The word anthropology comes from two Greek words meaning “the study of human beings.” Anthropologists, the people who practice anthropology, describe humans and their cultures, from prehistoric times to today. They try to find out what the first human societies were like. They research how cultures and languages developed. Anthropologists often compare different human communities to each other. They try to determine the similarities and differences between them. By studying specific groups of people, anthropologists hope to increase the understanding of humanity as a whole. DivisionsThere are two main divisions of anthropology: physical and cultural. Within cultural anthropology are the related fields of archaeology (the study of things created by people) and linguistics (the study of language). Physical anthropologyPhysical anthropologists study the physical features of modern humans, including their shape, size, and anatomy. They find similarities and differences among people in geographic regions. They also study the remains of prehistoric humans to learn about human origins and human evolution. Cultural anthropologyCultural anthropologists examine ancient and modern human cultures. Some of the things they study are art, clothing, language, religion, customs, and social structure. When cultural anthropologists study other cultures they try not to make any judgments about them. For example, there are groups of people who pierce and stretch their earlobes with large plugs. Anthropologists would not think of the practice as strange or ugly. They would find out why the people stretched their earlobes. They might also compare the earlobe stretching to the practices of other groups. ArchaeologyArchaeology is a type of cultural anthropology. Archaeologists study and interpret the things left by prehistoric and ancient peoples. Those things, called artifacts, include stone tools, pottery, baskets, carvings and paintings, and jewelry. Using artifacts, archaeologists can imagine how people without a written history lived. (See also archaeology.) LinguisticsLinguists study how people invent, learn, and use language. Anthropologists are interested in language because people pass along their culture through language. In order to learn much about a group of people, anthropologists must learn something about the group's language. HistoryPeople have studied and written about the nature of humankind at least since the time of the ancient Greeks. Ancient scholars wrote about the social habits, customs, arts, religions, and languages of different groups of people. For many centuries most of the people who wrote about these subjects were historians and philosophers. Anthropology did not develop as a separate field of study until the 19th century. From that time anthropology was considered to be a science. At first people thought of anthropology as one vast field of study. Gradually the field split into physical anthropology and cultural anthropology. Physical anthropologyEarly physical anthropologists divided people into inferior and superior races. They ranked the races based on such characteristics as skull size, height, and skin color. However, the idea of inferior races came from the anthropologists' prejudices against other peoples, not from true science. In the 20th century physical anthropologists began using genetics to study groups of humans and their ancestors. They found that modern humans are all very similar in their genes. Anthropologists today do not use the idea of race in their studies. They think of different physical features as variations in the human species, not as signs of any race. Cultural anthropologyEarly cultural anthropologists focused on the theory of evolution. They assumed that human societies evolved from primitive to civilized. Franz Boas, a German anthropologist who worked in the United States, disagreed. In the early 20th century Boas said that no culture was superior to any other culture. Cultures simply developed in different ways. He thought anthropologists should observe people and collect facts about them. One of Boas' students, U.S. anthropologist Margaret Mead, studied groups of people in Oceania. She disproved the theory that men were always dominant over women. For example, she observed a society where men and women were considered to be equal and another society where men depended on the more dominant women. Other cultural anthropologists of the 20th century came up with their own theories. For example, some argued that basic human culture developed in a few ancient places and then spread throughout the world. A British group of anthropologists believed that all human culture came from one place—ancient Egypt. Though later anthropologists rejected this idea, they agreed that some cultural traits spread from place to place. Other anthropologists argued that all human societies develop and structure themselves in similar ways. They worked to identify the elements that are common to all cultures. Anthropologists today continue to develop new theories about human culture. |