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Anthropology (literally, "humankind-study") is the scientific investigation of diversity in humans--diversity in their bodies and diversity in their behavior.  Another way to think about anthropology is as the study of what is necessary and possible for humans.  By studying the range of human bodies and behaviors, we can see what is common to all humanity as well as what is unique to each group and what the "limits" of humanity are.
 
Anthropology is commonly divided into four subfields:
Cultural or social anthropology--studies the diversity of human behavior in the present.
Physical anthropology--studies the diversity of human bodies in the past and present
Archaeology--studies the diversity of human behavior in the past
Linguistic anthropology--studies the diversity of human language in the past and present
 
William Haviland calls anthropology "the most liberating of sciences."  Anthropology does have the potential to liberate people from the assumptions and authorities of their own cultures--it tells us that there are other possible (and even quite successful) ways of being human.  Therefore, what we have always done or felt or believed is not what all humans do or feel or believe.
Anthropology can be liberating, it is clear, but it can also be corrosive--it can dissolve the certainty that our culture, our ways of being in the world and all the things we thought were real and true, are just man-made belief systems.  If they are different in other societies and in other times in history, then there may appear to be no reason why should not be different in our society.

American Anthropological Association

Anthropology News (Science Daily)

Anthropology World News (Texas A&M University)

International Affairs Resources

CIA World Factbook

University of Texas map library

Refdesk--the ultimate online reference site

See other books on anthropology by Jack David Eller

Professor Eller's new textbook
in Cultural Anthropology
culturalanthropologybookcover.jpg
Dr. Jack David Eller
Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Community College of Denver
Campus Box 850
PO Box 173363
Denver CO 80217
 
303-556-2475

Or e-mail:

david.eller@ccd.edu

  

Better Living Through Anthropology