preview

Cultural Anthropology

Decent Essays

What is anthropology? Anthropology is the scientific and humanistic study of human beings. So what is cultural anthropology? Cultural anthropology is the study of human thoughts and behaviors. As soon as we are born we are taught what our cultural knowledge is; what our norms and values are, as well as cultural construction and world view. Everyday we experience and encounter phenomenons that are part of our culture; without realizing it. Before taking this class, I often thought that our advanced society was the standard to which to measure all other societies from, but after reviewing the material in this course, it is impossible to make such a comparison. Many of the people in a culture similar to the U.S. would probably find most of the cultures we have studied to be “slow” strange or undesirable. In fact, it seems that many of the societies actually prefer to live the way they do and they accept it as normal. “Normal” is a relative term, and it is difficult to establish evidence to label a culture or its characteristics as abnormal. What may seem to work here in the U.S. often would be disastrous to other cultures. Last summer I had traveled parts of Europe with my friends, and it was astonishing to see the difference between cultures. One thing that was noticed right off the bat was that the Europeans start their week on a Monday and it ends on Sunday. While in the U.S. we start our week on Sunday and it goes to Saturday. Also while here in the U.S we think of

Get Access