Anthro 205 1st Edition Lecture 7 Outline of Last Lecture I Documentary II Questions to be analyzed throughout the documentary Outline of Current Lecture I How We Got Here II Human Nature When it Comes to Economic Practices III Subsistence and Resource Distribution Patterns Foragers IV Reciprocity Gift Economy V Marcel Mauss The Gift VI Concept of Domestication Current Lecture How We Got Here An Anthropological Perspective Within the context of capitalism Broader anthropological Perspective is so broad that it generalizes within the explanation there is fluidity There are other ways of looking at a problem Is there a human nature when it comes to economic practices Economics is not a separate domain of society and culture Living in the society that we do many of us have take for granted that we are supposed to maximize economic profit it became nature called Homo economics Homo economic We work to maximize our individual profit Liberal and neoliberal economic theories believe that human economic nature is rational and self interested OBS Economic theory assumes humans are rational and self interested This is not the case societies have been organized in may different ways Subsistence and resource distribution patterns foragers These notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor s lecture GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes not as a substitute Foraging are small groups hunter gatherer Is the closest thing to human nature the most common social model in history of humans Even though throughout time people thought foragers had very difficult live studies show that it was actually the opposite They had very varied intakes Most equalitarian model people were not born into casts The resources were distributed in reciprocity Reciprocity Gift economy Sound like nice giving no ties involved generous BUT it is not Different type of logic in reciprocity about economic exchanging that involves debt Reciprocity builds social ties social relationships people are tied together through what they owe each other Constant sense of mutual responsibility We find this in many societies not only foraging Strengthening social relationships was the core of this system not individual profit Marcel Mauss The Gift There s no such thing as a free gift Social relations are built on reciprocal indebtedness Instead of homo economicus we have homo reciprocans Domestication People didn t settle until they had to Centralization of resources and Redistribution by chief and other central figure Outline of Current Lecture I Race II Idea of the Evolution of Race a Darwin and the origin of species III Gould a Craniomatics IV Key concept Current Lecture Race Naturalizing Inequality Focus on human biology and inequality Historical knowledge is needed to understand racial inequality and where the idea of race comes from Race It is impossible to be discussed as a neutral subject it never has been o White span of colorblindness I don t see color If we stop talking about race it will go away We as a society make race a reality Race is not based on biology but race is rather an idea that we ascribe to biology Alan Goodman Biological anthropologists tried in the 1900 s to prove race as a biological characteristic Idea of the evolution of Race Darwin and the Origin of species o Important for cultural evolution o Idea of racial evolution The great chain of beings There Is a fixed world and all is in a fixed location can not move God Humans Animals Natural selection is about adaptation not finding the perfect gene Ex Peppered moths and natural selection evolution is not linear OBS The concept of natural selection that natural darwinists had in mind is not the same for they were looking for the perfect form self centered Gould Early pseudoscientist who thought that we could see primitive development of species He adapted theory to his idea Craniomatics o Measuring skulls and making racial hierarchy based on skull size Measurements were false study was biased o This study influenced eugenic studies around the world Nazi Germany Cesare Lombroso was obsessed with skull and body He believed that you could read on the body the history of the person criminal history He studied specifically the body of deviants to find stigmas and common traits of people that commited the same crime Key Concept Clinical Variation Human traits vary gradually across geographic areas not discretely in distinct categories There are no races only clines