ANTHROP 1AB3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Trobriand Islands, Margaret Mead, Arnold Van Gennep
15 Dec 2018
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Document Summary
Tend to think about identities are inherited/biological but it is cultural. Naturalizing discourse: think/talk that our identities are natural. Debate about nature vs nurture (margaret mead: coming of age in samoa) Identities as embodied: we use our bodies (consciously or unconsciously: language (parents vs friends, gender, national origin, clothing (homa hoodfar"s work on veiling among young muslim women) What is important is not the gift Commodities: are items that involve a transfer of value and a counter-transfer: a sells something to b, and the transaction is finished. Commodities become gifts when we appropriate and personalize them. Rites of passage: term coined in 1908 by arnold van gennep. Rituals that accompany many changes in status/identity (these can be secular or religious) Three stages: separation, liminality and reincorporation: separation. Often involves physical separation or isolation from a particular group. Can involve symbols of separation (cutting hair, wearing different clothes) e. g military haircuts.
