15

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School

Old Dominion University *

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Course

110P

Subject

Anthropology

Date

Apr 3, 2024

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docx

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Uploaded by ChiefChinchillaPerson1100

Ruth Benedict (“Anthropology” and the “Abnormal”) You need to know that Ruth Benedict was an anthropologist who defended cultural relativism, a theory asserting that standards of morality, normality, rationality, and beauty are created by, dependent on, and relative to each culture. Although the theory has some strengths, it has serious weaknesses. First, its strengths. Cultural Relativism is sensitive to the diversity of cultural values and practices. Cultural practices can vary with different environments and challenges. A culture that regularly has water shortages will understandably condemn the luxurious use of water (as when people wash their cars), whereas a culture where there is plenty of water will normally not condemn the luxurious use of water. Further, cultures can have different values and priorities. Amish culture values family, tradition, and farming but does not value higher education or much technology. The weaknesses of cultural relativism (covered more in the next reading by W.T. Stace “Ethical Relativism”): Cultural relativism treats moral norms like arbitrary rules of board games like Monopoly. It regards moral norms as not true or false, wise or unwise. It does not regard moral rules and standards as attempts to help people get along, to help people reduce or prevent suffering and social conflict. Consequently, cultural relativism appears to imply that even a practice that clearly violates the Golden Rule can be right in a culture (not just considered right) if it is generally accepted and institutionalized. In short, Nazi extermination of Jews, gypsies, and other minorities could be right according to cultural relativism.

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