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1.6: End of Chapter Review

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    158715

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    Test Your Knowledge

    1. What are some key approaches to anthropological research?

    2. How has the discipline of anthropology changed over time?

    3. What are some similarities and differences between the subdisciplines? How does the “fifth subdiscipline” of applied anthropology fit within the larger discipline of anthropology?

    4. What are some subfields of biological anthropology and what do those anthropologists study?

    5. What is science? What is the scientific method? How does science compare to other ways of knowing?

    GLOSSARY

    Bipedal: Habitually using only two legs to walk.

    Cultural relativism: The idea that we should seek to understand another person’s beliefs and behaviors from the perspective of their culture rather than our own.

    Empirical evidence: Information or data that is collected through a documented process of observation and experimentation.

    Ethnocentrism: The tendency to view one’s own culture as most important, correct, and as a stick by which to measure all other cultures.

    Historical archaeologists: Archaeologists who excavate and analyze material remains to supplement a society’s written records.

    Holism: The idea that the parts of a system interconnect and interact to make up the whole.

    Hominins: Species that are regarded as human, directly ancestral to humans, or very closely related to humans.

    Human variation: The range of forms of any human characteristic, such as body shape or skin color.

    Human adaptation: The ways in which human bodies, people, or cultures change, often in ways better suited to the environment or social context.

    Hypothesis: A tentative explanation of observed phenomena that relies on empirical evidence, is testable, and is able to be refuted.

    Knowledge system: A unified way of knowing that is shared by a group of people and is used to explain and predict phenomena.

    Participant observation: A research method common in cultural anthropology that involves living with, observing, and participating in the same activities as the people one studies.

    Prehistoric archaeologists: Archaeologists who survey, excavate, and analyze material remains to study civilizations that lacked written records.

    Religious belief: A firmly held opinion or conviction typically based on spiritual apprehension rather that does not require testing or validation but can rely on observation and experience.

    Sapir-Whorf hypothesis: The principle that the language you speak allows you to think about some things and not other things. This is also known as the linguistic relativity hypothesis.

    Scholarly peer review: The process where an author’s work must pass the scrutiny of other experts in the field before being published in a journal or book.

    Scientific law: A prediction about what will happen when a specific set of conditions exist; typically mathematical.

    Scientific theory: A plausible explanation of a wide range of observed phenomena in the natural world that relies on empirical evidence and which is testable and falsifiable.

    Scientific understanding: Knowledge accumulated by systematic scientific study, supported by rigorous testing, and organized by general principles.

    FOR FURTHER EXPLORATION

    American Anthropological Association website: https://www.americananthro.org/

    Partners in Health: https://www.pih.org/

    Understanding Science. 2018. University of California Museum of Paleontology. 3 January. www.understandingscience.org.

    Anticole, Matt. What’s the difference between a scientific law and theory? TedEd Lesson. https://ed.ted.com/lessons/what-s-the-difference-between-a-scientific-law-and-theory-matt-anticole#watc

    This page titled 1.6: End of Chapter Review is shared under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Beth Shook, Katie Nelson, Kelsie Aguilera, & Lara Braff, Eds. (Society for Anthropology in Community Colleges) via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform; a detailed edit history is available upon request.