Chapter 2 Flashcards
Types of Research
- Ethnography
2. Excavation
Ethnography
Detailed description and analysis of a society or culture
Participant Observation
Taking part in the important events of societies and asking careful questions of the people.
Fieldwork
Firsthand research experience
Informants
Knowledgeable people willing to work with the anthropologist.
Within-Culture Comparisons
Testing a theory within one society by comparing individuals, families, households, communities, or districts
Regional Controlled Comparisons
The comparison of ethnographic information obtained from societies found in a particular region—societies that presumably have similar histories and occupy similar environments
Cross-Cultural Research
Worldwide comparisons
Example: Whiting’s work on the adaptive value of a long postpartum sex taboo.
Ethnohistory
Studies based on descriptive materials about a single society at more than one point in time.
Explains variations in cultural patterns
Excavation
The discovery and processing of an archaeological site
Excavation has 2 goals:
- to find every scrap of evidence (or a statistically representative sample) about the past that a given site holds
- to record the horizontal and vertical location of that evidence with precision.
Artifact
Anything made or modified by humans.
Lithic
Technical name for tools made of stone.
Only kind of artifact available for 99% of human history
Ceramics
Pots and other items made form baked clay.
Fossils
Hardened Remains or impressions of plants and animals that lived in the past.
Conditions must be favorable and specific for preservation.
Only 3% of species that ever lived have been found.
Features
Artifacts of human manufacture that cannot be removed from an archaeological site.
Ex. hearths, pits, buildings, living floors.
How are Sites Created?
Sites are created when remnants of human activity are covered or buried by some natural process
Taphonomy
The study of the processes of site disturbance and destruction.
How are sites found?
- Pedestrian Survey.
2. Remote Sensing.
Pedestrian Survey (walkover)
Walking around and looking for sites.
Detecting anomalies in the soil.
Remote Sensing
allow archaeologists to find deposits from a remote location
Stratigraphy
The study of how different rock or soil formations are laid down in successive layers or strata
Conservation
The process of treating artifacts, ecofacts, and in some cases even features, to stop decay and, if possible, reverse the deterioration process.
Dating the Evidence 2 TYPES:
- Absolute/Chronometric Dating.
- Relative Dating.
