Comparative Cultures Review Questions
Course Introduction
Comparative Cultures explores the diverse traditions, beliefs, values, and customs that shape societies around the world. Through examining themes such as religion, language, social organization, gender roles, and artistic expressions, students develop an understanding of both the uniqueness and interconnectedness of different cultures. The course encourages critical analysis of cultural practices, promotes cross-cultural communication, and fosters empathy by highlighting similarities and differences in worldviews. By engaging with case studies, multimedia resources, and group discussions, students gain a deeper appreciation of global diversity and its impact on contemporary issues.
Recommended Textbook
Cultural Anthropology 9th Edition by Raymond Scupin
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18 Chapters
1080 Verified Questions
1080 Flashcards
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Page 2
Chapter 1: Introduction to Anthropology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Anthropology, a scientific discipline, has no relationship with history, a humanistic discipline.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q2) The material products of former societies are known as __________.
A) artifacts
B) fossils
C) legacies
D) antiquaries
Answer: A
Q3) Even in the nineteenth century, anthropologists were aware of the dangers of ethnocentric beliefs and carefully promoted objective interpretations of other societies.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Page 3
Chapter 2: Human Evolution
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Sample Questions
Q1) How are archaeological cultures defined?
A) through comparison to contemporary hunter-gatherer societies
B) on the basis of distinctive artifacts left by prehistoric ethnic groups
C) by dating the natural materials used to produce nonutilitarian objects
D) according to how much trade occurred between different prehistoric population centers
Answer: B
Q2) Upper Paleolithic people gathered plants to supplement their food resources.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) Paleolithic hunters and gatherers lived mostly in marginal areas, such as dry desert regions.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q4) Burins are special projectile points for hunting large game like mammoths.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Chapter 3: Culture
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Sample Questions
Q1) The term "ideology" refers to __________.
A) signs and symbols used to communicate particular ideas
B) beliefs and values supporting the interests of a group
C) specific expressions of material culture
D) a faulty or misguided worldview
Answer: B
Q2) __________ is credited with providing us with the first detailed definition of culture, ". . . that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, arts, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society."
A) Leslie White
B)E. B. Tylor
C) Clifford Geertz
D) Marvin Harris
Answer: B
Q3) Anthropologists have determined that specific food preferences are biologically based and not culturally influenced.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Chapter 4: Psychological and Cognitive Anthropology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Culture allows humans to adjust to a wide range of physical environments.
A)True
B)False
Q2) According to psychologist Jean Piaget, learning occurs through the processes of __________.
A) assimilation and accommodation
B) enculturation and intimidation
C) absorption and cognation
D) affiliation and enculturation
Q3) After spending nine months in Samoa and working with individuals in three different villages, Margaret Mead concluded that __________.
A) Samoan society differed little from that of the United States in the 1920s
B) many key elements of Samoan culture had diffused from Thailand
C) Franz Boas's theories of cultural relativism had serious flaws
D) becoming an adult was less stressful in Samoa than in the United States
Q4) How have the ideas of human personality and development introduced by Sigmund Freud and Jean Piaget influenced anthropological understandings of culture and enculturation?
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Chapter 5: Language
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Sample Questions
Q1) Anthropologists use the ethnosemantic approach to study how different societies understand and classify everyday objects like animals, plants, and food.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is an example of linguistic relativism because it maintains that the world is experienced differently among different language communities.
A)True
B)False
Q3) John Lucy's research on the relationship among thought, language, and behavior showed that __________.
A) kinship terminology is tied to a perception of familial closeness
B) Hopi and English speakers had different perspectives on the passage of time
C) grammar affected the way Mayan and English speakers sorted objects
D) gender-biased terms reflect social categories
Q4) According to Herbert Terrace's research, chimpanzees are highly intelligent animals that can learn many signs, but cannot understand syntax.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 6: Anthropological Explanations
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Q1) Postmodernist anthropologists stress that ethnographers should present themselves as objective researchers.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The term "functionalism" in anthropology refers to the notion that __________.
A) ethnographers are competent observers of human culture
B) some societies are "functional" while others are "dysfunctional"
C) cultural practices function to fulfill specific needs in a given society
D) culture is transmitted through functions like rituals and ceremonies
Q3) It has been said that cultural ecology reduces human behavior to simple adaptations to the external environment, and that it does not take into consideration such things as history, political structure, and religious ideologies.
A)True
B)False
Q4) The opposite of cultural relativism is __________.
A) biological relativism
B) ethnocentrism
C) biological realism
D) historical particularism
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Chapter 7: Analyzing Sociocultural Systems
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Sample Questions
Q1) Participant observation is the only method cultural anthropologists use to collect data.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Anthropologists have concluded that band societies have been the basic type of sociocultural system for as long as __________ years.
A) 100
B) 10,000
C) one million
D) ten million
Q3) You have just been awarded a grant of $100,000 to conduct research among the Tingunee of the lower Quebin river valley. The Tingunee have never been visited by other peoples nor is anything known about their culture. What might your goal be in this study? Formulate a general research design to study the culture of these people. What research strategies might you employ, what data might you collect, and what concerns might you have in doing this study?
Q4) Foragers have practiced the same ways of life since Paleolithic times.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 8: Environment, Subsistence, and Demography
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Sample Questions
Q1) __________ are incentives for people to move from one society to another.
A) Demographic determinants
B) Migration factors
C) Push factors
D) Pull factors
Q2) The Nuer slaughter most of their cattle in the fall and store the meat for use over the year.
A)True
B)False
Q3) Before the Industrial Revolution, most societies depended on fossil fuels to support their ways of life.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Nuer subsistence, like that of many other pastoral peoples, __________.
A) is based primarily on the consumption of meat products
B) is based solely on cattle and pigs
C) depends heavily on the blood and milk of their animals
D) is largely based on crops and foraging, with herding only contributing a small portion to the diet
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Chapter 9: Technology and Economies
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Q1) A form of exchange in which the time of repayment and the value of the return are not calculated is called generalized reciprocity.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Anthropologist Alvin Wolfe has proposed that multinational corporations are beginning to evolve into supranational entities that are more powerful and influential than the nation-state.
A)True
B)False
Q3) The attempt to get something for nothing is called negative reciprocity.
A)True
B)False
Q4) __________ is an economic system in which the state owns the basic means of production.
A) Capitalism
B) Idealism
C) Socialism
D) Futurism
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Page 11
Chapter 10: Social Structure, The Family, Gender, and Age
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Q1) Because of both the strict marriage rules and postmarital residence rules found in hunter-gatherer societies, it is very difficult to obtain a divorce.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Discuss the social organization of chiefdoms. You should include such things as rank and status, family and kinship, and marriage and residence rules. Explain how these aspects of culture are interrelated.
Q3) In a conical clan, all members of the clan trace their descent from __________.
A) the chief
B) the grandmother of the chief
C) the patron god of the chief
D) a common ancestor
Q4) Societies recognize two kinds of status: __________ status, attached to a person from birth, and __________ status, based on a person's specific actions.
A) ascribed; achieved
B) natal; gained
C) birth; adult
D) born; won
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Chapter 11: Politics, Warfare, and Law
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following are used by Eskimo to resolve disputes?
A) song duels and wrestling matches
B) poetry contests and foot races
C) sled races and ice-fishing contests
D) cold weather ordeals and kayak races
Q2) Archaeologist Timothy Earle suggests that the key factor in the evolution of chiefdoms was which of the following?
A) regional symbiosis managed by descent groups
B) ceremonial trade and regional religious beliefs
C) control by individuals over resources and human labor
D) the storage and redistribution of food
Q3) Explain the segmentary lineage system and complementary opposition. Do you see any adaptive significance in this form of political organization?
Q4) Let us assume that the United States has just invaded Haiti and has installed a new government on the island. Will everyone in Haiti consider the new government to be a legitimate one or an illegitimate one? Why?
Q5) What are codified laws? How do they differ from other social controls? How and why do anthropologists think they evolved?
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Chapter 12: Religion and Aesthetics
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Sample Questions
Q1) In Polynesia, the term mana refers to which of the following?
A) a bread-like substance that appears in times of drought
B) elaborate forms of deference and expressions of humility
C) a cosmic force that certain individuals could acquire
D) the ritual of human sacrifice practiced at harvest time
Q2) The Lugbara build shrines and offer sacrifices to their ancestors based on the belief that __________.
A) the ghosts of their ancestors continue to interact with living lineage elders
B) such actions will prevent soul loss
C) they will one day be reincarnated
D) their ancestors will intercede with the sky deity in order to bring rain
Q3) Chiefs often maintained political legitimacy through rituals and religious beliefs.
A)True
B)False
Q4) In ancient agricultural states, religion sanctified and legitimized the authority of political leaders.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 13: Globalization, Culture, and Indigenous Societies
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Q1) One of the principal criticisms of modernization theory is that __________.
A) it holds Western industrial capitalist society as superior to all others
B) its proponents advocate a "back-to-nature" approach
C) it ignores the needs and rights of individual entrepreneurs
D) it promotes traditional family values
Q2) As the head of state of an underdeveloped nation, what are the public policies that you would implement if you wished to modernize your society?
Q3) Globalization refers to the rise of industrial states and the social, economic, political, and cultural consequences this industrialism has had on nonindustrial societies, among other things.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Immanuel Wallerstein, the chief proponent of world-systems theory, agrees with dependency theorists that industrial nations prosper through the economic domination and exploitation of nonindustrial peoples.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 14: Globalization in Latin America,Africa, and the Caribbean
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Q1) What were haciendas in the Spanish colonies and fazendas in Brazil?
A) large-scale plantations
B) prison camps
C) mining towns
D) military bases
Q2) Under apartheid in South Africa, the term "coloreds" referred to individuals of mixed __________ descent.
A) Spanish and Portuguese
B) African and European
C) Bantu and Zulu
D) Protestant and Catholic
Q3) The __________ established the Union of South Africa in 1910.
A) French
B) Germans
C) Portuguese
D) British
Q4) Agricultural land is more likely to be individually owned by peasants in open peasant communities.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 15: Globalization in the Middle East and Asia
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Q1) What changes did ethnologist Hani Fakhouri observe in the village of Kafr El-Elow as a result of increased industrialization? What effects did industrialization have on the lives of the fellaheen of this community?
Q2) The vast majority of people in the Middle East live in oil-rich countries.
A)True
B)False
Q3) The collapse of the jajmani system is related to which of the following?
A) Western conveniences that eliminated the need for certain services
B) the adoption of a single monetary system by a centralized government
C) the return of skilled artisans to their traditional villages
D) Indian independence and self-determination
Q4) The term for rural peasants in Egypt is fellaheen.
A)True
B)False
Q5) To what does the term purdah refer?
A) the idea of physical attractiveness and sensuality
B) the wearing of the veil and forced seclusion of Muslim women
C) the concept of the traditional extended family
D) bridewealth paid in traditional Islamic families
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Chapter 16: Ethnicity
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Q1) Compare and contrast two culturally pluralistic societies. What is the basis of cultural pluralism and how is it fostered and maintained in each of these societies? Do you think the United States is a culturally pluralistic society? Why or why not?
Q2) The end result of intermarriage between members of different ethnic groups is cultural pluralism.
A)True
B)False
Q3) Which of the following countries has the highest percentage of ethnic homogeneity?
A) China
B) Japan
C) Mexico
D) the United States
Q4) Which term refers to the systematic attempt to kill and totally eliminate a particular ethnic group?
A) apartheid
B) fratricide
C) ethnocide
D) genocide
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Page 18
Chapter 17: Contemporary Global Trends
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Q1) Thomas Malthus predicted that populations would grow much slower than the production of food and other resources needed to sustain the population.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Female infanticide has been virtually eliminated in China due to the one-child policy.
A)True B)False
Q3) Both Japan and the United States have become "postindustrial" societies. To what does the term "postindustrial" refer?
A) Large segments of their economies are devoted to providing services rather than manufacturing goods.
B) Their economies developed largely as a result of weapons manufacture during World War II.
C) In each country, the working class has achieved a higher standard of living than ever before.
D) Each was affected by the Industrial Revolution.
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Chapter 18: Applied Anthropology
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Sample Questions
Q1) The use of anthropology to offer practical solutions to problems faced by a society is known as basic anthropology.
A)True
B)False
Q2) What is Le Projet du Garbage?
A) a teaching exercise performed in archaeology labs
B) an ongoing archaeological project of the University of Arizona that studies the intricacies of Hohokam lifeways
C) a historical archaeology study conducted by Jim Deetz
D) a project that analyzes contemporary behaviors by studying what people throw away
Q3) Even though there are numerous pieces of legislation aimed at curtailing pot hunting, this practice still persists. The text example of the looting of the __________ is an excellent illustration of the problems that exist.
A) left bank of the Seine
B) Slack Farm site in Kentucky
C) southern banks of the Nile
D) Big Dog Site in Idaho
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