Topic outline

  • General

  • Topic 1

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                                         Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

    BRANCH: Anthropology

    1st  Lesson

     

    THE UNIQUENES OF ANTHROPOLOGY?

     

    Anthropology is an intellectually challenging, theoretically ambitious subject which tries to achieve an understanding of culture, society and humanity through detailed studies of local life, made sense of though comparison and contextualization. But it is also a form of storytelling about the life that you and I could have led, but didn’t because we were busy living our own lives.

    Some anthropologists have chosen their field of inquiry for existential reasons, sometimes with a strong element of self-discovery; they may have grown up as the children of migrants or expatriates in a culturally foreign environment, or they are simply fascinated by faraway places, or they may be engaged in questions of global justice or minority rights issues- immigrants, indigenous groups or other minorities.

    As a profession or a science –sometimes even as a vocation- anthropology has grander ambitions than offering keys to individual self-understanding or bringing travel stories or political tracts to the people. At the deepest level, anthropology raises philosophical questions which it tries to respond to by exploring human lives under different conditions , thereby saying sometimes  not just about what it means to be human, but also about the world in which we live.

    To simplify somewhat, one may say that anthropology primarily offers two kinds of insights. First, its practitioners produce knowledge about the actual cultural variation in the world; studies may deal with, say, the role of caste and wealth in village life, technology among highland people, religion, life on the wall street stock exchange, the political importance of kinship in different societies, or concepts about life.

    Second, anthropology offers methods and theoretical perspectives enabling the practitioner to explore, compare and understand these varied expressions of the human conditions. In other words, the subject offers both things to think about and things to think with.

    Nedumaran, M,Suresh R.Anthropology an overview

    int J Orofac Biol2022, 6:1:4-8

    Web published, International Journal of oral biology, MM publichers

    Questions:

    1-    What is the general idea of the text?

    2-    In one sentence, what is the uniqueness of anthropology?

    3-    According to the text, what is the definition of anthropology?

    4-    Find in the text the synonym of : interesting – answer – upland – attempts – comprehend – carrying.

    5-    What is the opposite of the underlined words in the text? 

    6-    Translate the first paragraph into Arabic?

     


  • Topic 2

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                                         Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

    BRANCH: Anthropology

    2nd  Lesson

     

    ………………………………………………

     

    Anthropology is not just a toolbox, it is also a craft which teaches the novice how to obtain a certain kind of knowledge and what this knowledge might say something about. Just as a carpenter can specialize in either furniture or buildings, and one journalist may cover fluctuations in the stock market while another deals with another deals with royal scandals, the craft of anthropology can be used for many different things. Like carpenters or journalists, all anthropologists share set professional skills.

    Some newcomers to anthropology are initially flabbergasted to discover that it is just to often rigorously analytical as it may be colorfully evocative, and some see it as deeply ironic that a subject which claims to make sense of the life worlds of ordinary people can be so knotty.

    Many anthropological texts are beautifully written, but it is also true that many of them are though, dry and convoluted. Anthropology insists on being analytical and theoretical, and, as a consequence, it can often feel both inaccessible and alienating. Since its contents are so important and –arguably- fascinating, this only indicates that there is a great need for good anthropological writings.

    Anthropology is not alone studying society and culture academically. Sociology describes and accounts for social life, especially in modern societies, in great breadth and depth. Political science deals with politics at all levels, from the village to the Modern cities. Psychology studies the mental life of humans by means of scientific and interpretive methods, and human geography looks at economic and social processes in a transnational perspective.

    Finally, there is the fairly new subject, controversial but popular among students and the public, of cultural studies, which can be described as an amalgamation of cultural sociology, history and ideas, literary studies and anthropology. In other word, there is a considerable overlap between the social sciences, and it may well be argued that the disciplinary boundaries’ are to some extent artificial. The social sciences represent some of the same interest and try to respond to some of the same questions, although there are also differences.

    Moreover, anthropology also has much in common with humanities such as literary studies and history. Philosophy has always provided intellectual input for anthropology, and there is a productive, passionately debated frontier area toward biology.

    Questions:

    1-    Give a title to the text?

    2-    What is the general idea of the text?

    3-    What is the definition of anthropology according to the text?

    4-    Find in the text the synonym of: connection – famous – answer – disgraces – beginner – variations – type of – skill – gain .

    5-    Give the opposite of the underlined words in the text?

    6-    Translate the full text into Arabic?

     

     

     

     

     


  • Topic 3

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                                         Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

    BRANCH: Anthropology

    3rd  Lesson

     

    ………………………………………………

    Until 1970’s, anthropology still concentrated mainly on detailed studies of local life and ethnographic fieldwork was its main –in some case its sole – method. The situation eventually became more complex , as anthropologists increasingly began to study all kinds of societies , and also became the methodological repertoire has become more diverse .

    If we ask the major question: What is anthropology now? We might answer by saying that it is the comparative study of culture and society, with local life as the starting point. Put differently, anthropology distinguishes itself from the other lines of inquiry by insisting that social reality is first and foremost created through relationships between people and the groups to which they belong. A current concept such as globalization, for example, has no meaning to an anthropologist unless it can be studied through actual people, their relationship to each other and to a larger surrounding world.

    When this level of the ‘nitty-gritty’ is established, it is possible to explore the linkages between the locally lived world and the large-scale phenomena (such as global capitalism or the state). But it is only when an anthropologist has spent enough time crawling on all floors , as it were, studying the world by looking at the grains of sand on the beach through a magnifying glass, that he or she is ready to enter the helicopter armed with a pair of binoculars, in order to obtain  an overview.

    Anthropology means, translated literally from ancient Greek, the study of humanity. Of course, it would be presumptuous to assume that anthropologists have the monopoly here. Besides, philosophical anthropology raises fundamental questions concerning the human condition. Physical anthropology is the study of human pre-history and evolution. For sometimes, physical anthropology also included the study of races. these are no larger scientifically interesting since genetics has disproven their existence, but in social and cultural anthropology , race may still be interesting as a social construction , because it remains important in ideologies by which people live.

     

    Thomas Holland Eriksen , Waht is anthropology, Second edition, Pluto Press on www.Plutobooks.com, PP 9-10

    Questions:

    1- Give a title to the text?

    2- -What is the general idea of the text?

    3-   Find in the text the synonym of: summary – arrogant – single – essential – comprised – differentiated – increases – progression.

    4- Give the opposite of the underlined words in the text?

    5- Translate the first and second paragraph into Arabic?    


  • Topic 4

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES                    BRANCH: Anthropology

    4rth  Lesson

    …………………………………………………………….

    As a university discipline , anthropology is not a very old subject –it has been taught for about 100 years, in most universities less – but it has raised questions which have been formulated in different guises since antiquity: Are the differences between peoples inborn or learned? Why are they so many languages and how different are they really? Do all religions have something in common? Which forms of governance exist, and how do they work? Is it possible to rank societies on a ladder according to their level of development? What is it that all humans have in common and perhaps most importantly: what kind of creatures are humans? Are they aggressive animals, social animals, altruistic animals, or are they , perhaps, the only self-defining animals on the planet?

    Every thinking person has an opinion and these matters, such questions can sacredly be answered once and for all. But they can be asked in an accurate and informed way. It is the goal of anthropology to establish has detailed knowledge as possible about life in its mind-boggling diversity and to develop a conceptual that makes it possible to compare life-world and societies. This in turn enables us to understand both differences and similarities between the man different ways of being human.

    In spite of the enormous variations of anthropologist document, the very existence of the discipline proves beyond that it is possible to communicate fruitfully and intelligibly between different forms of human life. Had it been impossible to understand culturally remote peoples. Anthropology as such would have been impossible; nobody who practices anthropology believes that this is impossible (although few believe that it possible to understand everything). On the contrary, different societies are made to shed light on each other through comparison.

    Thomas Holland Eriksen , Waht is anthropology, Second edition, Pluto Press on www.Plutobooks.com, PP 10-11

    Questions:

    1- Find a suitable title to the text?

    2- What is the general idea of the text?

    3- Find in the text the synonym of: congenital -impressive - productively -   elevated - abstarct - set up - truly - field.

    4- What are the opposites of the underlined words in the text?

    5- Translate the full text into Arabic?

     

     


  • Topic 5

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES                    BRANCH: Anthropology

    5th  Lesson

    …………………………………………………………….

     

    The great enigma of anthropology can be phrased like this: All over the world, humans are born with same cognitive and physical apparatus, and yet they grow into dotingly different persons and groups, with different social types, beliefs, technologies, languages and notions about the good life.

    Differences in innate endowments vary each group and not between them, so that musicality, intelligence, institution and other qualities that vary from person to person are quite evenly distributes globally. It is not that Africans are ‘born with rhythm’ or that northerners are ‘innately cold and introverted’. To the extent that such particular social milieu stimulate inborn potentials for rhythmicity, while others encourage the ability to think abstractly.

    So, like other human sciences , anthropology emerged as a distant field of inquiry in Europe following the period of heightened intellectual awareness and scientific curiosity known as the enlightenment culminating with the French revolution  in the eighteen century.

    Thomas Holland Eriksen , Waht is anthropology, Second edition, Pluto Press on www.Plutobooks.com, PP 12-13

    Questions:

    1- Find a suitable title to the text?

    2- What is the general idea of the text?

    3- Give three full definitions of anthropology?

    4- What are the main subjects of anthropology?

    5- Cite and define five major  domains of anthropology?

    6- Translate the full text into Arabic?


  • Topic 6

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                                                      Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES                                                           BRANCH: Anthropology

    6th  Lesson

    ANTHROPOLOGY IS NECESSARY

     

    Anthropology is the study of mankind (anthropos). Etymologically, anthropology comes from the word anthropos meaning man and logos meaning knowledge. Anthropology looks at humans as something complex in terms of physical, emotional, social and cultural complexity. Anthropology also refers to the science of humans and their culture.

    Since anthropology is one of the social sciences, of course it is necessary, and undoubtedly very important considering humans as social creatures cannot possibly loose interacting with each other. Studying anthropology will create tolerance and peaceful life. Being unable to understand each other has resulted in prejudice, quarrel and even war. Differences are often considered as a threat, but when managed properly, they that could be a beauty, like a variety of colorful flowers in a garden.

    Things that occur in life on a small scale: in the household, between ethnic and religious groups, even among a religious group to elements or a nation, and between countries. Can anthropology solve life problems mentioned?

     Certainly anthropology has a significant contribution. It is the study of all kinds of things that have to do with human beings. At the very least, someone who has studied or learned anthropology will further acknowledge and understand that every people, ethnic group, religion, community and nation has certain a distinctive and particular character. Thus, it will promote mutual tolerance and peace.

      Questions:

    1-    Find another suitable title to the text?

    2-    What is the general idea of the text?

    3-    What is the full definition of anthropology cited in the text?

    4-    Try to find in the text the synonym of: answer – domestic – participation- stated – required – unique – endorce.

    5-    Give the opposite of the underlined words in the text?

    6-    Give a small Summary the text?

    7-     Translate the full text into Arabic?


  • Topic 7

    UNIVERSITY OF TLEMCEN                                                                      Master 1 LMD Anthropology

    FACULTY OF HUMAN SCIENCES ET SOCIAL SCIENCES

    DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES                                                           BRANCH: Anthropology

    6th  Lesson

     

    APPLIED ANTHROPOLOGY

    The four subfields of anthropology (biological anthropology, archeology, linguistic anthropology and cultural anthropology) are well established. However, anthropologists also recognize a fifth subfield.

    Applied anthropology id the use of anthropological data from the other subfields to address modern problems and concerns, ranging from interventions in the treatment of disease to the management of cultural resources, and assisting the police in murder investigations.

    Anthropologists have played an increasing role in creating governments’ policies and legislation, the planning of development projects and the implementation of marketing strategies. Although anthropologists are typically trained in one of the major subfield, an increasing number find employment outside of universities and museums.

    Although many anthropologists see at least some aspects of their work as applied, it is the implication of anthropological data that is the central part of some researchers ‘careers. Indeed, approximately half of the people with doctorates in anthropology currently find careers of academic institutions.

    Questions:

    1-    What is the general idea of the text?

    2-    What is the full definition of applied anthropology according to the text?

    3-    In a small paragraph, try to speak about the importance of applied anthropology in general?

    4-    Give a summary of the text?

    5-    Translate the full text into Arabic?

     


  • Topic 8

  • Topic 9

  • Topic 10


    Final Exercice of translation  : translate the coming text into arabic


    What is Anthropology?

    The word anthropology is derived from Greek, with “anthropos” meaning “human” and “logy” referring to the “study of.” Therefore anthropology by definition, is the study of humans. It is about our history, our prehistory before written records, our biology, our language, the distribution of peoples all over the planet, and the cultural and social aspects of our existence. The methods we use on this journey of self-discovery are varied and eclectic—it’s an unusual discipline. What is perhaps unique about anthropology is its global quality, its comparative potential, and its integrative possibilities, which result from its examination of histories, biologies, languages, and socio-cultural variations. As a discipline, it is unusual because it is both soft and hard, including science as well as the humanities, between nature and culture, the past and the present, searching for new ways to understand the human condition. We are an academic discipline with porous boundaries that has refused to specialize and as a result can claim to have made enormous contributions to understanding what it means to be human. But this is a journey that has not always been perfect. At its beginning as an academic discipline anthropology focused on “the study of others,” meaning foreign cultures, but using the term “others” imposed false thoughts of “civilized versus savagery.” These dualistic views have often caused discrimination, wars, or even genocide. Now, anthropologists strive to uncover and better understand the mysteries of all cultures and eliminate the prejudice that it first created.

    A Brief History of Anthropological Thinking

    Imagine you are living several thousand years ago. Maybe you are a wife and mother of three children. Maybe you are a young man eager to start your own family. Maybe you are a prominent religious leader, or maybe you are a respected healer. Your family has, for as long as people can remember, lived the way you do. You learned to act, eat, hunt, talk, pray, and live the way you do from your parents, your extended family, and your small community. Suddenly, you encounter a new group of people who have a different way of living, speak strangely, and eat in an unusual manner. They have a different way of addressing the supernatural and caring for their sick. What do you make of these differences? These are the questions that have faced people for tens of thousands of years as human groups have moved around and settled in different parts of the world.

    One of the first examples of someone who attempted to systematically study and document cultural differences is Zhang Qian (164 BC – 113 BC). Born in the second century BCE in Hanzhong, China, Zhang was a military officer who was assigned by Emperor Wu of Han to travel through Central Asia, going as far as what is today Uzbekistan. He spent more than twenty-five years traveling and recording his observations of the peoples and cultures of Central Asia. The Emperor used this information to establish new relationships and cultural connections with China’s neighbors to the West. Zhang discovered many of the trade routes used in the Silk Road and introduced several new cultural ideas, including Buddhism, into Chinese culture.

    Another early traveler and documenter of culture of note was Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn Battuta, known most widely as Ibn Battuta, (1304-1369). Ibn Battuta was an Amazigh (Berber) Moroccan Muslim scholar. During the fourteenth century, he traveled for a period of nearly thirty years, covering almost the whole of the Islamic world, including parts of Europe, Africa, India, and China. Upon his return to the Kingdom of Morocco, he documented the customs and traditions of the people he encountered in a book called Tuhfat al-anzar fi gharaaib al-amsar wa ajaaib al-asfar (A Gift to those who Contemplate the Wonders of Cities and the Marvels of Traveling), a book commonly known as Al Rihla, which means “travels” in Arabic. This book became part of a genre of Arabic literature that included descriptions of the people and places visited along with commentary about the cultures encountered. Some scholars consider Al Rihla to be among the first examples of early pre-anthropological writing.

    Later, from the 1400s through the 1700s, during the so-called “Age of Discovery,” Europeans began to explore the world, and then colonize it. Europeans exploited natural resources and human labor in other parts of the world, exerting social and political control over the people they encountered. New trade routes along with the trade of enslaved Africans fueled a growing European empire while forever disrupting previously independent cultures. European ethnocentrism—the belief that one’s own culture is better than others—was used to justify the subjugation of non-European societies on the alleged basis that these groups were socially and even biologically inferior. Indeed, the emerging anthropological practices of this time were ethnocentric and often supported colonial projects.

    As European empires expanded, new ways of understanding the world and its people arose. Beginning in the eighteenth century in Europe, the Age of the Enlightenment was a social and philosophical movement that privileged science, rationality, and experience, while critiquing religious authority. This crucial period of intellectual development planted the seeds for many academic disciplines, including anthropology. It gave ordinary people the capacity to learn the “truth” through observation and experience: anyone could ask questions and use rational thought to discover things about the natural and social world. For example, geologist Sir Charles Lyell (1797-1875) observed layers of rock and argued that the earth’s surface must have changed gradually over long periods of time. He disputed the Young Earth theory, which was popular at the time and used Biblical information to date the earth as only 6,000 years old, Charles Darwin (1809-1882), a naturalist and biologist, observed similarities between fossils and living specimens, leading him to argue that all life is descended from a common ancestor. Philosopher John Locke (1632-1704) contemplated the origins of society itself, proposing that people historically had lived in relative isolation until they agreed to form a society in which the government would protect their personal property.

    These radical ideas about the earth, evolution, and society influenced early social scientists into the nineteenth century. Philosopher and anthropologist Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), inspired by scientific principles, used biological evolution as a model to understand social evolution. Just as biological life evolved from simple to complex multicellular organisms, he postulated that societies “evolve” to become larger and more complex. Anthropologist Lewis Henry Morgan (1818-1881) argued that all societies “progress” through the same stages of development: savagery—barbarism—civilization. Societies were classified into these stages based on their family structure, technologies, and methods for acquiring food. So-called “savage” societies, ones that used stone tools and foraged for food, were said to be stalled in their social, mental, and even moral development.

    Ethnocentric ideas like Morgan’s were challenged by anthropologists in the early twentieth century in both Europe and the United States. During World War I, Bronislaw Malinowski (1884-1942), a Polish anthropologist, became stranded on the Trobriand Islands located north of Australia and Papua New Guinea. While there, he started to develop participant-observation fieldwork: the method of immersive, long-term research that cultural anthropologists use today. By living with and observing the Trobriand Islanders, he realized that their culture was not “savage,” but was well-suited to fulfill the needs of the people. He developed a theory to explain human cultural diversity: each culture functions to satisfy the specific biological and psychological needs of its people. While this theory has been critiqued as biological reductionism, it was an early attempt to view other cultures in more open-minded ways.

     



  • Topic 11

  • Topic 12

  • Topic 13

  • Topic 14