Patterns of Subsistence

1. (Foragers, agricultural and pastoral societies) ANT 1010. SLCC. Lolita Nikolova, Ph.D. (Haviland et al. 2005, Chapter 6) Some subsistence economies: Foraging Agriculture Mixed Pastoralism Cultural type Society type Adaptation Culture area Patterns of Subsistence

2. Foraging societies Agricultural societies Societies with mixed economies Nomadic societies Pre-industrial societies Industrial societies Post-Industrial societies (Technological) Resources Labor Adaptation Reproduction and production of social relationships and culture Household and communities (lineage, village, cities) Economies

3. Resources • Resources used to produce goods and services include: • Raw materials • Labor • Technology Neolithic revolutionThe profound culture change associated with the early domestication of plants and animals. Modes of Distributing Goods Reciprocity Redistribution Market exchange

4. Adaptation • Interaction between • changes an organism makes in its environment • changes the environmentmakes in the organism.

5. Patterns of Labor • Every society has a division of labor by gender and age. • This is an elaboration of patterns found among monkeys and apes. • Division by gender makes learning more efficient. • Division by age provides sufficient time to developing skills. Three Patterns of Work by Gender • Flexible/integrated pattern • Rigid segregation pattern • Dual sex pattern

6. culture areaA geographic region in which a number of different societies follow similar patterns of life. • cultural adaptationThe process organisms undergo to achieve a beneficial adjustment to an available environment and the result of that process—the characteristics of organisms that fit them to the particular environmental conditions in which they are found.

7. culture typeThe view of a culture in terms of the relation of its particular technology to the environment exploited by that technology. culture coreThe features of a culture that play a part in matters relating to the society’s way of making a living.

8. food foraging Hunting, fishing, and gathering wild plant foods. • carrying capacityThe number of people who can be supported by the available resources at a given level of technology. • density of social relationsRoughly, the number and intensity of interactions among the members of a camp or other residential unit.

9. Food Foraging Life: Characteristics • Move about a great deal. • Small size of local groups. • Populations stabilize at numbers well below the carrying capacity of their land. • Egalitarian, populations have few possessions and share what they have.

10. Food Foraging: Impact on Society Three elements of human organization: • Division of labor by gender. • Food sharing. • The camp as the center of daily activity and the place where food is shared.

11. convergent evolutionIn cultural evolution, the development of similar adaptations to similar environmental conditions by peoples whose ancestral cultures were quite different. • parallel evolutionIn cultural evolution, the development of similar adaptations to similar environmental conditions by peoples whose ancestral cultures were similar.

12. intensive agricultureCrop cultivation using technologies other than hand tools, such as irrigation, fertilizers, and the wooden or metal plow pulled by harnessed draft animals. • pastoralismBreeding and managing of herds of domesticated grazing animals, such as goats, sheep, cattle, llamas, or camels.

13. Transition to Food Production • Began about 11,000 to 9,000 y.a. • Probably the result of increased management of wild food resources. • Resulted in the development of permanent settlements as people practiced horticulture using simple hand tools.

14. HorticultureCultivation of crops using hand tools such as digging sticks. • swidden farmingAn extensive form of horticulture in which the natural vegetation is cut, the slash is subsequently burned, and crops then planted amongst the ashes.

15. Pastoralism • Subsistence that relies on raising herds of domesticated animals, such as cattle, sheep, and goats. • Pastoralists are usually nomadic. transhumancePattern of strict seasonal movement between different environmental zones.

16. Development of Cities • Cities developed as intensified agricultural techniques created a surplus. • Individuals were free to specialize full-time in other activities. Preindustrial citiesThe kinds of urban settlements that are characteristic of nonindustrial civilizations.

17. Social Structure of Cities • Development of cities resulted in increased social stratification. • People are ranked according to gender, the work they do, and the family they are born into. • Social relationships grow more formal and centralized.

18. Cultural ecologyThe study of the interaction of specific human cultures with their environment. EcosystemA system, or a functioning whole, composed of both the physical environment and the organisms living within it.

19. Procedures for Cultural Ecology • Analyze the interrelationship of a culture’s technology and its environment. • Analyze the patterns of behavior associated with a culture’s technology. • Determine the relation between those behavior patterns and the rest of the cultural system.

20. ProgressThe notion that humans are moving forward to a higher, more advanced stage in their development toward perfection.