The 1960's were a productive era for developing contemporary anthropological theories. Several theorists emerged following the original Boasian framework and developed ethno science and cognitive paradigms. Around the same time theorists interested in exploring systems of meaning and significance developed a cultural constructionist/interpretive paradigm. Developing in complete opposition was the cultural materialist paradigm that focused mainly on the causes and similarities between cultures related to their environments and socio-cultural systems. Finally, postmodernist theories developed doing away with western knowledge and the basic definitions of anthropology, as we know it.
[...] People formulate their realities this way and create norms. It is not the whether the realities that these people hold stand up to the scientific Western knowledge, “that which is thought to be real, is treated as real” (307). This idea is revisited later of in my paper when looking at the postmodernist perspective regarding Western science and knowledge. One of the main points is that there are multiple in societies and it is the people of that culture that make those “truths.” There is not a specific founder of the symbolic/inteprevitist approach, but there are major players. [...]
[...] First is that all knowledge is socially and culturally constructed and that no system of knowledge can claim truth or superior as a generator of truth because each system of knowledge is different. Second is that there is as much true of Western knowledge as there is anywhere else. Postmodernists believe that Western knowledge is not superior. The third theme is that all forms of knowledge can be hegemonic, or used to support oppression. The fourth theme states that science is subject to the same critiques as other parts of the culture and that it is also socially constructed and has a history. [...]
[...] study and is defined as sum of a given society's folk classifications, all of that society's ethno science, its particular ways of classifying material and social universe” (282). This view is entirely symbolic-meaningful and idealist in nature, meaning based on the ideas people has of phenomena's and how they explain them. Human behaviors and actions were shaped by the values and symbols of the culture. Further, cognitive anthropologists treat culture like a language which is where the emic and etic distinctions, which comes up in all the contemporary theories. [...]
[...] I chose this side because I believe that the cultural materialists are simple and science oriented. When I am studying societies that are unlike my own I would want both the insider's point of view and my own point of view as the observer. The insider can provide detailed information that in vital and often hard to obtain as an outsider, but while this information is valuable; it cannot always be fully trusted because people distort their perceptions to look better. [...]
[...] Further, cultural materialists believe that material powers are the guiding societal force in history and cannot be changed by personal will, however they argue that in order to understand the entire system thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors must be taken into account which differs largely from interprevitist theory because the interprevitists believe the human behavior is unimportant and focus only on human thoughts and ideas. This leads to the cultural materialist perspective on the emic and etic distinctions because the epistemological principle of the theory is the distinction between material entities and ideas. [...]
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