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  • Essay / Ethnography as a method of anthropology

    Anthropology has been understood as an "eclectic discipline in terms of methods" according to Bernard and Gravlee's statement (p.8), the increasing scope of anthropology on the humanities after anthropologists decided to develop a range exponentially growing number of social research methods and procedures. due to the ability of anthropology to adapt to almost all contexts and situations, it has allowed this science to explain the origins of several human manifestations and collective thoughts such as religion, politics, economics and it even dwells on the most biological aspect of science by explaining the stages of evolution. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayBut one of the broadest concepts developed by anthropology is culture in all its complexity. In fact, anthropology has adapted and delved into the studies of different cultures that it has also developed an approach known as "cultural anthropology" which holistically studies the human being in which “the whole” (all the elements involved in the complete context of the phenomenon) provides an explanation of the behavior of all the elements. that come together to form the fabric that is culture itself. Although anthropology cannot be considered a "rocket science" like mathematics or physics, it uses several methods to measure and collect data that allow an approximation of the phenomenon being studied. Ethnography is one of the methods on which anthropology relies to study societies and civilizations. This is how researchers learn about the way of life of a concrete society or social group by using tools such as participant observation or interviewing to document and archive all data. Ethnography approaches the phenomenon or objective of study with the expectation of interpreting and understanding a reality that interacts with a broader context. Its objective is more focused on the acquisition of knowledge and theoretical approaches rather than on solving practical problems. All information obtained is taken into consideration, to understand how subjects act, speak and think, it is important to consider verbal and non-verbal information, this also leads to understanding their understanding of the world and events, of "who is happening” (technically, this is the performance that researchers claim to understand). An ethnographic study only brings together the global or collective vision of the social context studied. Once we know how anthropology approaches culture(s) and human manifestations and know (at least) one of its methods, we might get closer to a definition for culture, but define culture is not an easy task because many authors and researchers have adopted a specific theoretical position based on their studies, research and experiences (may also be related to personal biases), but there are many converging factors among all these concepts and definitions proposed by all these authors. One of the first to establish a definition of culture was Tylor (1871). Its definition lays the foundations of what we call “folklore” (the knowledge of the people) which includes all manifestations. which results from cultural movement such as: belief systems or religions, artistic expressions, morals, laws, social orders and other habits and abilities acquired by men within the framework of their society. Franz Boas (1938) and Malinowski (1941) proposed aspects.