The Evolution of Anthropology: From Faith to Science

Cont 4: New Movement Shift from Faith to Science

It started questioning what’s happening around him/her. Nature went from being feared and respected to something to be tamed and subdued. During the period of conquest, modern anthropology was birthed. Michel Eyquem put forward a very important aspect at the basis of modern anthropology, which is relativism (written by looking at cannibalism). It is the belief that there is no absolute truth, only the truth that a particular individual or culture happens to believe.

Second Shock: Raw Materials to Semi-Finished Products

The industrial system experienced a revolution in each country, leading to more factories and increased human labor. This enabled another idea of evolutionism to appear (Darwin). This way of understanding time, technology, and modern economy introduced new ways of thinking that defined other cultures they encountered, which weren’t developed in their economic and technological manner, as lesser cultures. This justified European superiority, moving from an idea of shapes of growth to a structure.

Based on a diachronic view, meaning that everything is based on a sequence of time, if you want to understand something, you have to look back.

Third Phase: Structural Functionalism

Structural functionalism examines how society works and how things function. It’s not a sequence but rather layers. The idea is that society is a whole, integrated system. Interventions in society aim to re-establish equilibrium.

• Structure: Organized arrangement of the parts of society.
• Function: Contribution of the parts to the maintenance of the whole.

Context of functionalism: The world and its colonies. There is a concern with maintaining order and stability, focusing on how to rule the people within them (this is where anthropology comes in, as you need to know them).

Evolution vs. Functionalism

• Evolution: Historical, diachronic, organism, evolution of society.
• Functionalism: Present, synchronic (occurring at the same time), machine, function rather by function of society and equilibrium.

Strengths and Weaknesses

• Strengths: Establish the concept of cultural integration, emphasis on social context, and refined fieldwork methods.
• Weaknesses: Treats the subject of study as an object, ignores assumptions researchers bring to the field, does not account for history or change, and political implications.