The Cosmic Race By Jose Vasconcelos

Culture is defined as the traditions, customs, norms, beliefs, values and thought patterning passed down from generation to generation (Jandt 2010). The world consists of many different cultures. In this Ethnographic Interview, I was given the opportunity to explore and learn more about a culture different from my own. Through observation I’ve have seen how people of different cultures differ from mines. For example, the type of foods a person

While reading in both books about ethnography I was shocked to learn that there was a ton of different theoretical perspectives. I was also shocked at how the theories are so different from one another. For some the only similarity is that it is the study of humans. Before the class I thought that there was a set way on how anthropology was studied but I very quickly found out that is not the case. Anthropology is very broad and is open to tons of different interpretations. There is no set way on how we must go about researching and studying.

The book, The Dobe Ju/'hoansi is a great example of an ethnography. It is a very detailed description of every aspect of the San people's life. From the environment they inhabit to the food they eat, the book goes into great detail on how these people survive. More importantly, the book describes their personal relationships with each other and other band level societies, marriage and sexuality topics, and how they solve disputes. Personally, I feel the attention directed towards their interpersonal relationships, was the key in understanding these Ju/'hoansi's way of life. Some of the most important topics mentioned in the ethnography are the foraging for a living, their marriage and sexuality, and conflicts, politics, and exchange.

Ethnography tells about a culture and the members that comprise this culture. A definition is the scientific description of the customs and individual people of a culture. The process of doing this assignment allowed me to explore another aspect of a cultural group. I was able to learn extensively about interactions between individuals and how see them as a culture. The group that comprises my ethnography is a cultural group very common to Utah. The culture I focused on was the LDS culture, to be more specific I studied a sub-culture of this group. My subculture was a group of 12 year old adolescents that are a Sunday school class in this culture.

For the Life of the World authored by Fr. Alexander Schmemann an Orthodox priest was originally intended as a “study guide” in the 1970’s for students preparing themselves for Missionary work, giving them a “world view”, helping to speak about Christian view points along with an approach to how they coalesce through the eyes of the Orthodox Church. A key theme Fr. Schmemann discussed is Secularism, which he believes developed from our progressive alienation of the Christian culture. Additionally, he presents his interpretation of the transforming biblical themes of creation, fall, and redemption through a sacramental understanding. Fr. Schmemann’s experiences within the Orthodox Church liturgy reveal unity in the meanings of these three themes. It is through these understandings he believes can effectively offset the disastrous effects of secularism while revitalizing the sacramental understanding of the world.

Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s arguments from “Racial Formations” are about how race is socially constructed and is shown in Caucasia by Danzy Senna. Michael Omi and Howard Winant believe that race is socially constructed in society; therefore, the meaning of race varies within different cultures and societies. According to Omi and Winant, influences such as, media, school, politics, history, family and economy create society’s structure of race. In Caucasia, media, family and school are forces that create race by stating how one should conform to social norms for different racial groups.

One historian, John Davidson (like a few others) are somewhat doubtful about the concept of race. He like many others fears that it is way too clumsy to describe as well as too complex. Many historians do not like using concepts that are fabricated. As Davidson says “race exists as a socially constructed reality.” Race however is no longer an easy way to categorize especially with newer concepts such as “identities” and “ethnicities”. This makes it increasingly difficult to use race as an organizing concept. This can be said of Latin America; due to conflicts with racial ideologies and identities many Latin American countries try to distance themselves from the black/white dichotomy. One example can come from Dominican Republic, Black Dominicans due not use the term black. Instead many choose terms mullatto or trigeño (tan) to distance themselves from the term Negro (black). Each of these distinctions has claimed to come from sources however each identity emphasizes different elements that can appeal to different historians. Many Latin American historians will use the many identities and interpretations of race; nevertheless they will all come from the same source. This includes many Latin American historians such as Alan Knight. Franklin Knight, Harry Hoetink, etc. Although they

Ethnography is a qualitative method of research in which the researcher takes part in the activities of a group such that they are able to complete their observations over a period of time in a natural, real-life environment.

In this context, Audry Smedley’s Race in North America provides the reader with a chronological approach to the concept of race that explores its evolution and their implications in the configuration of societies among the world.

Answer: Ethnographic research is different from other social science approaches to research because it goes more in depth. With an ethnographic research you are required to eat, sleep, and breath what is being studied. In order to get a better understanding you will need to incorporate such living (as that of the culture being studied) into your life. It’s more of a research to gain the knowledge of a current situation as oppose to something that has happened in the past. For example Sterk was researching prostitution. She followed the lives of many

James P. Spradley (1979) described the insider approach to understanding culture as "a quiet revolution" among the social sciences (p. iii). Cultural anthropologists, however, have long emphasized the importance of the ethnographic method, an approach to understanding a different culture through participation, observation, the use of key informants, and interviews. Cultural anthropologists have employed the ethnographic method in an attempt to surmount several formidable cultural questions: How can one understand another's culture? How can culture be qualitatively and quantitatively assessed? What aspects of a culture make it unique and which connect it to other cultures? If

I read the book Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert Heinlein and enjoyed it thoroughly. The novel is completely immersive. The author does a great job at creating fascinating settings, cultures, and societies. Heinlein 's galaxy provides an interesting allegory for many human institutions such as government, free trade, education, and slavery. This book was written at the beginning of the civil rights movements in 1957 and one of the prominent issues the book addresses is lavery. However, Heinlein doesn’t say slavery is evil because it is racist, it makes the point it is a violation of personal rights. This book touches on a lot of subjects such as economics, slavery, the military, romance, math theories, education, and politics. Another reason I liked the book is that although Baslim died very early in the book, his profound influence, and the impact of his character is seen all throughout the book. One theme is that slavery is an abhorrent but persistent institution. I believe that Heinlein recognized slavery might still have been an issue in the 1950’s and he hated it. Another theme involves loyalty; whether it to be your family or something else such as yourself. Thorby is fiercely loyal to Baslim even though he dies, and wants to do everything he would have wanted. A final theme is the possibility and importance of self-improvement as this is a coming of age novel, and the protagonist, Thorby, started as a slave and became the head of one of the most powerful conglomerates

Benjamin Alire Sáenz is the resounding author of the books: Sammy and Julianna in Hollywood, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, and In Perfect Light. All through these novel Sáenz retains a certain style that differs him from other authors. Benjamin Alire Sáenz is a realistic fiction author whose stories are all focused on a boy who lives near the border of Texas and Mexico (which influences the common use of Spanish in their dialogue) and is a bit of an outsider; he goes through a tremendously hard and emotionally deep experience in public view and he suffers from an unwillingness to accept his life as it is, creating conflict within him.

The chapter “The Age of Total War” in Eric Hobsbawm’s novel “The Age of Extremes” is broken into four sections in order to explore the time period of 1914-1945. This essay will explore the subjects and processes that are present in this chapter of Hobsbawm’s (1994) novel in a limited scope. The processes that will be discussed are how the zero sum game led to the total war of World War one; the desire for revanchism led to the existence of World War Two, the cost of World War Two led to the economic crisis and how the disaster these events caused resulted in the desensitization of human beings. Throughout this chapter, Hobsbawm (1994) frequently expresses a fear for human kind in both a literal and metaphoric sense arguing that people of

Race is a social construct that was created by the Europeans in order to minoritize different racial groups. In the reading by Bonilla-Silva, he defines race to be manmade, “This means that notions of racial difference are human creations rather than eternal, essential categories… racial categories have a history and are subject to change.” For example in a lecture by Dr. Aguilar-Hernandez, he stated that the Irish, Italians and Jews were called black before but are now considered white, Mexican-Americans were also considered white up until the 1980s. These ideas lead to the racialization of racial groups.