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Anthropology

<OpenstaxParagraph>
	By the end of this section, you will be able to:
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxUl>
	<OpenstaxLi>
		Define the gaze and list important features of this concept.
	</OpenstaxLi>
	<OpenstaxLi>
		Give an example of the imperial gaze in popular photographic media.
	</OpenstaxLi>
	<OpenstaxLi>
		Describe the use of photography in colonial contexts.
	</OpenstaxLi>
	<OpenstaxLi>
		Discuss local techniques of self-representation through popular photography.
	</OpenstaxLi>
</OpenstaxUl>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	In addition to creating their own visual media, visual anthropologists conduct research on how the people they study produce visual media to represent themselves as well as cultural others.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Have you ever browsed through a copy of the magazine <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm>? In the latter half of the 20th century, many American schools and middle-class households subscribed to this magazine as an educational resource for school-age children. Founded in 1888, the magazine has developed a reputation for its colorfully illustrated coverage of science, geography, history, and world cultures. Now owned in part by the Walt Disney Company, the magazine is published in 40 languages and has a global circulation of over six million.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	What strikes many young people about <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm> is not so much the informative textual content but rather the alluring images of non-Western peoples. Cultural anthropologist Catherine <OpenstaxTerm>Lutz</OpenstaxTerm> and sociologist Jane <OpenstaxTerm>Collins</OpenstaxTerm> (1993) set out to study how <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm> depicted people in contexts outside the United States and western Europe. In their holistic approach, they conducted research into the production process at <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm>, then subjected the photographs to rigorous content analysis, and finally interviewed people about how they made sense of the images.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxFigure id="fig-00001" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/f4cf929b0dd1aacc85853e6b7a688e24a84c0215" alt="Image on the magazine cover is of a smiling young woman wearing colorful clothing and carrying a large basket of flowers and fruit on her head." mediaType="image/jpeg" width="800" height="432" />
<OpenstaxFigureText width="800">
	<strong>Figure 15.5</strong> National Geographic cover from 1961 featuring the “exotic other.” Researchers have noted that during the latter half of the twentieth century the magazine commonly portrayed non-Western people as exotic and close to nature. (credit: “NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC Magazine - October 1961 - South Vietnam Fights the Red Tide - Nam Việt Nam chiến đấu chống thủy triều đỏ” by manhhai/flickr, CC BY 2.0)
</OpenstaxFigureText>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Based on analysis of 600 <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm> photos depicting non-Western peoples from 1950 to 1986, Lutz and Collins noted that the magazine portrayed non-Western peoples as exotic, idealized, and close to nature. Very rarely did photographs in the magazine reveal any traces of the complex colonial and postcolonial histories of their subjects or their entanglements in national and global processes. Instead, <OpenstaxEm>National Geographic</OpenstaxEm> photographs tended to depict happy people immersed in purely traditional lifeways. Without historical or political context, the apparent difference between “us” (the viewer) and “them” (the people depicted in the photographs) would seem to be developmental or evolutionary. In other words, the people depicted in the images were made to seem simpler or more backward than those viewing the images. Perhaps, the images seem to suggest, “they” have not yet achieved modernity. While emphasizing a theme of common humanity, the magazine nonetheless reproduced primitivist and orientalist stereotypes about non-Western peoples while obscuring the historical and political processes that have shaped their equally complex lifeways.
</OpenstaxParagraph>

15.4 Photography, Representation, and Memory

1 What Is Anthropology?

1.1 The Study of Humanity, or "Anthropology Is Vast"

1.1.1 The Heart of Anthropology: Central Narrative and Commitments

1.1.2 Central Commitment #1: Exploring Sociocultural Diversity

1.1.3 Central Commitment #2: Understanding How Societies Hold Together

1.1.4 Central Commitment #3: Examining the Interdependence of Humans and Nature

1.2 The Four-Field Approach: Four Approaches within the Guiding Narrative

1.2.1 Biological Anthropology

1.2.2 Archaeology

1.2.3 Cultural Anthropology

1.2.4 Linguistic Anthropology

1.2.5 How the Four Fields Work Together: The Example of Race

1.3 Overcoming Ethnocentrism

1.3.1 Enculturation and Ethnocentrism

1.3.2 Primitivism and Orientalism

1.4 Western Bias in Our Assumptions about Humanity

1.4.1 Primitivism and Orientalism in Popular Culture

1.4.2 The Bias of Backwardness

1.5 Holism, Anthropology’s Distinctive Approach

1.5.1 Society as an Integrated Whole

1.5.2 Sources of Contradiction, Conflict, and Change

1.6 Cross-Cultural Comparison and Cultural Relativism

1.6.1 Relativism Is Not “Anything Goes”

1.6.2 Morality, Activism, and Cultural Relativism

1.7 Reaching for an Insider’s Point of View

1.7.1 The Challenge of Representing Others

1.7.2 Collaborative Methods of Representation

1.7.3 Working across Cultures toward Common Goals

1.7.4 Suggested Readings

2 Methods: Cultural and Archaeological

2.1 Archaeological Research Methods

2.1.1 Archaeological Techniques

2.1.2 Archaeological Dating Methods

2.2 Conservation and Naturalism

2.2.1 Early Efforts

2.2.2 Salvage Anthropology

2.2.3 Museum Collections

2.2.4 Interpretation and Voice

2.3 Ethnography and Ethnology

2.3.1 The Development of Ethnography and Ethnology

2.3.2 Perspective and Interpretation in Ethnography

2.4 Participant Observation and Interviewing

2.4.1 Participant Observation

2.4.2 Interviewing Informants

2.4.3 Ethical Considerations

2.5 Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis

2.5.1 Differences between Quantitative and Qualitative Information

2.5.2 Modeling

2.5.3 The Science of Anthropology

2.6 Collections

2.6.1 Archives

2.6.2 Three-Dimensional Collections

2.6.3 Ownership

2.6.4 Suggested Readings

3 Culture Concept Theory: Theories of Cultural Change

3.1 The Homeyness of Culture

3.2 The Winkiness of Culture

3.3 The Elements of Culture

3.3.1 Culture Is What We Make

3.3.2 Culture Is What We Do

3.3.3 Culture Is What We Think

3.4 The Aggregates of Culture

3.4.1 Symbols

3.4.2 Ritual

3.4.3 Social Structure

3.5 Modes of Cultural Analysis

3.5.1 Evolution, Adaptation, and Historical Particularism

3.5.2 Functionalism

3.5.3 Structuralism

3.5.4 Ontology

3.6 The Paradoxes of Culture

3.6.1 Paradox 1: Culture Is Continuous, but It Changes

3.6.2 Paradox 2: Culture Is Bounded but Mobile

3.6.3 Paradox 3: Culture Is Consensual but Contested

3.6.4 Paradox 4: Culture Is Shared, but It Varies

3.6.5 Suggested Readings

4 Biological Evolution and Early Human Evidence

4.1 What Is Biological Anthropology?

4.1.1 Looking to the Deep Past

4.1.2 Exploring What It Means to Be Human

4.2 What’s in a Name? The Science of Taxonomy

4.2.1 Defining the Science of Taxonomy

4.2.2 Defining a Species

4.3 It’s All in the Genes! The Foundation of Evolution

4.3.1 The Units of Life

4.3.2 Gregor Mendel and the Laws of Heredity

4.3.3 Mendelian Inheritance in Humans

4.4 Evolution in Action: Past and Present

4.4.1 Early Evolutionists and the Fixity of Species

4.4.2 Charles Darwin’s Role in Changing Views of the Natural World

4.4.3 Understanding Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection

4.5 What Is a Primate?

4.5.1 What Is a Primate?

4.5.2 Primate Behavioral Variation

4.5.3 Explaining Primate Success

4.5.4 Primate Classification and Taxonomy

4.6 Origin of and Classification of Primates

4.6.1 Understanding Concepts of Time

4.6.2 Fossils and Dating Methods