Unit 2 vocab - Societal Institution
Terms
undefined, object
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- Limited Purpose Money
- Forms of money that may be hard to use in many situations...(Aztec used chocolate beans, Yurok Indians used cowrie shells)
- Polytheism
- belief in multiple gods
- Atheist
- someone who denies the existence of god
- Tribe
- simplest type of true political organization, composed of a number of bands that share a common culture. (Population of a tribe is more concentrated then one of a band, greater and more assured food supply as well)
- Why are decisions necessary?
- Members of a society have conflicting needs, wants, and calues
- Sachem
- political leader, head of a tribe
- Amulet
- Fetish used to ward off evil spirits
- Natural division of labor
- division of labor by age and sex (most societies consider some tasks as "women's jobs" and others may be "men's jobs"....but these tasks can differ from culture to culture)
- Betrothal
- when two people are expected to marry
- Rites of passage
- often mark a person's change from one status to another...child to adult...to mark the important transition from childhood to adult status...many cultures engage in important ceremonies...
- Economics
- the study of how societies (individuals, firms, governments) satisfy their unlimited want and needs given a scarcity of resources (oil, land, trees, steel, aluminum, metals, plastic, concrete, marble, clean water, diamonds, gold, industrial diamonds, glass, rubber, TIME)
- Second lesson in reciprocity
- Never refuse a gift, and never fail to return a gift. If you cannot use it, you can always give it away to someone else - there is no such thing as too much - there are never too many bananas.
- patrilineal
- based on or tracing descent through the male line
- monogamy
- having only one spouse at a time
- bilineal
- descent in which the individual figures kinship through both the father's and mother's descent group.
- Market exchange
- An exchange system where production for sale is the primary goal and buying and selling takes place under competitive conditions determined by the laws of supply and demand
- Popol Vuh
- Mayan sacred book
- Band
- A small group of people, all related to one another who occupy a single area or region. Bands have little or no political organization.
- Pragmatic
- matter-of-fact: concerned with practical matters
- Social Control
- When an agreement cannot be reached peacefully, people invent some ways to settle differences (keeps the society functioning)
- Third lesson in reciprocity
- Where reciprocity is a rule and fits are the idiom. You cannot demand a gift, just as you cannot refuse a request.
- Scientific Field Work
- A method for studying other cultures
- Trial by Ordeal
- A painful test in which guilt or innocence of someone is determined
- Primary Family (nuclear)
- the immediate family (husband and wife, their children, and sometimes their parents.
- Economic System
- a particular set of social institutions which deals with the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in a particular society
- Charm
- Fetish used to attract good spirits
- Dumb Barter
- an exchange where no words are exchanged between the traders
- matrilineal
- based on or tracing descent through the female line
- Surplus
- excess: a quantity much larger than is needed
- Filial Loyalty
- dutiful obedience on the part of children to parents
- Cultural Changes
- the different ways a culture changes.
- Patricians
- Aristocrats
- Manitou
- (among the Algonquin Indians of North America) supernatural being, the great spirit, pure supernatural power
- Taboo
- declared as forbidden
- Potlach Ceremony
- the host gains high status by burning their acquired wealth at a big feast that their guests are unable to match...such acts let Haida Chiefs gain respect...the haida household is an economic unit that produces, distributes, and consumes surplus goods...the haida consider hard work a virtue and scorn laziness but gain pleasure by watching their years of hard work go up in smoke at potlatch parties...
- Vodounist
- people who believe they communicate directly with, indeed are often possessed by, the many spirits who populate the everyday world.
- Mana
- The belief that a larger force controls the world and everything.
- Animism
- belief that animals, plants, and trees and other physical objects possess within them an unseen spirit or soul. (practice nature worship)
- Gaman
- A term that means that basically represents toughing it our, enduring hardship (Many Japanese regard gaman with pride as a national trait)
- Concombre Zombi
- the zombie's cucumber
- Polyandry
- having more than one husband at a time
- The zombie's powder
- a mixture containing parts of toads, sea worms, lizards, tarantulas, and human bones...poison is rubbed into the victim's skin and eventually his metabolism is lowered to a level almost indistinguishable from death.
- Bronislaw Malinowski
- Polish - born anthropologist advanced Boa's fieldwork techniques by spending several years living among the Trobriand Islanders of the South Pacific.
- Creation story
- the story that explains how the world came into being and how their group was founded (mayan story of creation: world was first a huge sea...god of lightning and god of thunder met each other...created the earth...created human to speak their names and worship them....created man successfully from corn meal...corn meal and light are important symbols in Mayan religion...)
- Services
- refer to jobs that some people do for others
- Three reasons families stay together in Japan?
- Low expectations, Patience, and shame (a divorce is considered very shameful...)
- Dowry
- the equivalent of gifts from parents to newlyweds in our culture (a sum of money or goods paid to the future husband or in some cultures the future wife)
- Subsistence societies
- societies that produce no surplus beyond a tiny amount.... only produce what they need a little more (Hunters and gatherers produce just enough to survive...produce only what is necessary)
- Tualcha Mura
- (The Arunta) two fathers make a special agreement concerning their children.
- Reciprocity
- The idea that two acts will, over time, cancel each other out.
- Exogamy
- The rule that marriages must be to a person outside the family or social group's called exogamy (the Navajo use exogamy to establish friendly ties with neighboring tribes)
- Gift Transfer
- a type of simple exchange where goods and services that are different but have similar values are exchanged. (Exchange between pygmies and negroes in Africa. Pygmies leave forest products like ivory and honey at a "trading spot". Then, the negroes come and take these goods and leave some of their own such as iron knives, hatchets, and other agricultural products)
- Henry Rowe SchoolCraft
- Collected the songs and tales of the Plains Indians and was surprised to see that the Indians had a very complicated language and realized they had feelings and emotions just as all people have.
- Icon
- An image, picture, or other representation
- Extended Family
- refers to relatives other than the primary family
- Patriarchal
- characteristic of a form of social organization in which the male is the family head and title is traced through the male line
- Market economy
- everyone makes his livelihood by selling something in the market (An economy in which goods and services are exchanged in a free market)
- Confederacy
- A union of two or more tribes or states
- Voodoo
- ancient religion of African descent, relies on ancestor worship and speaking with the dead.
- Levirate
- (a custom commonly found in nonliterate societies) required a man to marry his brother's widow and assumes responsibility for her children
- 7-11 husband
- A husband that leaves for work at 7 am and returns at 11 pm
- Law of supply
- As the price of the product rises (falls), the quantity supplied will rise (fall) SUPPLY TO THE SKY
- Symbol
- Something used to represent something else
- Fetishes
- an object regarded as having special powers
- Dr. Franz Boa
- A german - born physical scientist who developed scientific field work as a method for studying other cultures To study the Northwest coast Indian, he actually lived with them. He found that all cultures no matter how simple they looked were complicated
- Five questions Economics is centered around?
- Who produces the goods and services people want? Who decides who does what work? Who gets the goods and services that are produces? How are the goods and services actually used?
- A society
- A group of people that speaks, thinks, and behaves alike in most things.
- Edward Tylor
- English scholar who first defined culture. (very interested in customs) noted that people practice customs that seem at first to serve no real purpose. He suggested that these were passed down from earlier practices. Their original meaning had changed over time. They then fulfilled a new function or purpose (when a man greeted another man he wanted to know that the other was not carrying a weapon so he shook hands with him)
- Soa
- a go-between that matches up a boy and a girl (Samoan culture)
- Laws
- A system of rules enforced by a set of institutions...(standardized norms that regulate human conduct)
- Neolocal
- residence in which the married couple's household has no connection with either the husband's or wife's family.
- Barter
- an equal exchange, an exchange of goods and services not involving money...
- Divination
- a foreseeing or foretelling of future events (the act of divining)
- Father Sahagun
- Catholic priest who made a study of Aztec indians in Mexico. He found that they had a highly developed civilization.
- Bride price
- a custom were a man pays back a girl's family for taking her from them (essentially buying the bride from her family for a certain sum of money)
- Bokor
- a voodoo priest that dealt in black magic
- Sorcerers
- those who practice black magic
- General Purpose Money
- A type of medium of exchange that makes complex economic systems possible - (all members of society must agree to use it as a basis for exchange, all members of society must agree on its value, it is more useful if it can be broken down into different amounts, it needs to be portable, it has to be durable so it lasts over time)
- Law of demand
- As the price of a product rises (falls), the quantity demanded of that product falls (rises)DEMAND DESCENDS
- Patrilocal
- residence after marriage in association with the husband's father's relatives.
- Zombies
- the living dead
- matriarchal
- a form of social organization in which a female is the family head and title is traced through the female line
- Magic
- any art that invokes supernatural powers
- Ancestor worship
- a belief in the spirits of dead ancestors (African tribe Baganda believe in ghost that cannot be seen but can fee, see and understand....believe that the ghost or soul of a dead ancestor remains part of the family....)
- Fugu Fish
- a species of puffer fish (contains puffer fish poison tetrodotoxin)
- Agnostic
- a religious orientation of doubt; a denial of ultimate knowledge of the existence of God
- Ethnobotonist
- the study of the relationship between plants and people.
- Medical anthropologists
- Physical anthropologists who study problems of health.
- Nature worship
- (used in animism) a system of religion that worships natural forces and phenomen
- Medium of Exchange
- Some type of money that can be used in all kinds of trade
- Monotheism
- belief in a single god
- Priests
- - learn their ceremonial practices from religious studies (ministers, imams, rabbis)
- Empire
- - States that conquer and rule other tribes or states (include more than one culture)
- Lewis Henry Morgan
- Published a study called the "League of the Iroquois" his work provided much of our knowledge of how the American Indians lived before the arrival of the white man.
- Conjugal
- of or relating to marriage or to the relationship between a wife and husband
- Sororate
- required that should a man's wife die, he must marry her unmarried sister (The Levirate and Sororate insure the continuance of the family and kinship bonds established through marriage and insure that after the death of a parent, children will be cared for.
- Tetrodotoxin
- drug used in zombification
- Go - betweens
- A matchmaker
- White magic and black magic
- good and bad magic
- Law of scarcity
- when someone perceives something that they desire to be in limited quantity, the perceived value of that thing or person becomes much greater than if were widely available.
- Command economy
- A planned economy or directed economy is an economic system in which the state or government manages the economy
- First lesson in reciprocity
- In a society where food is shared of gifted a part of social life; you may not buy it with money,
- Goods
- THings HUmans use
- Margaret Mead
- Spent several years in the South Pacific studying the Polynesians of Samoa and some of the various cultures of Melanesia and New Guinea. She reported her work in "Coming of age in Samoa" and "growing up in New Guinea" which described child-rearing practices in both islands. Hers studies threw light on the process of enculturation. She also made a theory of the people of the Manus in the South Pacific and how cultural change affected them (world war 2, military base was established and disrupted the life of the Manus, the Manus wanted to adopt American styles and customs
- Datura
- The zombie's cucumber...a type of plant...(ayurvedic herb of Indian origin that works as a mydriatic (dilate the pupil) and a narcotic)
- polygamy
- having more than one spouse at a time
- State
- politically organized body up people under a single gov. (centralized authority, has army, economic surplus, produce enough good to support large army and certain specializations)
- Opportunity cost
- The value of whatever is sacrificed when a decision is made (other meaning: The potential benefit that is foregone from not following the best, financially optimal, alternative course of action.
- Matrilocal
- residence after marriage in association with the wife's mother's relatives.
- Imitative Magic
- when the magician imitates the results he wishes (the rain dance of the Hopi Indians)
- Shamans
- the people who have control of the supernatural power in a society: witch doctor, medicine man/woman
- Endogamy
- A custom or law permitting marriage only among members within the same social or religious group
- Polygyny
- having more than one wife at a time
- Ritual
- any customary observance or practice
- Conspicuous Consumption
- Wasteful display of wealth (potlatch ceremonies)
- Contagious Magic
- When people use something that has been in close contact with whatever they wish to influence (Melanesians fear having their pictures taken because their belief that the picture will give others magic power over them)
- Incest Taboo
- A basic restriction that forbids people too closely related by blood our marriage to marry each other
- Plebians
- Common people
- egalitarian
- a person who believes in the equality of all people (classless)
- Caste system
- a rigid status system in the Hindu religion