ANT 1101 Lecture Notes - Thick Description, Essentialism
3 Oct 2012
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Document Summary
A descriptive account of social life and culture in a particular social system based on detailed observations of what people actually do. Also a written document produced by an anthropologist from their ethnographic research. Explains not only behaviour but also its context and meaning. Looking at the whole culture, and then deeper into the culture looking at things such as laws and beliefs. Example: winking and blinking same movement but the difference is the wink is communicating something and is deliberately sending a message, and if you didn"t know this culture code you wouldn"t know what was going on. A blink is involuntary it means nothing because it is a natural action. A wink has a purpose behind it, which is culturally bound. The belief that a society or culture has an underlying and unchanging. Ignores the effect of outside influences (history, change, globalization, etc. )
