1.4 Western Bias in Our Assumptions about Humanity

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Define and recognize cultural bias.
• Analyze forms of cultural bias in our own interactions and institutions.
• Describe how the four fields of anthropology can work together to expose and overturn the misconceptions of cultural bias.

Euro-American ethnocentrism is everywhere in American culture—in our movies, advertising, museums, amusement parks, and news media. Though the styles have shifted somewhat in the past century, both primitivism and orientalism still persist as two discernible styles of bias.