ANTH 206 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Darrell A. Posey, Symbolic Capital, Aspirin
8 Jun 2018
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9/21/17
Quiz Responses:
• For readings, should know thesis, main points and concepts, methodology, main results.
• Lectures provide context and point out limits of the research.
o Don't need to know all- try to have a few examples per reading.
o Mainly know central concepts for each anthropologist
• Motivations for traditional environmental knowledge:
o Goal is not to compare understandings, cultural expressions of knowledge about biology in
biological terms. Study on their own terms
o Ca’t just assue that people think like us (ethnocentrism- our practices are meaningful to
the point that they will explain the practices of others)
• Levi Strauss Bricoleurs and Engineers
o Idea that all humans have same intellectual capacities- can all create meaning from the
same limited set of signs.
o Linguists and anthropologists may think Levi-Strauss' signs is reductionist- how to add
different meanings to the same first units
• Levi-Strauss Summary
o Wanted to emancipate from utilitarian point of view (people do not only know what is
useful, knowing is a human endeavor).
o Humans' intellectual capacities are the same across the species
o Meanings are different across cultures
o Knowledge is cast in a structure- individuals, society, ecological structure are irrelevant
â–Ş Levi-Strauss was not an ethnologist for most of his career- did not study actual people,
focused on the signs
â–Ş Post structuralism- move to find signs embedded in a social context. Having a word
and its meaning is not universal, shared, meanings shift due to social dynamics.
• Interpretation of a sign is not the same for every member of a group
TEK and Biodiversity
• Ethno*ology entails power relations- how to study other knowledge systems without dissecting a
culture from a distance.
• Purpose of Ethno*ology
o Managers of a protected area may want anthropologists- seen as facilitators who can help
translate culture, create contact, interaction and trust, make it possible to explain
environmental conservation to other cultures
â–Ş Paternalism- assume the project is good enough, translate and explain and other
people will understand and go along
â–Ş Still can care for the people who work with and select who you work for. Accept input
of local populations, anthropologists as mediators
o Interpreters- by studying others and learning how they manage the environment, look to
apply to better conservation
â–Ş Ethnocentric- disregard what you see as bad
â–Ş Still possible that you can have engaged, mature projects
â–Ş Environmental Conservation is not always good, but can be done well
• Anthropologist Roles
o Mediators
â–Ş Work among interdisciplinary teams, organizing public hearings
o Community advocates
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
For readings, should know thesis, main points and concepts, methodology, main results. Study on their own terms: ca(cid:374)"t just assu(cid:373)e that people think like us (ethnocentrism- our practices are meaningful to the point that they will explain the practices of others) Idea that all humans have same intellectual capacities- can all create meaning from the same limited set of signs: linguists and anthropologists may think levi-strauss" signs is reductionist- how to add different meanings to the same first units. Levi-strauss was not an ethnologist for most of his career- did not study actual people, focused on the signs: post structuralism- move to find signs embedded in a social context. Having a word and its meaning is not universal, shared, meanings shift due to social dynamics. Interpretation of a sign is not the same for every member of a group. Still can care for the people who work with and select who you work for.
