Kerala Plus Two Anthropology (DHSE) flashcards

33 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Holism

The anthropological principle that human societies and biological traits must be studied as integrated wholes, linking economy, kinship, religion, politics, and biology rather than isolating single aspects.

Ethnocentrism

Judging another culture by the standards of one's own; anthropology counters it with cultural relativism, which evaluates beliefs and practices within their own cultural context.

Emic and etic

Emic refers to the insider's perspective using local categories; etic refers to the outsider analyst's comparative categories. Ethnography ideally combines both for a rounded account.

Applied anthropology

The use of anthropological methods and knowledge to address practical problems such as public health, tribal development, education, forensic identification, and cultural resource management.

Bipedalism

Habitual upright walking on two legs, marked by a centrally placed foramen magnum, S-shaped spine, bowl-shaped pelvis, and valgus knee; the earliest defining hominin adaptation.

Homo erectus

A hominin species dated roughly 1.9 million to 300,000 years ago, with brain size around 900-1100 cc, Acheulian handaxes, and the first major expansion out of Africa.

Radiocarbon dating

An absolute dating method measuring the decay of carbon-14 in organic remains such as bone, charcoal, and shell; useful for material up to about 50,000 years old.

Mosaic evolution

The pattern in which different anatomical traits evolve at different rates; for example, Ardipithecus shows bipedal pelvis features alongside a grasping foot adapted to trees.

Clinal variation

The gradual, continuous geographic change in a biological trait such as skin colour or gene frequency, showing that human variation does not fall into discrete racial categories.

Bergmann's rule

The principle that populations in colder climates tend to have larger body mass, reducing relative surface area and heat loss; Allen's rule similarly predicts shorter extremities.

Balanced polymorphism

Maintenance of a harmful allele in a population because heterozygotes have an advantage; sickle-cell trait persists where malaria is endemic because carriers resist the disease.

Race as social construct

The view that racial categories are socially created classifications rather than biologically valid divisions, since most genetic variation occurs within rather than between populations.

Strepsirrhines and haplorhines

The two primate suborders: strepsirrhines (lemurs, lorises) have a wet nose and grooming claw; haplorhines (tarsiers, monkeys, apes) have a dry nose and enclosed eye sockets.

Female philopatry

A social pattern in which females remain in their natal group while males disperse, as in macaques and chimpanzees, producing female kin networks and matrilineal alliances.

Referential alarm calls

Vocal signals that denote specific predators or threats, as in vervet monkeys with distinct calls for eagles, snakes, and leopards, showing semantic communication in primates.

One-male harem group

A primate social unit with one adult male, several adult females, and offspring, as in gorillas and hamadryas baboons; males compete intensely for access to groups.

Oldowan and Acheulian

The Oldowan is the earliest stone tool tradition of simple flaked pebbles; the Acheulian is later, characterised by bifacial handaxes and cleavers associated with Homo erectus.

Levallois technique

A Middle Palaeolithic prepared-core method in which a core is shaped so that a single blow removes a predetermined flake of desired size and form.

Microliths

Small, often geometric stone blades and flakes typical of the Mesolithic, frequently used as composite tool components set in wood or bone handles.

Megalithic burial

A prehistoric burial practice using large stone structures such as dolmens, cists, and menhirs; in Kerala, associated with Iron Age urn burials and dolmens.

Matrilineal descent

A unilineal system tracing descent through the mother's line, forming matrilineages and clans; examples include the Nayar, Khasi, and Trobriand Islanders.

Bridewealth

Goods or valuables transferred from the groom's kin to the bride's kin at marriage, legitimising the union and often compensating for the loss of a household member.

Family of procreation

The family a person establishes through marriage by having or adopting children, distinguished from the family of orientation into which that person was born.

Avunculocal residence

A post-marital residence rule in which a couple lives with or near the husband's maternal uncle, common in matrilineal societies to keep male heirs in the lineage.

Reciprocity

The exchange of goods and services between people; generalised reciprocity is open-ended, balanced reciprocity expects equivalent return, and negative reciprocity seeks advantage.

Potlatch

A competitive gift-giving ceremony of Northwest Coast Native Americans in which hosts distribute wealth to gain status, illustrating Mauss's theory of gift obligations.

Segmentary lineage system

A political order without central government in which nested descent groups ally and oppose one another according to context, as described by Evans-Pritchard among the Nuer.

Chiefdom

A ranked, centralised political form with a chief, hereditary status differences, redistribution, and larger populations than tribes but lacking a full state bureaucracy.

Sympathetic magic

Frazer's term for magic based on similarity (imitative) or contact (contagious); it assumes that like produces like or that things once in contact remain connected.

Rites of passage

Rituals marking transitions in status, analysed by van Gennep as having three phases: separation, liminality, and incorporation; examples include initiation and marriage.

Communitas

Victor Turner's term for the egalitarian, unstructured social bond experienced during the liminal phase of ritual, temporarily suspending normal hierarchy.

Cholanaickan

A particularly isolated hunter-gatherer tribal community of the Nilambur forests in Malappuram district, Kerala, known for forest-based subsistence and limited contact.

Participant observation

A fieldwork method in which the researcher lives among a community, takes part in daily activities, and records observations to gain an insider's understanding.