ages of 15 and 25.
D)Members of sub-cultures come closer to achieving their ideal pattern than do members of the dominant culture.
E)While members of the dominant culture usually control the government,members of sub-cultures usually control the media.

Question 39

Comparing culture to a system implies that:

A)A change in one part of culture will result in changes in other parts of culture.
B)Culture is a means to an end.
C)Each cultural pattern has the same meaning for every individual.
D)A culture has no immediate relationship to its natural environment.
E)No part of culture can work unless every part of culture works.

Question 40

What is a primary innovation?

A)A modification made to an older object.
B)An object or idea that is genuinely new and different.
C)An innovation recently drawn from another culture.
D)An object which has yet to be discovered.
E)An object that has been rediscovered.

Question 41

Sir Edward Tylor's early definition of culture was intended as a way of explaining the differences between human societies.

Question 42

Cultures are systems,so a change in one aspect of a culture is likely to result in changes in other aspects of the culture.

Question 43

Anthropologists have discovered that all humans use similar methods for classifying the world around them.

Question 44

A Karen house is a type of religious temple in Thailand.

Question 45

Child-rearing practices in all cultures are designed to produce knowledgeable adults.

Question 46

Inuit children are protected from the harsh environment and physical challenges until it is time for them to transition into adulthood.

Question 47

One example of transculturation is when young people in the Middle East use social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter to show the repression occurring within their countries.

Question 48

Diffusion is generally a peaceful process that benefits all of the cultures involved.

Question 49

One advantage of cultural adaptation over biological adaptation is that culture can usually change more rapidly than biology.

Question 50

Conflict is present in large hierarchical societies,but absent in small egalitarian societies.

Question 51

Fully understanding an issue requires using many theoretical perspectives.

Question 52

The mudyi tree is a central symbol for the Ndembu.

Question 53

To an extent,most members of society share norms and values upon which they all agree.

Question 54

Language has many symbolic components,but it is not considered a symbol system.

Question 55

Interpretive anthropologists would argue that football is a sport that is heavily laden with sexuality.

Question 56

Ethnoscience is a theoretical approach that focuses on the way in which members of a culture classify their world.

Question 57

All anthropologists agree that culture is a shared set of norms and values.

Question 58

A subculture is a group that has differing values and beliefs from the dominant culture in the same society.

Question 59

All cultures are made up of learned behaviors.

Question 60

Because he understood Karen culture,anthropologist James Hamilton was able to make many improvements to Karen house building.

Question 61

How would you best describe a neo-Marxist theoretical approach?

Question 62

What advantages does cultural adaptation have over biological adaptation?

Question 63

Define transculturation and give an example of it.

Question 64

Why do functionalist anthropologists frequently compare cultures to biological organisms?

Question 65

How is a subculture different from a dominant culture?

Question 66

What is structural anthropology?

Question 67

The process of learning to be a member of a particular cultural group is called __________.

Question 68

What are the six characteristics of culture?

Question 69

What does Clifford Geertz mean by saying that "culture is like a novel"?

Question 70

Compare and contrast the concepts of norms and values.

Question 71

Name two primary ways that culture changes.

Question 72

Describe Marvin Harris' analysis of Hindu cows in India using an ecological functionalist approach.

Question 73

Define cognitive anthropology and give an example of a cognitive approach in the discipline.

Question 74

Define what a symbol is and provide an example.

Question 75

Why do many anthropologists believe that football is so popular in the United States?

Question 76

Name three adaptive aspects of a Karen house in northwestern Thailand.

Question 77

What are the disadvantages of cultural adaptation over biological adaptation?

Question 78

What do anthropologists mean by the term "social birth"?

Question 79

__________ is the movement of cultural traits from one society to another.

Question 80

Compare Tylor's 1873 definition of culture with that which is most used today.How are they alike and different?