Modern Anthropology: A Collection of Fields

• Anthropology is the study of humans and their society. This is a very wide topic and difficult to study because of its breadth. Modern anthropology divides the field into several sub-topics in order to focus on the different aspects of culture and society. Each sub-field focuses on a different view of human culture.
  
  

Sub-fields in Modern Anthropology

• The main branches of modern anthropology are physical and cultural. Physical anthropology refers to the study of race, evolution (and its relevant physical characteristics), genetics and physical environment in relation to a culture.
  
  Cultural anthropology includes the study of language, sociology and archeology (for extinct cultures) of a particular society.
  
  

Two Important Figures in Modern Anthropology

• Franz Boas was a German-born anthropologist whose career spanned the early-to-mid 1900s. He chose a different path from other anthropologists at the time by choosing to do field work before arriving at theories. Contemporaries of Boas were doing the opposite: creating theories and then going to do field research to support the theories.
  
  Accordingly, bigotry and other prejudices were widespread amongst anthropologists of the time. Boas worked against this trend, did extensive work with the Kwakiutl tribe, and introduced scientific methods for conducting research.
  
  Another trailblazer of modern anthropology was Claude Levi-Strauss. Among his many achievements, he studied several tribes in depth, realizing that "primitive" people were just as adept as Westernized people at distinguishing a symbol from an object. He also wrote at length about the similarities between myths in different societies.
  
  

Stucturalism

• Structuralism states that there are hidden or unconscious rules that govern the way humans talk. People don't know why they express themselves exactly the way they do, they just do it automatically. Humans have internal and unconscious rules that govern what they say, and by extension, the society they live in. These rules that govern expression are the key to a culture and a society.
  
  

Cutural Relativism

• The concept of cultural relativism was introduced by modern anthropology. When a researcher goes to study another culture, modern anthropologists say that she should see the other culture from a neutral state. A researcher should not judge another culture based on the mores and norms of her own society, but rather keep her judgments in check while she studies this new society. Each society can only be judged by its own norms. There are no absolute values of right or wrong, sacred or heretical, silly or solemn.