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Chinese, Yue / Cantonese

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Chinese, Jin

Chinese, Min Nan

Persian, Dari

Persian, Western

Polish

Pashto

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Chinese, Xiang

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Chinese, Hakka

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Anthropology

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	In the latter part of the 20th century, increasing global flows of trade, people, technologies, communication, and ideas all coalesced in a strong but uneven wave of globalization rippling across the globe. To be clear, the world has always been integrated by such flows, but advanced technologies combined with the profit drive of corporate capitalism forced a sudden acceleration of these processes roughly from the late 1970s into the 2000s.
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	As people, objects, and messages began to travel across national boundaries with increasing frequency and speed, many scholars argued that nation-states would lose their relevance as structures of economic and political order for their populations. Some scholars thought that globalization would result in the erasure of cultural and national differences, replacing global diversity with a uniform culture based on American corporate capitalism and consumerism. Would globalization result in the “McDonaldization” of the world?
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	As global researchers with a powerful toolkit of cross-cultural methods, anthropologists were uniquely poised to address this question. In short, the answer was an emphatic “No!” Rather than diminishing the importance of local structures and identities, <OpenstaxTerm>globalization</OpenstaxTerm> has transformed and enhanced them. Consider the increasing popularity of global travel. Why would anyone go anywhere if things were the same wherever you went? Many nation-states invest heavily in their distinctive cultures, monuments, and environmental features in order to attract global travelers keen to experience something new and different.
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	Consider another strong force of <OpenstaxTerm>globalization</OpenstaxTerm>, the increasing tendency for large corporate manufacturers based in the United States to relocate their factories to poorer countries where labor is cheaper and environmental regulation may be weaker. Initially, this technique undermined the power of nation-states and local communities to challenge corporate practices. Over time, however, the resulting loss of well-paid working-class jobs in the United States has generated a great deal of political controversy. This loss of working-class jobs has resulted in rising levels of inequality in American society. Some politicians call for the American government to create incentives and regulations to keep American jobs within American borders. Ironically, then, globalization may provoke citizens to enhance the power of their nation-states.
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	In poorer countries, <OpenstaxTerm>globalization</OpenstaxTerm> has resulted in increased environmental damage as globalized industries take advantage of looser regulations. Industrial pollution and the dumping of hazardous waste by global corporations pose serious threats to the health of local communities in many non-Western countries. Responding to these threats, local peoples turn to their governments to enact environmental protections. Moreover, the forces of globalization have created a strong network of transnational resistance to environmentally destructive practices with organizations such as the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution (GAHP) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).
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	In the wake of Benedict <OpenstaxTerm>Anderson</OpenstaxTerm>’s (1983) formulation of nation-states as imagined communities, many anthropologists have considered how globalization creates transnational forms of imagined community alongside the nation. Cultural anthropologist Arjun <OpenstaxTerm>Appadurai</OpenstaxTerm> (1996) argues that globalization freed popular imagination from the constraints of the nation, creating multiple realms of imagined community cross-cutting national borders. Appadurai postulates five dimensions of global flows, constructing realms of activity and imagination: ethnicity, technology, finance, media, and ideology. The global environmental movement, for instance, constitutes a transnational imagined community based on ideas of environmental sustainability. Through media and communication technologies, people all over the world join in the discussions and activities of this imagined community.
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	Appadurai has also pointed to the darker consequences of globalization for national and transnational politics. While globalization might seem to be associated with free flows and flexibility, the forces of transnationalism have also resulted in a proliferation of forms of political violence, especially violence against ethnic, racial, and religious minority groups (2006). With increasing global flows, many communities are subject to increased cultural mixing and pressures for change. With rising immigration, for instance, national communities may be forced to reformulate notions of common language, practices, and values. While some citizens of a national community may embrace a more cosmopolitan and multicultural identity, others may experience a sense of insecurity and threat to their way of life. This insecurity is particularly keen among those working-class and poor groups that suffer from the increased inequality brought about by globalization. Appadurai describes how cultural and economic insecurity can provoke majority ethnic and racial groups to acts of violence against minority groups in their national communities. Seeking an elusive and imaginary national “purity,” dominant groups seek to reassert their power over political, economic, and cultural institutions. Anti-immigrant politics in the United States and anti-American politics in some non-Western countries are both dangerous and sometimes violent responses to the common forces of globalization.
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	<OpenstaxNoteTitle> Profiles in Anthropology </OpenstaxNoteTitle> <OpenstaxH3> Laura Nader 1930- </OpenstaxH3><OpenstaxFigure id="fig-00004" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/4dd4f2364a5201064f63361ff666bf3671e7189e" alt="Two women engaged in conversation at a table set for a formal dinner." mediaType="image/jpeg" width="800" height="533" />
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		Figure 8.9 Laura Nader (right) engaged in conversation. (credit: “Moët Hennessy • Financial Times Club Dinner” by Financial Times/flickr, CC BY 2.0)
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		“What was proven in the last election is that the United States is not an electoral democracy, by which I mean the two parties’ stranglehold on power has made it impossible for other voices to be heard.” —Laura Nader (in Nkrumah 2005)
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		Personal History: Born and raised in Winsted, Connecticut, Laura Nader grew up in a family with strong commitments to community and public service. Her mother, Rose, was a politically minded schoolteacher who frequently wrote letters to the editor of the local newspaper. Her father, Nathra, owned a restaurant where local people met to talk about community and political issues. Laura’s parents challenged her and her siblings to debate political issues and develop their own opinions.
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		Area of Anthropology: Nader earned a BA in Latin American studies from Wells College (Aurora, New York) and then went on to study anthropology at Harvard, earning a PhD from Radcliffe College in 1961. Nader’s areas of interest include politics and law, in particular how the legal-political system operates as a form of social control.
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		Accomplishments in the Field: For her dissertation, Nader studied local courts in the Zapotec village of Talea in southwestern Mexico (1990). She discovered that the legal system in Talea was shaped by a strong emphasis on harmony rather than conviction and punishment. When conflicts arose, the courts brought people together face to face to engage in discussions aimed at reaching reconciliation and balanced solutions. Rather than focusing on blame and criminality, the legal process sought to restore community solidarity and consensus in the wake of the rift. Nader traced this “harmony ideology” to the context of colonial conquest by the Spanish, showing how missionaries and colonial administrators emphasized the moral value of harmony in order to dominate and pacify Indigenous peoples. She argued that local peoples in villages such as Talea have appropriated harmony ideology to their own ends, adopting methods of conflict resolution in order to prevent outside authorities from interfering in their affairs.
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		Bringing the lessons of her research back home to the American legal system, Nader argued that harmony ideology operates as a strong force against Americans seeking justice against large corporations. Though the American system is focused much more on blame and conviction, large corporations are able to evade the consequences of wrongful actions by using sophisticated legal procedures and forcing monetary settlements. Many such settlements include stipulations preventing people from publicly talking about the controversy, essentially purchasing the silence of complainants. Though governed by harmony ideology, the goal of such legal processes is not the restoration of good relations among community members but rather the forcing of capitulation and silence on complainants. Nader’s comparative work on the law in Talea and the United States is vividly portrayed in the ethnographic film <OpenstaxEm>Little Injustices</OpenstaxEm> (1981).
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		Importance of Their Work: In 1960, Nader was the first woman hired for a tenure-track anthropology position at the University of California, Berkeley. From 1984 to 2010, she taught an innovative and popular course called Controlling Processes, exploring dominant ideologies and techniques of power in complex industrialized societies such as the United States (the author of this chapter took this course at Berkeley in 1990). Nader’s own research identifies controlling processes that shape law and justice in many societies, exploring how citizens participate and challenge these hegemonic legal processes. Throughout her career, she has worked to make legal anthropology a force for justice reaching beyond the scholarly arena into public life. She has been a visiting professor in law schools at Yale, Stanford, and Harvard.
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8.4.3 Nation-States and Globalization

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