Anthropology Optional (Underlying concept in theories) by Sourabh Sir

Model Answer

Question #1. Write short note on  Culture Area- Age Area

Introduction:

The concepts of the culture-area and of the age-area method as applicable to culture have been developed by Clark Wissler in three books: The American Indian (1917); Man, and Culture (1923); The Relation of Nature to Man (1926).

The two concepts have this in common, they deal with the space distribution of cultural phenomena. They differ in that the culture area refers to culture traits as they occur aggregated in nature, whereas the age-area method is applicable to separate traits or isolable clusters of elements. They differ further in that the culture area, as such, is not concerned with time factors, whereas the age-area concept is a device for inferring time sequences from space distributions.

The emergence of the concept:

•   The major proponents of the American school of diffusion are Franz Boas, Clark Wissler, and A L Kroeber. Franz Boas is known as the founder of the American School of Diffusionism.
•   The culture area is the dominant theme in the American school of diffusion. Besides, a number of other concepts such as culture centre, culture margin, culture climax, age area, etc. are also used to explain the nature and process of diffusion.

American School of Diffusion:

•  American diffusionists divided the world into different cultural areas on the basis of geographical similarity.
• Clark Wissler emphasized the concept of culture area referring to the area in which similar culture traits or culture complexes are found. Hence the American school of diffusion is also known as a culture area school.
• Wissler also pointed out that in each culture area, there is a culture centre. It is the core of a culture area, from where all social, economic, political, and religious activities are controlled and governed.
• It is the geographical area where maximum culture traits are found and from where various culture traits diffuse to other parts.
• Cultural margin is the peripheral area of a culture where minimum culture traits are found. It also keeps borders with other cultures.
• A L Kroeber used the term culture climax as equivalent to the term culture centre. Culture climax is the portion of the culture area from where most of the cultural traits in the area are spread or concentrated.
• It also refers to that part of the area where people have the largest contact with culture.

Concept of Age Area by Clark Wissler:

• Wissler also put forward the concept ‘age area’. It is the relative age of cultural traits based on geographical distribution. It means, the most widely distributed trait around the centre would be the oldest one.
• According to Wissler, there are mainly two types of diffusions: Natural diffusion and Organised diffusion.
• Natural Diffusion: In natural diffusion, cultural traits of one cultural group are diffused to one part of a different cultural group. It is transmitted through natural agencies or by trial-and-error methods. It is a time-consuming process and develops gradually
• Organised diffusion: In this diffusion, the cultural traits are transmitted through some organized agencies like missionary activities, military invasion, etc. Organized diffusion is a very fast and quick process.

Conclusion:

All the anthropologists hitherto mentioned have been either interested in the origin and development of culture or historical explanations of cultural origin and its spread from one geographical region to another.

However, at the beginning of the 20th century, Malinowski and Radcliffe Brown put forward another approach to the analysis of culture. Malinowski put forward the theory of functionalism and Radcliffe Brown the theory of structural functionalism.

Question #2. Write short note on Thick description of Clifford Geertz

Introduction:

Geertz described the practice of thick description as a way of providing cultural context and meaning that people place on actions, words, things, etc. Thick descriptions provide enough context so that a person outside the culture can make meaning of the behavior.

Theory of Clifford Geertz in the context of Culture:

• He argued that culture is made up of the meanings people find to make sense of their lives and to guide their actions. Interpretive social science is an attempt to engage those meanings. Unlike other anthropological scholars, Geertz did not focus on so-called primitive groups.
• The thick description of Clifford Geertz is based on observation, description, interpretation, and analysis of a situation.
• According to Geertz, Culture is a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means by which men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and attitudes toward life.
• The function of culture is to impose meaning on the world and make it understandable.

Clifford Geertz’s definition of religion:

• Religion is a system of symbols that acts to establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing those conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods.
• Geertz aims to provide social science with an understanding and appreciation of thick description. While Geertz applies a thick description in the direction of anthropological study (specifically his own 'interpretive anthropology'), his theory that asserts the essentially semiotic nature of culture has many implications.

Geertz’s interpretive approach:

• Geertz saw the task of interpretive anthropology as fundamentally about getting some idea of how people conceptualize and understand their world, what they are doing, and how they are going about doing it, to get an idea of their world.

Conclusion:

One of the central points in Geertz’s thesis is that religious beliefs do not merely interpret social and psychological processes in cosmic terms, they also shape them. Religions differ in terms of the complexity with which they do it. The complexity of religion is not dependent upon the scale of evolution of society.