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Hunter-gatherers Characteristics

Hunter-gatherers Characteristics. For each of these you should know : what it means how/why it is adaptive for their chosen subsistence strategy h ow it relates to / affects the other characteristics on the list. mobility small group size food sharing egalitarianism communal property

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Hunter-gatherers Characteristics

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  1. Hunter-gatherersCharacteristics • For each of these you should know: • what it means • how/why it is adaptive for their chosen subsistence strategy • how it relates to / affects the other characteristics on the list • mobility • small group size • food sharing • egalitarianism • communal property • rarity of warfare Use p. 413-417 to complete your explanations. I will come around and award classwork points for completing this assignment.

  2. Be sure to include the following in your notes: • definition of carrying capacity • how hunter-gatherers keep populations low – this answer refers to a biological adaptation not just a cultural one • the only status differences among hunter-gatherers (hint: there are two) • hunter-gatherers and surplus • hunter-gatherers and a concept of land ownership

  3. Hunter-gatherersCharacteristics • rarity of warfare • How do you define war? • Early ethnographies - !Kung, Mbuti Pygmies – reported few deadly conflicts. • Carol Ember (1970s) • 64% - war at least once every two years • 26% - war less often • 10% - war extremely rare • Lawrence Keeley (1990s) • 25-30% adult males die violently • That’s the same as 2 billion deaths in the 20th C.

  4. Hunter-gatherersCharacteristics rarity of warfare? • Why do we care? • Whether war is frequent or rare reveals what about hunter-gatherers’ nature? • Why would we want to know whether hunter-gatherers are naturally violent or not? • What subsistence strategy have most humans used for most of history?

  5. Hunter-gatherersCharacteristics rarity of warfare? • Why would we want to compare rates of violence of our ancestors (hunter-gatherers) to rates of violence in modern society? • What do anthropologists have to assume about modern hunter-gatherers in order to understand whether modern society has made us more or less violent?

  6. !Kung Inuit (Netsilik) Tlingit • tundra / sea coast • scarce resources: most calories from hunting • temperate rainforest / sea coast • very abundant resources: mostly hunting & fishing • grasslands / semi-arid desert • semi-abundant resources: both hunting & gathering

  7. Which one: !Kung, Tlingit, or Inuit (Netsilik)? • live in settled communities with permanent housing? • believe in 3 gods – one hates humans, the other is a moody baby, and the last one just sorta puts up with humans? • are able to accumulate some personal wealth? • near gender equality: neither gender is dominant? • work an average of 17 hours per week?

  8. Hunter-gatherers are SAVAGES! • Anthropology became a field of study in the 1800s. The first anthropologists described hunter-gatherers as inferior, primitive savages. STEREOTYPES • culturally poor: no art, no literature, etc. • Ignorant & primitive • very low status for women • must slave long hours just to get the bare minimum to survive • are unhealthy

  9. Hunter-gatherers are NOBLE SAVAGES. • The myth of the NOBLE SAVAGE arose later among anthropologists and romanticized hunter-gatherers as the ideal human, far superior to us. STEREOTYPES • They share everything and live in perfectly harmonious, close-knit groups. • They have a deeper respect for the environment. • Their lifestyle is much healthier than ours.

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