anthropology notes
Anthro 139
• Clan becomes important
1922
• “An account of native enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea.” BOOK
• Synoptic chart
• “… to collect concrete data, and accordingly I took a village census, wrote down genealogies, drew up plans, and collected the terms of kinship. But all this remained dead material, which led no further into the understanding of real native mentality or behavior…” (Malinowski, B. 1922)
• Verandah anthropologist
• Malinowski is saying in order to do real anthropological research, we need to be in the environment
• Participant-observation
• “Social anthropology began in the Trobriand Islands in 1914” o Leach, Edmund R.
• Armchair (at home) → Verandah (in a distant country – Rivers) → Participant Observation (observing and participating in everyday field settings – Malinowski, Evans-Pritchard)
• Malinowski – left England, not armchair
Notes and Querries
• Tylor was thinking of developing Armchair o When most researchers were at home
• It kept changing
• After Malinowski, the notes and Querries book was viewed by other people
• He wanted to help people to make sure they are documenting things clearly
There’s a focus on what to collect, what cultural content
• Querries about “string” (p. 286)
• The process of doing anthropological fieldwork o The how of anthropology o There weren’t too many other sources of guidance o People still needed guidance on what to collect
• If there is a yearly cycle, you can see the whole thing
Evans-Pritchard
• Didn’t think notes and querries was helpful
• Theorizing culture o Video that we saw
• “it was soon clear that if I could gain a full understanding of the meaning of this word, I should have the key to Zande philosophy” (from the video Strange Beliefs)
• facts in themselves are meaningless
• “even an idiot can produce a new fact” o thing is to product a new idea
• relationship between theory and data
o
• Clan becomes important
1922
• “An account of native enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea.” BOOK
• Synoptic chart
• “… to collect concrete data, and accordingly I took a village census, wrote down genealogies, drew up plans, and collected the terms of kinship. But all this remained dead material, which led no further into the understanding of real native mentality or behavior…” (Malinowski, B. 1922)
• Verandah anthropologist
• Malinowski is saying in order to do real anthropological research, we need to be in the environment
• Participant-observation
• “Social anthropology began in the Trobriand Islands in 1914” o Leach, Edmund R.
• Armchair (at home) → Verandah (in a distant country – Rivers) → Participant Observation (observing and participating in everyday field settings – Malinowski, Evans-Pritchard)
• Malinowski – left England, not armchair
Notes and Querries
• Tylor was thinking of developing Armchair o When most researchers were at home
• It kept changing
• After Malinowski, the notes and Querries book was viewed by other people
• He wanted to help people to make sure they are documenting things clearly
There’s a focus on what to collect, what cultural content
• Querries about “string” (p. 286)
• The process of doing anthropological fieldwork o The how of anthropology o There weren’t too many other sources of guidance o People still needed guidance on what to collect
• If there is a yearly cycle, you can see the whole thing
Evans-Pritchard
• Didn’t think notes and querries was helpful
• Theorizing culture o Video that we saw
• “it was soon clear that if I could gain a full understanding of the meaning of this word, I should have the key to Zande philosophy” (from the video Strange Beliefs)
• facts in themselves are meaningless
• “even an idiot can produce a new fact” o thing is to product a new idea
• relationship between theory and data
o