ANTHROP 2F03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Cultural Relativism, Empiricism, Cultural Anthropology
15 Nov 2014
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Language and culture shape perception and cognition o boas and. Alternating sounds - trace back anthropology back to boas- Related to alternating sounds, problem is not with speaker, but the person hearing. Observer bias (tendency to hear sounds alternating) is not personal, its cultural. Caused english speaker to perceive it as alternating sound. Reflection of english speakers belief of english culture superiority forms basis of cultural relativism. Even if meaningless or take on different meaning in another culture, leads him to categorize core of cultural anthro. Cultural relativism as core of cultural anthropology: empiricism: with a resulting skepticism of attempts to formulate. Scientific, moral, political: scientific stake: you wont understand something unless you are part of the culture, moral: putting superiority over one people over the other- signs of linguistic superiority and justified a superiority in culture. European peoples over non-european people: opposite of cultural relativism: ethnocentrism. What is culture: shared, socially learned, knowledge, and patterns of behaviour.
