How is anthropology a natural science

Anthropology, a Natural Science? Robert Redfield Robert Redfield. Oxford Academic. Google Scholar. Select Format Select format. Permissions Icon Permissions. Article PDF first page preview. Issue Section:. You do not currently have access to this article. Download all slides. Sign in Don't already have an Oxford Academic account? You could not be signed in. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

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Lingis, A. Open Journal of Philosophy , 4 , Conflicts of Interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest. Subfields or related fields include anthropometrics, forensic anthropology, osteology, and nutritional anthropology.

Socio-cultural anthropology is the investigation, often through long term, intensive field studies including participant-observation methods , of the culture and social organization of a particular people: language, economic and political organization, law and conflict resolution, patterns of consumption and exchange, kinship and family structure, gender relations, childrearing and socialization, religion, mythology, symbolism, etc.

British universities have tended to call the corresponding field social anthropology, and for much of the 20th century emphasized the analysis of social organization more than cultural symbolism.

In some European countries, socio-cultural anthropology is known as ethnology a term also used in English-speaking countries to denote the comparative aspect of socio-cultural anthropology.

Subfields and related fields include psychological anthropology, folklore, anthropology of religion, ethnic studies, cultural studies, anthropology of media and cyberspace, and study of the diffusion of social practices and cultural forms. Linguistic anthropology seeks to understand the processes of human communications, verbal and non-verbal, variation in language across time and space, the social uses of language, and the relationship between language and culture.

It is the branch of anthropology that brings linguistic methods to bear on anthropological problems, linking the analysis of linguistic forms and processes to the interpretation of sociocultural processes. Linguistic anthropologists often draw on related fields including anthropological linguistics, sociolinguistics, cognitive linguistics, semiotics, discourse analysis, and narrative analysis.

Archaeology studies the contemporary distribution and form of artifacts materials modified by past human activities , with the intent of understanding distribution and movement of ancient populations, development of human social organization, and relationships among contemporary populations; it also contributes significantly to the work of population geneticists, historical linguists, and many historians. Archaeology involves a wide variety of field techniques remote sensing, survey, geophysical studies, coring, excavation and laboratory procedures compositional analyses, dating studies radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence dating , measures of formal variability, examination of wear patterns, residue analyses, etc.

Archaeologists predominantly study materials produced by prehistoric groups but also includes modern, historical and ethnographic populations.

Archaeology is usually regarded as a separate but related field outside North America, although closely related to the anthropological field of material culture, which deals with physical objects created or used within a living or past group as a means of understanding its cultural values. Reference Terms.