Essay Culture & Humanity EXAM 2: ANTH 152 LCC Wai`anae Moku: Fall 2020
Culture & Humanity
EXAM 2: ANTH 152 LCC Wai`anae Moku: Fall 2020
- General Directions: Please complete the ID and essay sections at home as directed below. All answers should be typed (font 12, standard margins) and the essay should be double spaced, and between 2-5 pages (2 is likely not sufficient, and more than 5 is not appreciated; 3-4 pages is likely the appropriate length). You do not need a work cited page as long as you use only course materials. You can use other spacing for the ID section. The exam is due November 2, 2020 (upload to laulima); grace period to noon on Wednesday (Tuesday is a holiday).
- ID Section (40 points): Below you will find a list of terms from the class materials.Choose only five of the following terms to identify and explain. Do not form an essay for the ID section; just give the identification and significance in the form of a numbered list of terms. The goal is to show a wide spectrum of learning so avoid using the same cultural world or issue for every ID term. In writing answers, be sure to reference course materials (readings, powerpoint, etc.) in developing your answer. Use my answers to help orient you as you build your own answer, but in using information from course materials do not simply cut and paste answers I gave you. Demonstrate knowledge from your own synthesis of the information. If you answer using general information from internet searches you will not score well. Each of the terms were highlighted in power-point and discussion. In approximately 3-6 sentences identify and articulate the course significance of each term by giving (a) basic identification in terms of course materials (what it is/means/etc.); (b) location of the term in a particular cultural context where relevant (or analytical context for person/place); and (c) broader anthropological concepts, principles, etc. it helps illuminate, explain, etc. Select the terms according to the following rules
Chose at least one of the following Indigenous terms
o Hatuke, Babahuago, Kerekere, Riproi, Ku`e Names Project, Nagol, Sese
Choose at least one of the following Places
o Malekula island, Waya Island, Lake Lugu, Himalayan Mountains
Choose at least one concept/principle of anthropological analysis or a theorist:o Matrilineal, Polyandry, Social Structure, Ethnocentrism, Franz Boas,
Michel Foucault
The other two terms are at your discretion; they can come from either of the
above lists.
III. Essay (60 points): Imagine the following scenario.
• Context: A space alien, Tyzog, has landed in a rural Tennessee community of
the U.S. Mainland. He notes to you the following about human beings in thiscommunity. Girls and boys seem to “officially” turn into men and women only following a ritual Tyzog learns is called “high school graduation”. Tyzog notesthat young human women and men in the community always marry their high school sweethearts and both young men and women only begin to have sexual relations in the context of marriage to their high school sweethearts (of the opposite sex). The young women look forward to serving their husbands as housewives and mothers, and having their husbands take care of them, but avoidseeking professions themselves as they feel “naturally less able” then their men atproviding for their families and becoming professionals.
• Question: Tyzog then asks you, an expert anthropologist, if the gender/kinship/marriage norms of this community are universal for all human beings (all humans do it the same way)? Using knowledge you have learned about cultural anthropology, explain to the space alien whether he has or has not noted universal features of all human development of personhood and subjectivity based upon his field studies of this rural American community, or norms that are more culturally specific. To answer Tyzog you want to describe
different cultural worlds you have learned about to support orchallenge Tyzog’s understanding of human norms of personhood and subjectivity. Please explain to Tyzog as much as you can to help him better understand the development and key features of gender in the human species.
o Inwritingyouressayintroduceconceptsandissueswithspecificreferences to course materials that show how your research is based on ideas, principles, methods you learned in class.
▪ Example: “To fully understand humanity, Tyzog should learn aboutother peoples and places. In the case of the Moso in the bookLeaving Mother Lake we learned “X, Y, Z”. In the case of Thailand,we learned in the Chapter from At Home and in the Field called“Prostitutes, Menstrual Blood, Minor Wives, and Feeding the Ducks” that women “A, B, C”.
o The book on the Moso must be referenced to earn a high grade; which of the other materials you reference is otherwise at your discretion.
o It is not advisable to bring up every concept and reading we discussed. Chose a set that links a few issues you understood best and organize your essay around that set of material. You are trying to show me you understand (a) the methods and (b) key concepts/principles, issues cultural anthropologists apply to learn about culture; and (c) how particular case studies illuminated these methods and concepts/principles/issues.
o Organize the essay with an introductory paragraph with a thesis statement, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. It can read as a “letter” to Tyzog.
Anthropology 152
Week 6: Fall 2020
Overview
• Franz Boas
• Father of Anthropology
• Cultural Meaning,
Social Organization,
Social Structure
• Kinship Variation
• Kinship Project
• Summary Points
Franz Boas
• As noted in handout on Boas by Monaghan/Just
reading
• As they note, he is the “father” of American
Anthropology in late 1800s-early 1900s
• He has interesting ideas, activism, and ethical
commitments that continue to be important
today
• As founder, his studies were in another field:
psycho-physics
Franz Boas
Human Diversity and Equality
• Boas is a founding father of the ethnographic method.
• Keep in mind while fieldwork seems perhaps an obvious way to learn
from people today (live with them), For Boas, a European, to live with
Indigenous peoples who at that time were marginalized and left to
“die” in reservations this was deeply radical.
• Boas considered Indigenous cultural worlds and peoples as
equally important as Western cultures and peoples.
• This conflicted with the racist worldviews at the time in Europe
and in the US.
• Boas founded the idea that you need to understand a culture in
its own terms rather than another culture’s terms and by living
with the people one is trying to learn about.
Franz Boas: Psychophysics
• His research in psychophysics among
Inuit peoples (arctic peoples sometimes
known as Eskimo) revealed Inuit
perceived different colors of sea water
than Europeans.
• Boas, foundationally, argued that the
differences were a result of cultural
differences between the peoples, and not
racial differences between them.
• This challenged “racism” at his time.
Franz Boas
Kulterbrille
• Note Monaghan and Just introduce his idea
of “kulturbrille” (pg. 38)
• For Boas, each people engages the world around
them in terms of their “kulturbrille” (cultural
glasses). Dif ferent peoples have dif ferent
kulturbrille which today we would characterize as
different “worldviews”
• In our class, we are in a sense learning different
“kulturbrille” for understanding the meaning and
value of food, kinship, marriage, and other
dimensions of human being is relative to culture
Franz Boas: Cultural Contexts
• Cultural Contexts of human differences
• Following Boas to this day, anthropologists seek
to understand say differences in “food”, “dance”,
“marriage, etc. between peoples as an effect of
cultural differences and not racial ones given by
biological dimensions of human being (genetics).
• Much of what we continue to examine in
anthropology, and how we analyze it, is rooted in
his foundational studies and progressive
philosophy.
Cultural Meaning vs
Social Organization
• Thus far, we have focused
o n h o w t h e c u l t u r a l
meaning of various “things”
varies (animals, mountains,
bodies, etc.)
• I h a v e t r i e d t o
introduce you to how
t h e m e a n i n g a n d
v a l u e o f v a r i o u s
things varies cross-
culturally
• Social Organization
• Anthropology is also
interested in how the
social organization of
human l i fe var ies
cross-culturally
Society
Some anthropologists, separate
society from culture. These are also
conceived as different “angles” to
understand “the same complex
thing”
Society is constituted by social
structures that can be understood as
“rules and regularities that govern human social behavior, the
ways people associate with one another, and how activity is
organized”
“or “the patterned and predictable social relations of a cultural
group”
Functions of Social
Structures
The social structures of a society, in part,
maintain the “social order” of society/
culture. Of course, some may see that as a
good order and others a bad order. This
leads us to realize a politics in social
structures.
Some examples of Social Structures
include:
Marriage
Kinship: We will focus on this for now.
Gender
Economy
Political System
Kinship:
FAMILY
• Societies differ in
h o w t h e y g i v e
meaning and value
(categorize) and
organize fami ly
(kinship).
Plurality
in
Kinship
• Kinship systems differ in:
• the categories used to give
meaning and value to kinship
• How they organize families (by
emphasizing one or both sides of
a family, for example).
• Emphasizing the importance
on one side (dad or mom’s
side for example) compared
to the other.
• S o c i a l O b l i g a t i o n s t o w a r d
relatives
• Obligations that members of
one culture regard as normal
may be absent or different in
other cultures.
Broader
Significance
of Kinship
Diversity
Biology reproduces human being, but it does not
assign meaning, value, and organization to your
descendants. That is accomplished through
kinship systems
While all people live in kin
groups of some kind, the kind
one has depends upon culture.
Different Social Groups have, on some
level, different Symbolic Realities, and
principles of social organization as a
result of differences in kinship social
structure and meaning/value
Kinship does not reduce to biology, but is
entangled in culture (a symbolic order).
Broader
Significance of
Kinship Diversity
• Kinship and Subjectivity
• T h e d i f f e r e n c e s o f
kinship systems entail
d i f f e r e n c e s i n
subjectivity as well.
• Who we are depends
in part on how our
i d e n t i t y i s
constructed through
a kinship system.
• Peop le w ho have
ident i ty based in
d i f f e r e n t k i n s h i p
systems will have
d i f f e r e n t
subjectivities.
Diversity in Descent
Form of descent
How people in a given
culture trace their descent.
Bilateral
Tracing through both the
both male and female
lines.
Unilineal descent
Tracing descent on either
the mother’s or the father’s
ancestral line.
Two Kinds: Matrilineal,
Patrilineal
Cognatic
Tracing through either the
male or female line.
Unilineal
Kinship
• T h e d a r k e r
colored side is the
side emphasized
KINSHIP PROJECT
• ILLUSTATES HOW KINSHIP (FAMILY) IS
CULTURALLY CONSTRUCTED
• SHOWS HOW LANGUAGE CATEGORIES
CONSTITUTE ONE`S KINSHIP REALITY
• I L L U S T R A T E S P L U R A L I T Y O F
ORGANIZATION OF KINSHIP ON EARTH
BASIC KINSHIP SYMBOLS
MotherFather
SisterBrother
BASIC KINSHIP SYMBOLS
KINSHIP PROJECT
Eskimo/American Type
“Eskimo” Kinship terminology
BILATERAL SYSTEM
KINSHIP
PROJECT
• First draw an chart for your family in terms of the “Eskimo/
American” type of kinship system
• Instead of the way it is here do include your aunts and uncles that are
spouses like in the prior slide
• Youtube Help
• Kinship Diagram help
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-i1UF3htLKU
• How To Draw a Kinship Diagram
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCrvvrxr7Co
KINSHIP
PROJECT
• Note you draw yourself as the “box”; the first
chart above does not use the box style, but
please do use it.
• Note you should have “three generations” so
add one more compared to the one here.
• Please have “spouses” for married people
UNLIKE the one here, but like the one
above and below.
KINSHIP
PROJECT
• Like the one here and above, include a
“legend” for the different people.
Aunt/Uncle, etc. You do not have to
use the codes they give you; code as
you wish but give a “legend” for your
code.
“Eskimo” Kinship
terminology
BILATERAL
SYSTEM
• For your charts you would
then Provide the code:
• 1=Dad
• 2=Mom
• 3=Uncle
• 4=Aunt
• 5=Brother
• 6=Sister
• 7=Cousin
NEXT DRAW a
HAWAIIAN SYSTEM
FOR YOUR FAMILY.
• The one provided here
is a simpler version
than what I want, but it
gives you part of the
idea.
• Look at your project
directions and notice I
do not want English
t r an s l a t i on bu t t he
Hawaiian words.
• Follow me to the next
slide to see further
details I want.
HAWAIIAN
SYSTEM
• Lets include spouses as
“Makuahine/Makuakane”
and for your generation note
“Kane” or “Wahine” for
s p o u s e s o f “ c o u s i n s ,
yourself, or siblings”.
• In your chart, unlike the
one pictured in your
generation you want to
distinguish “kaikua’ana/
kaikana”
• I have also asked you to do
the next generation or
higher kupuna generation.
Lets look at that below.
HAWAIIAN
SYSTEM
• As a female, not in my
directions you have no
kaikuahine (that is for males)
• As a male, you have no
“kaikunane” (that is for
females)
• Whether female or male, you
separate your generation,
that is, cousins and siblings
same sex as you, as either
o lder ( k a i kua ` ana ) o r
younger (kaikaina)
NEXT DRAW a
MATRILINEAL SYSTEM
FOR YOUR FAMILY.
• Notice Father
side is not “kin”
KINSHIP
PROJECT
matrilineal
• For Matrilineal systems, you do not
have a full “code” like you do in
the American/Eskimo system. So
for this one just code like this one
does your “matrilineal kin”. You
can code in colors, numbers or
whatever.
• Note “matrilineal” includes mom
and mom’s sister’s kids, and mom
and mom’s brother, but not his kids.
• Pe o p l e “ i n ” a r e l i n ke d by
“mothers”. As a male, you are part
of your mom’s matrilineage, but
NOT the matrilineage of your own
children
For Extra-credit you can DRAW
A PATRILINEAL SYSTEM
FOR YOUR FAMILY.
• On th i s t ype ,
mother’s side is
not “kin”
KINSHIP
PROJECT
Patrilineal
• For patrilineal systems, you do
not have a full “code” like you
do in the American/Eskimo
system. So for this one just code
l i k e t h i s o n e d o e s y o u r
“patrilineal kin”. You can code in
colors, numbers or whatever.
• Note “patrilineal” includes dad
and dad’s brother’s kids, and
dad’s sister, but not her kids.
• People “in” are linked by “dads”.
As a female, you are part of your
dads patrilineage, but NOT the
parilineage of your own children
KINSHIP PROJECT
Significance
• By drawing the three charts you can begin to see that who counts as family is
relative to the cultural system; patrilineal and matrilineal systems do not for
example count the same people as “family”; they “organize” family differently
• Similarly, you can see that the meaning and value of the same people in the
chart changes meaning depending on which system one uses.
• In part the meaning/value change is based on code change, but it is also the
case the systems simply socially organize family differently.
Waya Island, Fiji
• We have a story
“An Anthropologist Behaving Badly” that discusses
aspects of kinship on an island world of Fiji
• Fiji is south and East of Hawai`i
Waya Island
Fiji
An Anthropologist Behaving Badly
Lisa Humphrey
• This is an interesting story that teaches about how value
is organized in terms of Fijian principles of kinship on
the basis of the “kerekere” system.
• Kerekere
• Roughly translates as “please”
• More broadly, kerekere is part of a system of reciprocity that
constitutes Fijian kinship organization and meaning.
An Anthropologist
Behaving Badly
Lisa Humphrey
• Humphrey loses a watch
and proceeds to retrieve it
by engaging in the kerekere
system of reciprocity.
• She presents herself as
Fijian kin and emphasizes
kerekere to get her watch
back
• S h o w s h o w k i n s h i p
organizes, articulates, in
everyday life.
• In other words, how kinship
is not just a set of codes for
class i fy ing k in but an
institution that provides
values at the center of
social life.
“Head Candy/
Gut Connection”
Lynette Hi`ilani Cruz
• This is an interesting
story in which Cruz
links genealogical
knowledge of Kānaka
Maoli kinship identity
with Hawaiian
Sovereignty movements
and struggles
Ku`e Names Project
Washington DC
• “We are them and they are us” (168)
• Shows the politics of kinship identity; by learning the names of
the ancestors of one’s family that protested, one learns a
potential political identity to embody and live to follow them in
the present
Ku`e Names Project
Pu`u Huluhulu
(Mauna A Wākea Access Road)
• “Entails “kuleana”;
responsibility to
them and their
politics.
• Thus kinship is not
only a social
structure, but
potentially a tool of
political organization
POSSIBLE
EXAM ID
TERMS
• Social Structure
• Waya Island, Fiji
• Kerekere
• Ku`e Names Project
• Bilateral
• Matrilineal
• Franz Boas
KEY EXAM
ANALYTICAL
STUDY
POINTS
• Kinship is an example of a social
structure that varies cross-culturally
though there are a limited number of
types of kinship systems of humanity.
• The meaning of kinship varies:
relatives in one system may take on
different meaning in another system
or lack meaning. For example, the
people who are kin in matrilineal
systems are not often kin in
patrilineal systems.
• The social organization of kinship
varies: kinship may be organized, for
example bilaterally or in unilineal
terms. Being organized around
matrilineal kin will be different than
being organized around bilateral kin.
• Biology reproduces human being, but it
does not assign meaning, value, and
organization to your descendants. That is
accomplished through kinship systems.
Different systems constitute different
“Kulturbrille” as Boas would say for
framing the world people live and
interpret.
KEY EXAM
STUDY POINTS
• Kinship does not reduce to
biology, but is entangled in
culture (a symbolic order)
• W hi le universal l y a l l
people live in kin groups
of some kind, the kind
one has depends upon
culture.
• Different Social Groups
have, on some level ,
different Realities, and
p r i n c i p l e s o f s o c i a l
organization as a result
of differences in kinship
structure
• Kinship diversity leads to
diversity in social life,
subjectivity, and identity.
KEY EXAM
STUDY POINTS
• Kinship and Subjectivity
• The differences of kinship
systems entail differences
in subjectivity as well.
Who we are depends in
part on how our identity is
constructed through a
kinship system.
• People who have identity
based in different kinship
systems will have different
subjectivities.
• Kinship is part of the
cultural construction of
“the self”
KEY EXAM
ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY POINTS
• In the ethnographic story of Fiji we see how kinship
practices ground broader social relationships and values
that constitute meaning in the cultural worlds of Fiji.
• Kinship then is not just about cultural categories but
broader practices that constitute identity and social
organization in a cultural world that can be engaged
to address everyday life problems like losing a watch.
KEY EXAM
ETHNOGAPHIC STUDY POINTS
• The ethnographic story of Hawaiian
Kinship by Cruz shows how kinship
social structure that can take on
political significance.
• Kānaka Maoli genealogical identity is used to
deform American National Identity
• Thus, it is not only a structure for social
organization but political organization too.
GENDER & CULTURE
Anthropology 2000: Culture & Humanity
Week 8: Fall 2020
1
Overview
Ethnology
Gender and Culture Basics
Gender Case Studies
Culture Theory:
Power Vs. Semiotic Approaches
Key Terms and Points
ETHNOLOGY vs ethnography
Ethnography
Description of a particular cultural world
Course Materials:
Rapa Nui, Vanuatu, Japan, etc.
Ethnology
Comparative Analysis of Different Cultures
Implications of Comparisons
Human realities as culturally constructed when you disclose variation. Food is an easy context to think about these issues.
Gender & Culture
We are engaging ethological analysis of gender; that is, cross cultural analysis of masculinity, femininity, transgender, etc.
First, what is the difference between Sex and Gender for social science basically?
Sex as biological
While there is some variation that complicates the classifications, generally there are biological markers that classify a person as male or female at birth:
Genetic Identity
XX, XY
Does not change with a “sex change/Gender Reassignment” operation
Reproductive Biology
Biology for Giving Birth
Uterus, etc.
Does not change with a “sex change/Gender Reassignment” operation
Biology for Contributing to Pregnancy
Sperm, etc.
Does not change with a “sex change/Gender Reassignment” operation
While these distinctions can be and are challenged, they remain foundational to introduce the anthropology of gender
5
Gender
Gender is constituted by the LEARNED knowledge, behaviors, values, and social roles that define different genders of a society
Masculinity
Femininity
Transgender
Queer Gender
“Other 3rd Genders”
6
Thus while one may be biologically male at birth, one learns one’s own cultural ways of being “masculine”, or learns ways of alternative genders (feminine, transgender, etc.)
Stereotypically, for example, male babies may start to wear “blue” while female babies wear “pink” clothes. One’s parents, in this case, are constructing our gender by selecting the clothes that masculinize or feminize us.
Gender
7
Two Kinds of Evidence showing gender is culturally constructed
1. Historical
2. Cross-cultural Variation
If gender were biologically determined, then it would NOT Change historically or cross-culturally, but be expressed UNIVERSALLY in the same way worldwide
All masculinity, femininity, third and additional genders would be the same everywhere at all times like all humans have a heart, lungs, etc. (minus complications of birth).
While there are some regularities, there is considerable diversity in human gender norms.
Gender
As Culturally Constructed
8
Gender & Culture
What are ways that gender is distinguished?
Or Constructed?
Think yourself before moving on
Gender & Culture
Some ways masculinity, femininity, and transgenders are constructed variably in different cultures:
Behavior
Clothing
Language
Personal Appearance
Social Roles
Marital, kinship, everyday life
Social opportunities/inequalities
Sexuality
Jobs
In the 1950s USA, this was marked by language categories
Nurses, Stewardess, Waitress, etc.—women
Doctors, Pilots, Chefs—Men
Rapa Nui Masculinity
Let me give you some Rapa Nui examples.
Being a Rapa Nui Man
Involves learning Carving Knowledge & Practice
It is part of Rapa Nui masculinity to carve;
Guys sit around and talk carving like men in the US culture sit around and talk sports stereotypically.
in the U.S. masculinity is not defined in these terms.
Below is my culture teacher Ioni Tuki who was introduced to you in my language story with Piru (his aunt).
Beside me is Ioni’s grand daughter assisting me.
11
Rapa Nui Masculinity
While living in Rapa Nui I learned to be a “man” by developing knowledge of Carving
12
RAPA NUI Gender
Being a Rapa Nui Man
Part of Rapa Nui masculinity involves learning to know how to fish;
Knowledge of fishing life is “normal” for defining masculinity in Rapa Nui.
Women occasionally fish, but not “normally”.
Here Ioni is fishing with his son.
RAPA NUI Gender
Rapa Nui women instead learn how to collect shell fish
Part of the “local knowledge” of Rapa Nui girls and women is to know how to go to the shore and gather shell fish
Pictured here is my teacher Piru who is on the cover of the At Home and in the Field Book
RAPA NUI Gender
Funny story:
One day, I went with the guys above fishing
There were two poles and three of us.
I decided to collect shell fish to make myself useful.
The guys in the above photo (father/son) started to tease me and call me a “woman” because I was doing “women’s” work and not being a REAL MAN!
RAPA NUI Gender
Hatuke
You are looking at the inside of a Sea Urchin that I collected with the women.
Generally, men do not collect shellfish;
it is the job of women to get shellfish.
Gendered Division of Labor
If you eat Hatuke in Rapa Nui, then you probably acquired it through the work of women while fish you get from the work of men
Gender and Ceremony/Ritual
Often masculinity, femininity, and additional genders are produced, in part, through coming of age rituals/ceremonies or specific cultural practices
Two cases studies to consider
Vanuatu and Nagol
Moso and the Skirt Ceremony.
VANUATU Masculinity
Take a look at the following quick youtube
Land Divers | National Geographic
NAGOL: Land Diving
A Traditional custom (Kastom) of a the southern part of Pentacost Island, Vanuatu
NAGOL, Vanuatu
Gender Symbolism
Nagol is a masculinity ritual
Traditionally a ritual that was part of becoming
A warrior
A sexually attractive man
Growing up, I sometimes see my playing sports like football as similarly constructing my masculinity—displaying my “tuffness” as a young man
Moso Cultural world
The collection of Chapters assigned on the Moso come from the book on the right by Namu and Mathieu.
Yang Erche Namu
Is a Moso woman who left the Moso world to become a famous international singer of China
The book is a story of Namu’s life
Christine Mathieu
Is an anthropologist of the Moso people
Moso people
Moso people
Live primarily around Lake Lugo in the Yunnan province of China
The Moso number about 30,000 and are one of 56 recognized ethnic groups of China
Naxi (pronounced Na-shi) peoples number about 300,000 and are the predominant ethnic group of Yunnan province.
Though sometimes called Naxi, the Moso distinguish themselves from the Naxi
Next slide provides more “mapping” of their world
Lake Lugo
YunnAn province, China
Moso History
There are no definitive histories of the ancient origins of Moso though they are known to have existed over a thousand years around Lake Lugo
Mathieu notes that there is an ancient “country of Women” referenced in Chinese history that had female rulers and ministers and a matrilineal family structure.
She wonders if some of them founded Moso society as their world was attacked in the 9th century and ceased to exist in Chinese history.
Moso Cultural WOrld
While Moso communities vary,
“All Moso speak and understand the same language, worship common gods, eat the same foods, sing the same songs, and wear similar traditional dress, and all Moso, even the patrilineal people of Labei share the belief that the true Moso family, that essential, founding unit of society, is the extended maternal household” (LML, pg. 274)
Mother Lake
Lake Lugu, also called “Xienami” or Mother Lake by the Moso
The lake is at about 10,000 feet.
THe higher mountain pictured is called Gamu and is known as the home of the Moso Goddess
Gamu Mountain
Home of Segge Gamu Goddess
Daba Reilgion
The Indigenous religion of Moso is called Daba
Segge Gamu, the Goddess of Gamu Mountain is a center of the worldview.
Segge Gamu
According to Namu,
Segge Gamu means “White Lioness”
Segge Gamu is a Mountain Goddess
“Gamu is not only a lioness,
she is also a woman and the mother of the Moso people” (LML, pg. 101).
Segge Gamu
According to Namu,
Segge Gamu is “very beautiful and has many lovers, as well as a special companion whose name is Azhapula, who is the mountain god of Qiansuo”
Namu tells stories of Segge Gamu that link her spiritual encounters to landscapes (LML, pages 101-102).
Today, Moso conduct festivals in her honor and sing songs that express gratitude for her protection, and care in providing food and resources for Moso life (LML, pages 102-103)
Moso Social Structure
“Seen from the Moso perspective…free visiting relationships strengthen and support the stability of the family. Because sexual relationships are assumed to be limited in time, because they take place outside working hours, and because they do not engage partners economically, love affairs don’t intrude on the family’s economic life or compete with the brother-sister and mother-children bonds that are at the affective core of the family” (LML, 276).
Matrilineal Society
“the ideal family is a large group of people, all related through the women of the house-grandmothers, maternal great-uncles, mothers, sisters, maternal undes, daughters, sons, grandchildren, nephews, and nieces. At the core of this family, there may be no husband, no wife, and no father, but, instead, brothers, sisters, mothers, and maternal uncles…
Ideally,-Moso families should never divide, wealth should be held communally and shared equally for the benefit of all family members, and there should be no need for inheritance rules because property may simply pass on, down the generations, as children succeed their mothers. and uncles in the ancestral home (LML, p. 274-275).
BabaHuago
While the Moso uphold this ideal of an indivisible family, however, they also keep sexual relations strictly out of the family-a rule of conduct that finds its most concrete expression in the fact that in a Moso house, only women have their own bedrooms, evocatively called babahuago, or “flower rooms.” Old people and children under thirteen sleep in the main room, near the fireplace or in wooden alcove beds alongside the walls. Adult men are expected to sleep at their lovers’, or if they don’t have lovers, in one of the outhouses or guest rooms if the family hasthose
Moso Femininity
Girls become women through completing a Skirt Ceremony.
Book: Leaving Mother Lake “My Skirt Ceremony” (on Laulima)
Watch “Free Love | National Geographic” on youtube
You will see the skirt ceremony toward the end though without some features described in the book (nudity).
Moso
Femininity
Book: Leaving Mother Lake “My Skirt Ceremony”
Please read details of the ceremony in the book
This is a great example of showing how “femininity” is produced through the ceremonial practice of the skirt ceremony rather than “naturally” given by biology.
Moso girls are born of course with the biological properties of a female; but “becoming a woman” or “womanhood” is culturally constructed by the ceremony.
BabaHuago
After completing the Skirt Ceremony, young women form their room into a babahuago:
“While the Moso uphold this ideal of an indivisible family, however, they also keep sexual relations strictly out of the family-a rule of conduct that finds its most concrete expression in the fact that in a Moso house, only women have their own bedrooms, evocatively called babahuago, or “flower rooms.” Old people and children under thirteen sleep in the main room, near the fireplace or in wooden alcove beds alongside the walls. Adult men are expected to sleep at their lovers’, or if they don’t have lovers, in one of the outhouses or guest rooms if the family has those” (LML,
Sese
“Because the Moso arrange sexual relations as men’s visits to their lovers’ houses, the custom is sometimes call visiting marriage, or also walking marriage. The latter, which is the term preferred by Chinese anthropologists, is derived from the Moso’s own terminology; who refer to sexual relationships as sese, meaning “walking.” By any stretch of the imagination, however, sese are not marriages. Sese are of two types – they are entirely private and usually short-lived, or they are more stable and publicly acknowledged, but all sese are of the visiting kind, and none involves the exchange of vows, property; the care of children, or expectations of fidelity” (LML, 275-276) .
“Visiting relationships, they say, keep relations between men and women pure and joyful, and people who live in large maternal houses do not fight like married people do” (LML, 280)
Gender Changes Historically Within a Cultural World
U.S. Femininity
What is normative Femininity has changed radically since the 1960s.
Changed because of the International Women’s Movement—POLITICAL Activism of Women throughout the world.
Thailand Case Study
Shows femininity changing as women challenge some of their subordinate status to men.
For example they are changing their perspectives on men having extra-marital relations; becoming less tolerant of husband promiscuity and the double standard for women (to be faithful despite male promiscuity)
Prostitutes, Menstrual Blood, Minor Wives and Feeding the Ducks
LeeRay Costa
Costa’s Chapter discusses three genders in Thailand while noting others:
Femininity, Transgendered, Masculinity
She describes the following features of Femininity
Riproi
Proper Women are “riproi” (neat, orderly, quiet)
They are Homemakers, Caregivers
Have Sex within Monogamous relation with Husband
Sophenee
They consciously distinguish themselves from Prostitutes (sophenee, garee)
Prostitutes have Sex outside marriage while riproi women do not.
Prostitutes, Menstrual Blood, Minor Wives and Feeding the Ducks
Costa characterizes some features of Thai masculinity as follows:
Men work outside the home
Have to avoid contact with dangerous “menstrual blood of women”
Women must keep undergarments away from men
Women kept away from many Buddhist temples due to “defiling” blood.
Mia Noi
Sex outside of Marriage is okay with “mia noi” unless excessive; wives are supposed to tolerate it.
It shows the virility of men and is positively valued within “reason”.
Prostitutes, Menstrual Blood, Minor Wives and Feeding the Ducks
Thai Masculinity
Feeding the Ducks
Now Thai women threaten overly promiscuous men that they may feed the ducks if they are too promiscuous
This means cutting off a man’s penis and feeding it to the ducks
Costa notes similarities to the Lorena Bobbitt story of the US a few decades ago (pictured)
Prostitutes, Menstrual Blood, Minor Wives and Feeding the Ducks
Thus, Thai gender norms are entangled in power relations between men and women (as well as other Thai genders)
Like Western women, Thai women are
Beginning to contest the norms that create different standards for men and women
Beginning to work outside their home and pursue more equitable relations with men.
The Politics of Normality
and Gender
Often many of us aspire to normality
If one is not normal in gender or other social practices one risks becoming ridiculed, pathologized, marginalized, etc.
Normality in gender or any social practice however should ultimately be studied POLITICALLY
Any given norm works often Against alternatives
In noting the “normal” by no means then does anthropology aim to “validate” the norm; in fact by nothing it as “normative” we aim to expose its contingency in culture that can be contested, revised, eliminated, etc.
Gender and the Politics of Norms
IN our Thai case study it is clear Costa is providing ethnography that contests the norms of Thai culture
Gender & Power
While all issues of culture are entangled in power relations and struggles, gender issues are particularly important of late to study entanglements of power as some genders are subordinated to others or in perpetual struggle for legitimacy in relation to others.
To address these issues of power I want to engage other conceptions and theory of culture.
44
Culture Theory
Semiotic Approaches
To some extent, in learning about how different cultural domains vary in meaning and value worldwide, we have been approaching culture in terms of semiotics (roughly a fancy word for meaning and value)
Power Approaches
I want to now begin to introduce more power-based approaches in light of our Thai Case
Culture & Power
Michel Foucault
In the Monaghan and Just text, the philosopher Michel Foucault (left) is introduced to discuss the relation of power to culture (on his right by the way is another philosopher—Jean Paul Sartre)
Foucault is famous for many philosophical ideas and has influenced anthropology and social sciences in many ways.
Culture & Power
While Foucault would not deny culture gives meaning and value to human being, he would complicate this semiotic view of culture by highlighting how any cultural formation of meaning and value works against alternative formations of meaning and value that could alternatively be present but are absent because of the history of power articulating in a social formation.
Culture & Power
Foucault’s books analyze how Cultural Knowledge formations (local or global) reflect a history of power relations and struggles.
For Foucault, the history of power underlying cultural formations is not only repressive (subjugates alternatives), but productive
it creates and legitimates particular kinds of societies and social identities
Those legitimated are validated in ways that marginalize alternatives.
Culture & Power
Consider the 1950s American feminine identity centered in being a “HOUSEWIFE”.
This gender norm produced femininity in ways that subjugated alternative roles for women.
Instead of producing women as equal to men in the public world, it confined their role to the home.
Feminists in this period, notably in the book The Feminine Mystique, challenged this gender role… what Foucault would call a “subject position”.
KEY EXAM
ANALYTICAL STUDY POINTS
Gender norms, are not given by one’s biological sex determined at birth; one learns them.
They are culturally constructed in the sense that the social roles, values, behaviors, knowledge, etc. that constitute masculinity/femininity/3rd genders are learned as a member of a social group by enculturation with the cultural categories, values, social institutions, etc. of that group.
The practices that constitute masculinity and femininity and 3rd genders are relative to culture on some level, and NOT UNIVERSAL. Nagol constitutes masculinity in Vanuatu but not in Hawaii.
This can be recognized by noting Gender norms change historically within cultural groups.
And noting that what is normative in one culture, may not be in another (just like food)
KEY EXAM
ANALYTICAL STUDY POINTS
Gender norms, and any norms, are importantly questioned to create alternative expression of gender that can be a source of liberation, social change, empowerment, etc. important for social equality, progress, justice, etc.
We begin cultural analysis, by first developing tools for understanding how meaning and value (of things, relations, people, etc. ) is culturally constructed. A second step involves seeing how that cultural meaning is political and thus contestable. By exposing the politics of cultural norms, alternatives can be realized that enable social changes, hopefully, progressive in form and substance. Also exposing the politics of cultural norms reveals the political history behind their emergence which “de-naturalizes” their necessity.
Possible ID TERms
Hatuke
Nagol
Sese
Babahuago
Riproi
Mia Noi
Segge Gamu
Hatuke
Exam Example
Hatuke is the Rapa Nui name for what we call “sea urchin” in the USA. While enjoyed as food by all on Rapa Nui generally, it is a food collected traditionally by women. Eating Hatuke in Rapa Nui depends upon the work of women. Eating fish in Rapa Nui, instead, depends on the work of men. There is a relatively strong gender division of labor for Rapa Nui and it is reflected in the food one eats. There is not only “culture” in food, but gender is IN food too.
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Marriage & Culture
Culture & Humanity
Anthropology 152: LCCw
Week 9: Fall 2020
1
Overview
Methodology & Theory
Cultural Relativism Vs. Ethnocentrism
Ethnology and Marriage
Case Studies
Moso
India
Vanuatu
Key terms and Analytical Points
Marriage as Social Structure
Marriage and Kinship are social structures that organize what people value, think about, and do in their everyday lives
As a people have different social structures and associated categorical systems linked to those structures they will interpret, value, think about, and do different things in their world compared to another and generally experience their reality in terms of a different WORLDVIEW
Marriage & Culture
ETHNOLOGICAL ISSUES
Anthropologists recognize any particular marriage system, like a specific kinship system or eating practice as a “cultural construct” rather than determined by biology or some other natural force because there is diversity in the types of marriage systems human beings have.
“Monogamous (heterosexual) marriage” is not Universal because:
Cultural worlds exist without Marriage: Moso
Different Forms of Marriage in different cultural worlds
Monogamy – one spouse.
Polygamy – plural spouses.
Polygyny – one man with multiple wives
Polyandry – one woman with multiple husbands
Group Marriage – several men and women married simultaneously to one another.
And today, in response to LGBTQ activism, there is marriage equality in some counties that gives citizens rights to marry in “same’ sex relationships
4
Marriage
Marriage is Not in the genes, but a social structure that one learns to desire to participate within as one is enculturated into a world where the institution exists and is valued
Culture is “IN” the type of marriage you are used to and normalize.
5
Marriage
Cultural Context
To understand its significance in a society it is important to analyze the way it functions to support other institutions, values, and social needs in a cultural context.
In other words, how it is “integrated” into a broader cultural context
Different forms of marriage or lack of marriage are functional in societies that respond to particular ecological conditions; we will see this in the case of Polyandry below.
6
Moso, China
In the book Leaving Mother Lake
The afterword provides some analytical points and defines the term “sese” (visit relationship) that is useful to know for the broader issues of marriage, kinship, and gender.
It is valuable to tie your knowledge of “worldview” from the first part of our class to the chapter on the “Mountain Goddess” (Segge Gamu).
The films sometimes “sese” is tranlated as “Walking Marriage”. The book Mother Lake prefer to interpret sese as a “visiting relationship” not constituting “marriage”. I tend to see sese not as a form of marriage but a kind of relationship. It is certainly up to you to decide which interpretation you agree with more or if you have a different interpretation that is fine too.
Moso
Moso realities
Are constructed and hence experienced differently than standard US cultural realities because, for example, they are socially structured by matrilineal kinship and do not interpret the world in terms of categories like husbands and fathers like in the US and do not structure their families around fathers and husbands.
Cultural Relativism & Moso
Cultural Relativism can be understood as a contextual method for interpreting the meaning and value of a cultural practice in terms of “local” cultural terms.
Exercising Methodological cultural relativism involves the interpretation of a cultural practice in terms of the broader set of values, institutions, beliefs, etc. inside the cultural world studied.
Sese relations (Moso system of visits) thus would be studied in terms of broader Moso practices like the skirt ceremony, matrilineal kinship, and worldview belief in the mountain Goddess Segge Gamu.
Ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism, in contrast to cultural relativism, analyzes all cultures in terms of one’s own culture
An ethnocentric analysis of Moso would critique Moso in various ways using the standards of, for example, US culture that emphasizes monogamous marriage.
Anthropologists strive to avoid ethnocentrism and study and learn from a cultural world on its own terms; that is relative to its own cultural context.
Polyandry
Polyandry is a form of polygamous marriage in which a woman has multiple husbands
It is less common than Polygyny (multiple wives, one husband)
Himalayan Mountains
Polyandry is principally found in North India, Nepal, Tibet, in the Himalayan Mountain regions, as well as in Sri Lanka .
Polyandry
View Video on Polyandry
Multiple Husbands National Geographic
Fraternal Polyandry
Tibet/North India Himalayan Region
Woman marries Brothers
An adaptive form of marriage to a mountain region where land is scarce and divided through patrilineage.
By marrying one woman, brothers do not divide land.
This keeps population lower too; polyandry is a kind of “birth control” method.
Fraternal Polyandry
North India, Himalayan Region
Ethnocentric Analysis
Ethnocentric analysis could, among other things, judge it immoral in terms of Western monogamy norms
Methodological Cultural Relativism.
Cultural relativist analysis would analyze the custom in terms of the broader social context of North India, Himalayan worlds. Investigate how it is valuable in the context of patrilineal land rules and resource scarcity. From this vantage, it appears highly adaptive and smart.
US Polyamory
While officially, polyandry is illegal in the US; increasingly, people are engaging in “polyamory” (coupling with multiple partners and or having open relationships).
Check following youtube (look for others as desired)
Polyamory: 1 Mom, 2 Dads and a Baby
Sorry, Wrong Number, From At Home and in the field
Ashley Vaughn
Malekula Island, Vanuatu
A story of how gender, marriage, and kinship is changing amidst the globalization of Vanuatu
Kinship System is Patrilineal
Marriage Traditionally is Arranged
Gender Roles strongly separate male and female life
Vanuatu
Independence in 1980
Previously under colonial rule by both France and Great Britain in the so-called “Condominium” system.
Island Geography
Approx. 80 islands, 60 inhabited
Language
Over 100 Indigenous Languages, English, French
Melanesian Pidgin is the lingua franca
Population
Approximately 200,000
Global Resources
Copra, Fish, Timber, Coffee, Coconuts, Beef
Patrilineal Descent
Vanuatu people in story are patrilineal.
People trace their primary kinship connections to the ancestors and living relatives of their fathers.
Sorry, Wrong Number
Ashley Vaughn
The story takes place in Malekula island; on the left upper side of this map (thus North Eastern Vanuatu)
Story is about Cultural Changes associated with Mobile Phone Technologies
Arranged Marriage system is undermined as couples meet outside of the family systems
Sorry, Wrong Number
Ashley Vaughn
Mobile Phone Technologies
Increases Participation in Cash Economy—need cash to buy minutes on the phone
This moves folks away from “kastom” practices of subsistence economy
Sorry, Wrong Number
Ashley Vaughn
Mobile Phone Technologies
Gender Norms Changing
Relations between males and females are increased with the technology;
traditionally, males and females have separate everyday lives given a strongly gendered division of labor
Technology creates a new “place” for communication and is altering the place of marriage relationships
Sorry, Wrong Number
Ashley Vaughn
While Vanuatu is unique, it is likely many cultures of the world will be impacted by the new technology.
It appears sexual relations and marriage is increasingly impacted by digitalization in the US
Vanuatu is just one example of global changes in relations resulting from the technology
Sorry, Wrong Number
Ashley Vaughn
Applying Methodological Cultural Relativism
From a global perspective, perhaps the introduction of the technology seems positive—enables Vanuatu people to join broader global system of technology
From a local perspective, particularly Vanuatu elders, the technology is likely seen as destructive of cultural traditions that could destabilize aspects of Vanuatu society.
In other words, the technology is potentially undermining “LOCAL KNOWLEDGE” of how to marry youth in a way that reproduces their cultural world.
Digital Marriage
In Cultural Context
Like any aspect of a cultural world, marriage can change as technology of the world changes.
Relationships world-wide are changing with the new digital technologies of cell-phones and computer dating apps
Vanuatu is a good case to see how an island world with very traditional, arranged marriages is changing with new technology.
25
Network Society
The rise of digital technology in organizing relationships that used to be achieved through organic, face-to-face communications is associated with the rise of a digital “Network Society” increasingly replacing the organic “KINSHIP” based society.
Example:
Children/youth/adults not able to or disinterested in a sit down, unplugged, dinner. Kinship (family) gathering, if attended, is complicated as everyone or most disconnect from the gathering and connect to their devices.
KEY EXAM
ANALYTICAL STUDY POINTS
Marriage is a social institution that has functional significance within a broader set of cultural values, knowledge, institutions, etc.
Anthropologists analyze differences in cultural norms in terms of methodological cultural relativism rather than ethnocentrism
This involves studying differences in terms of cultural context rather than some standard of norms outside of the cultural world investigated.
Marriage is not universal; has variable forms; and is a cultural practice that must be learned.
Cases like Moso, and Fraternal Polyandry in Himalayans show that different kinds of relationships and forms of marriage are functional in different cultural worlds.
Cases like Vanuatu show marriage and sexuality is changing in light of new digital technologies
Network societies organized by digital technology are replacing kinship based societies organized by organic social relations
KEY EXAM
ANALYTICAL STUDY POINTS
ETHNOLOGICAL ISSUES
Anthropological Implications
By disclosing variation, it entails that our own systems or any others, are a result of a cultural context and not based in “nature”. Culture is “IN” our marriage system and our marriage system articulates in a broader cultural context that establishes its significance and function.
Since, for example, we see the Moso functioning without “husbands and fathers” both gender roles are not essential but “cultural constructs”
While biology necessitates a role of males in reproduction, there is no necessity for husbands and fathers and thus it is NOT NATURAL to want them; only cultural.
28
POSSIBLE
EXAM ID TERMS
Sese
Polyandry
Malekula Island
Network Society
Himalayan Mountains
Ethnocentrism
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