ATH 155 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Imagined Community, Pastoralism, Soil Salinity
Exam Study Guide
Key Concepts – you should be able to give definitions for these, describe what
they mean and why they are important in your own words, and explain how/why
we use them.
The archaeological record: derives from human behavior and natural processes.
Material remains reflect behaviors that created the archaeological record. We can
reconstruct behavior from evidence in the archaeological record.
Context: relational aspects of the archaeological record. Types of contexts:
chronological, spatial, cultural and functional.
Association: Relationships among artifacts and features. Things found together in
same contexts are said to be associated.
Participant observation: Gathering information by living as closely as possible to the
people whose culture you are studying while participating in their lives as much as
possible.
Key informants: Individuals who are initial sources of information, they help
anthropologists identify major sources of data and help establish rapport with people.
Domestication: A process in which human management of the reproduction of a plant
or animal species establishes mutual dependence between that species and humans.
Food production: strategies that focus on “domestic” resources like horticulture,
pastoralism and agriculture. Horticulture is where hand tools are used for small-scale
crop production in sedistic areas, the crops are in a cycle of being planted, harvested
and cleared. The risks of this depend on crop diversity. Pastoralism is the herding of
domesticated animals. This is used for groups that are mobile and want to increase their
food supply. Agriculture uses non-human labor and yields a lot more crops. There is
systematic breeding of crops and animals. Therefore, this is on a much larger scale.
Food production gradually replaces foraging. Food production comes with a more
sedentary lifestyle, population growth, increase in trade, occupational specialization and
a food surplus.
Centers of domestication: Places where people independently [without influence from
another group that used domesticated plants or animals] domesticated plants or
animals.
Sedentism: the creation of permanent (or long-term) settlements and communities.
Chiefdom, State, Empire: typically, larger societies with varying degrees of social,
political, and economic difference and inequality, with institutionalized political offices,
and some measure of centralized authority, wealth, or power
Section II Topics
● Culture
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○ Defining culture: the complex whole which includes knowledge, belief,
art, law, morals and customs. Can be both ideal and real.
○ Characteristics of culture: Patterned, learned, enculturation, shared,
symbolic, integrated, adaptive, constructed and dynamic
○ Habitus: Internalized mental or cognitive frameworks people use to deal
with the social world
○ Practice and agency: practice is the totality of people's actions both
intentional and habitual. Agency is the ability of individuals to act and think
about how their actions affect their world, the things in their world and the
other people in their world.
○ Perception: ability to influence behavior and thought by leading people to
decide to behave or think as you wish through logical or emotional
appeals (often used in order to reach that consensus)
● Studying culture
○ Archaeological approaches
■ Excavation
■ Survey
■ Material culture
■ Context: relational aspects of the archaeological record. Types of
contexts: chronological, spatial, cultural and functional.
■ Association: Relationships among artifacts and features. Things
found together in same contexts are said to be associated.
■ Ecofacts: plant and animal remains incorporated into the
archaeological record.
■ Features: non-portable things constructed by people that cannot
be recovered without destroying them
■ Structures: things you can take down and out for evidence.
○ Ethnographic approaches
■ Interview
■ Key informants: Individuals who are initial sources of information,
they help anthropologists identify major sources of data and help
establish rapport with people.
■ Participant observation: Gathering information by living as closely
as possible to the people whose culture you are studying while
participating in their lives as much as possible.
● Human culture history
○ The Neolithic
■ Domestication: A process in which human management of the
reproduction of a plant or animal species establishes mutual
dependence between that species and humans.
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find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Key concepts you should be able to give definitions for these, describe what they mean and why they are important in your own words, and explain how/why we use them. The archaeological record: derives from human behavior and natural processes. Material remains reflect behaviors that created the archaeological record. We can reconstruct behavior from evidence in the archaeological record. Context: relational aspects of chronological, spatial, cultural and functional. Participant observation: gathering information by living as closely as possible to the people whose culture you are studying while participating in their lives as much as possible. Key informants: individuals who are initial sources of information, they help anthropologists identify major sources of data and help establish rapport with people. Domestication: a process in which human management of the reproduction of a plant or animal species establishes mutual dependence between that species and humans. Food production: strategies that focus on domestic resources like horticulture, pastoralism and agriculture.
