ANTH 100 Study Guide - Spring 2018, Comprehensive Midterm Notes - Orthogenesis, Franz Boas, Anthropology
Document Summary
Include examples from lectures and readings and associated ethnographers name where possible. A hierarchical social evolutionary theory asserting that social change will always follow the same direction and pass through the same stages. Lewis henry morgan"s scheme: savagery -> barabarism -> civilization. Enlightenment ideas of progress & darwinian biological evolution produced this notion. Lack of concern for history, historical development, or tradition. Approach to understanding society whereby the unique history of each culture is considered influential and central to understanding the present. The spreading of cultural ideas and practices through cross-cultural contact over time. The idea that one should suspend moral judgement and assumptions in order to appreciate and understand a culture on its own terms, rather than in comparison to one"s own. Unwillingness to take a moral position on cultural activiti. Looking at another culture through one"s ownes, even when people may be harmed by them, on the grounds that people have the right to uphold their cultural ways.
