Critique with armchair anthro?
Inaccurate, ethnocentric, racist
What is functionalism?
- Developed in the early 20th century (roughly 1910s-1930s)
- Based on Malinowski’s revolutionary method of participant observation, discussed in his ethnography ‘Argonauts of the Western Pacific’
- Sees each institution in society as holistically serving a function which corresponded to an individual’s basic needs
- Developed by Emilie Durkheim who has a universalistic, cohesion based theory of social class, with emphasis on the precede of ‘solidarity’ as individuals feel a moral duty to work for the maintenance of society is
Critique of functionalism?
- too cohesion-centred
- obviously not not all social institutions support individuals, otherwise there would be no stratifies societies with poverty/homelessness/etc
What is structural functionalism?
- Developed from 1930-1960
- similar to functionalism but emphasises how social structures are quite rigid
- Developed by Radcliffe-Brown and Evans Pritchard
Critique of structural functionalism?
- does not explain social change
* doesn’t recognise individual agency
What is transactionalism?
- Developed by Fredrik Barth in the late 1950s to 1970s.
* Social organisation derives from a web of transactions made by rational and economically-focused agents
Critique of transactionalism?
- based on Eurocentric notions of economic rationality
* doesn’t explain how some non-economic practices, such as religion, is a part of our social organisation
What is 2nd wave/ Western feminism?
- Developed in the 1960s-1980s
* Sees all women as universally oppressed, encouraging the same political goal of liberation of patriarchal oppression
Critique of 2nd wave/ Western feminism?
- concerned with middle class white women’s ideas of liberation
- silenced other women’s voices
- wrongly assumes that everyone is oppressed by the same structures
What is political economy?
- developed in the 1960s and 1970s, still important today, encompasses/borrows from many theories (e.g. World systems theory, dependency theory)
- Very vast analytical approach which looks at production in societies, with less focus on distribution/exchange
- looks at the political effects of macro economics
Critique of political economy?
- neglects individual’s agency
- not based on participant observation, doesn’t grasp how people think/feel
- sees people as chess pieces, products of material and historic exchanges (e.g. Colonialism, capitalism)
What is post modernism?
- developed in the 1980s, recently diminishing importance in Anthropology
- a vast school of thought that questions meta narratives and uses reflexivity to situate the anthropologist in their work.
Critique of post modernism?
- doesn’t give enough ethnographic detail, makes anthropologists the heroes of their own ethnographies
- becomes anti-political, makes it impossible to recognise inequality/marginalisation, which is counter-productive
What is 3rd wave/ post-modern feminism?
- developed in the late 1980s - present day
* focuses on intersectionality and allows different voices to be heard
Critique of 3rd wave feminism?
- accused of losing political and transformative edge of feminism
- so culturally relativist it becomes hard to talk about large marginalised groups
What is armchair anthropology?
- Developed in the late 19th century
- First Anthropologists thought that cultures had evolved through time and Victorian England
- Aboriginal and indigenous cultures considered ‘savages’ and ‘primitive’
What is false consciousness? How has it developed?
False consciousness is a term first used by Engels, but is ingrained in much of Marx’s discussion of class and power. It assumes that the proletariat/subordinate classes form a ‘false consciousness’ to conceal or obscure the reality of their exploitation by higher classes, because otherwise they would not willingly partake in transactions and social relations that counteract their own interests.
What is symbolic power?
Pierre bourdieu introduced it, arguing that symbolic power is more important than economic power in establishing hierarchies in society.
What is resistance theory?
Neo Marxist theory developed by Scott. If the proletariat to not show resistance to their dominant class through revolution, they may do so through other, more subtle forms.
