Essay Sample about Anthropology: Bronislaw Malinowski

What is anthropology? This is a simple question with a complicated answer because anthropology is many things. It is the study of humans, and it seeks to understand the structures which we bind ourselves together with, or culture. More specifically, certain areas of anthropology focus on social structures which through certain paradigms, are the foundations of culture. The study of humans is important because it helps us understand our commonality regardless of our cultural differences. Ideally, anthropology influences peoples thinking in a way that builds compassion for those who are from a different background. The study of anthropology is a tool that can help people become better human beings through having a deeper understanding of others, concepts of the systems that we share, and a better understanding of what makes us human. 

The work of an anthropologist allows certain opportunities to experience the life of others in a way that is up close and personal. This type of work is fieldwork. When an anthropologist is conducting fieldwork, they will likely engage in participant observation and record their findings in an ethnography. During fieldwork, the anthropologist is often exposed to events or behaviors that may be unusual in the culture that they are familiar with. Their own personal culture. Being exposed to some human differences is beneficial to the work that an anthropologist does. It is beneficial because it may contribute to the field in ways that lead to a better understanding of the diversity in humans. Some anthropologists have dedicated a lot of their work to improving living conditions in areas where they have done fieldwork and witness human right violations. Anthropologists such as Nancy Scheper-Hughes is one of the anthropologists who has contributed to a certain type of anthropology that is focused on improving the lives of those who are studied. This approach of course has been critiqued, but that is not the point. The point is that Anthropology can be used to improve the lives of others. I think that helping others is meaningful and through helping others, we become better people, professionals, and thinkers. 

Anthropology is a field that contributes to academia and therefore allows students, and others who are interested in learning to understand more about people from other cultures. Cultures can be understood through many different modes of thinking. The history of anthropological thinking has progressed as time has. The beginning of anthropology was founded on the notion that primitive cultures were less developed than “civilized” ones and therefore, civilized people are more advanced than primitive people, and savages. This mode of thought was problematic because it was a clear path to people feeling superior because of their culture. Ultimately, it led to a shallow understanding of other cultures.

From these rocky beginnings, work from many brilliant scholars have paved the way to different ways of understanding a culture. Participant observation for example was one of the main methods that the infamous Bronislaw Malinowski used in the Trainband Islands. Malinowski’s focus was on the thoughts of people and how that presented itself in culture. Through this method, he lived with the people that he was studying, and he wrote about his daily interactions and activities. He wrote this material in ethnographies. His work was influential but also highly critiqued.

Most of the critique directed towards Malinowski’s work was because of who and what he wrote about. He wrote mostly about men. What it because women were not present? No, women were on the island and participated in events, meals and other social gatherings in which Malinowski was present. Malinowski was influenced by the time in history in which he wrote his ethnographies, and during this time, Western society was patriarchal, and this presented itself in many academic works aside from Malinowski. The authority that Malinowski had in the influential work done during his fieldwork was based on his own preconceived notions of what was important to write about, and women were not a part of that. I imagine that much of the culture could have been understood better if Malinowski wrote about the thoughts of women and how they participated in the culture. In modern anthropology, perhaps feminist anthropologists as well as others are quick to criticize anthropologists who disregard experiences of women in culture so that the work produced from fieldwork, is comprehensive of the cultural norms for both genders. Whatever the case is, past and current work in anthropology has helped those who are studying learn more about cultures.

Malinowski contributed to the field of anthropology, but he was not the only one who did. Another person who was influential was the linguist, Benjamin Whorf. He contributed to anthropology by studying the structure of language and what he found was that the way language is structured, shapes the way that people perceive and act within the world. In Matthew Engleke’s book: How To Think Like an Anthropologist, he gives an example of linguistics shaping the world in different cultures. For example, certain groups of people in Australia don’t respond “good” to the question “how are you?”, instead, they give their geographical location. For example, they would answer “I am northeast from home” which makes them acutely aware of where they are always. Whorf was one of the linguists that contributed to the work of anthropology, and his work as well as others has helped the field and its progression. Language and communication is something that each culture has in common. The type of language can create different realities depending on its structure. 

Additionally, culture can be analyzed through a method called structuralism. This method was created by the French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss and asserts that all cultures are created by the human mind and culture is essentially a product of the mind. Of course this has been critiqued by Anthropologists such as A.L. Kroeber who asserted that individuals do not play a role in creating culture but that culture exists among humans. Levi-Strauss’s method of structuralism connects cultures and individuals regardless of their differences. The underlying system that we share is the mind and this factor creates a culture according to this theory. Other approaches created by additional anthropologists such as Franz Boas, take history as an important factor in how culture is created.

Boas was a remarkable anthropologist and actively worked to change the field to understand how cultures develop. His method of cultural customs took information from environmental conditions, psychological factors and most importantly, the historical development of the culture. This understanding that culture develops historically is generally rejected, but I think that Boas as well as others who share a similar understanding, like the French historian Michel Foucalt, have provided excellent information on the historical development of cultures. This type of understanding places humans in control of creating cultures because they create history. This approach was rejected by Boas’s student, A.L. Kroeber.

Kroeber used the term “super organic” to describe culture and to make a point that culture has it’s own existence outside of human creation. Another student of Boas, Ruth Benedict shared similar beliefs to Boas. She argued that culture was created when a group of humans large enough to be a society acquired the same set of habits. So, similarities in each culture include some type of language or communication, a historical structure and past, individual minds, and acquired habits.

These are similarities that can be argued are the foundations of any culture. I don’t believe that there is a one size fits all approach when it comes to anthropology and theories from all of the scholars I’ve mentioned hold merit. The approaches from Malinowski, Kroeber, Engelke, Foucalt, Boas, Levi-Straus, Whorf and Benidict contribute to anthropology so that people who study it can have a more thorough understanding of culture and humans. 

The work of all of these scholars from different backgrounds and academic discipline’s have contributed to the formation of modern anthropology. Anthropological theory has changed significantly from it’s beginning. It has moved from social evolutionism to an approach of structural and feminist as well as many other understandings. All these understanding and progression of paradigms have led to a better understanding of the diversity in humanity but also the things that we have in common. Although I can relate more to someone from the same culture as me, each culture may have similarities too such as communication or language, a historical structure, similar brains, and acquired habits all of which contribute to each unique formation of a culture. All of these modes of thought hold merit and furthermore help form a more thorough understanding of others, the concepts of the systems that we share, and they contribute to a better understanding of what makes us human and what connects us to humans from other cultures.