Lecture 2:
Fieldwork is what makes anthropology different from the other social
sciences.
Fieldwork is when you go to the country and study the way of life of the
people. It’s the ‘right of passage’
Ethnography is what you write up based on your fieldwork- more than just a
description, it describes why people do what they do; analytic.
Ethnography should be written based on the native’s point of view. With a lot
of description, Geertz referred to this is as ‘thick description’.
History of Anthropology:
Young discipline around for a 150 years. And only for the past 100 years were
they doing fieldwork.
Closely related to history, geography, Philosophy.
E.g. Marco polo learned about china and how it was different.
It’s roots in the Victorian era.
Edward Tylor- heavily influenced by Charles Darwin.
They would rank the cultures-these people are primitive, those who are well
culturally.
James Fraiser-study of myth of religion-all cultures come from spirits. To
religion. And then evolved to evolutionary thoughts. They were called ‘arm
chair anthropologists’.
Positivism: things that are true. Anthropology is not as positive as scientist,
because it can be subjective.
Malinowski: Father of social anthropology.
Trobriand islands the world war broke out, so he was stuck in the Trobriands.
So he had to do 2 years of fieldwork.
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