ANTA02H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Emic And Etic, Headhunting, Cultural Relativism
Document Summary
Anta02 lecture 3 on fieldwork, feelings, and emotional force. Cultural relativism is difficult, and at times inadequate. Rosaldo tried to understand the logic behind headhunting, to translate it. Only his own experience (his empathy) could translate it viscerally. At times, you have to feel something yourself in order to truly understand it. We shouldn"t assume a symbolic depth to a cultural practice. Thick description : behaviour must be understood, and described, in context. Psychologists used to claim only 6 basic categories of emotions could be consistently performed through facial expression. Happiness, surprise, anger, sadness, fear, and disgust. How good are we at distinguishing more complex emotions? e. g. , happily surprised, . Is it always polite to express certain feelings? (e. g. disgust) Thick description is necessary to avoid attributing your own assumptions, feelings, rationales, etc. Emotional force emphasizes that some things matter more emotionally than others and you can"t always describe this in purely logical terms.
