1. Theme: Relativism What is epistemology? What is relativism?
How are they related?
What is cultural relativism?

2. Ruth Benedict

3. Gene Weltfish

4. Theme: Objective/Subjective
What distinguishes objective and subjective?
What range of meanings and applied contexts can you come up with for both terms?

5. Applications When is one emphasized or valued over the other?
Which academic disciplines seem aligned with these terms?

6. Anthropology
What are possible (or proper) subjects for anthropological research?
How is anthropology related to travel (also in its abstract sense)?

7. Bronislaw Malinowski

8. Raymond Firth

9. Claude Levi-Strauss

10. Marshall Sahlins

11. Mary Douglas

12. Pierre Bourdieu

13. Defining Description
What is meant, in everyday speech, by description?
If I asked for a detailed description, what would you assume I meant by this?
What is worthy of a detailed description?
How might this apply to cultural matters?

14. Examples for Practice Registration procedures Graduation ceremony
A birthday party
A vacation on the east coast

15. Theme: Native What does native mean, either as an adjective or a noun?
What range of senses does it convey?
What distinguishes natives from strangers?
How does this function in Taiwan?

16. Clifford Geertz ( )

17. Geertz and Culture
How does Geertz define culture? (or what authors help him to define it)
Can you envision a specific situation from his definition?
What does he seem to reject from a definition of culture?
passages: 4-5

18. Twitch and Wink
What does all this business about twitches and winks mean?
What other behaviors come to mind which have this dual meaning problem?
Why might they not be translatable across cultural lines?
What links arise to epistemology?
passage: 7

19. Cultural Specificity
Consider: words, gestures, postures, situations, etc. which are culturally specific, offensive between cultures, unintelligible outside of certain situations, etc.
What are you aware of?

21. Construction
Geertz refers to his own representation as a “construction”—what does he mean by this?
How does it refer back to the uncertainties that he just finished discussing about winks, twitches, and conspiracies?
passage: 9

22. Document What is meant by “culture, this acted document”?
Or, how can “human behavior” be “symbolic action”?
What does Geertz mean in these phrases?
passage: 10

23. Semiotics and Culture
What does Geertz mean by a semiotic view or understanding of culture?
Is semiotics a dirty word?
Is this sort of relativism to your liking? What are the consequences for travel writing?
passage: 14

24. Marvin Harris ( )

25. Defining emics/etics
What basic definition of emics and etics does Harris offer?
What is your initial reaction to this divide?
What applications first come to mind?
passage: 31

26. Relativism, Again?
Is this distinction between the terms an example of relativism?
If it is, is it a problematic relativism?

27. Science
Note that for etic distinctions, Harris mentions “scientific observers.”
How would such an observer differ from the average person chosen randomly off the street?
passage: 32-33

28. Outsider/Insider
How are the terms outsider and insider used in respect to the system? Note how Harris criticizes the possible outcome that the participant is more trustworthy than the outsider observer.
Try to find concrete examples that would support this idea or throw it into doubt, keeping our focus in mind.

29. Judgments of Validity
Assertions from emic or etic viewpoints can be shown to be wrong—how?
What different criteria are used to demonstrate incorrectness? Do you agree with this?
What is suggested about the dynamics between individual and community in Harris’s statements?

30. Intentional Fallacy/Authorship
Some literary critics claim that one becomes an outsider to one’s own work and experience.
How might this affect the member of a community’s observation of his or her own community?

31. Political Dimension How does the emic/etic problem become politicized?
What other struggles might this problem be linked to?
passage: 33

32. Harris: Objective/Subjective
How does Harris distinguish the terms objective and subjective in regard to the key words?
Which is connected to which? Which is applicable and which is not and for what reason?
passage: 34

33. Contradictions
What contradictions arise in the study of emics and etics between observers and participants?
Could you expand Harris’s examples, perhaps in less scholarly contexts?
You might consider the problem of the Jamesian narrator.
passage: 37

34. The Travel Narrative
How is written culture implicated in the discussion of emics and etics in the past?
Why is this question relevant to some of our travel narratives, especially ones in which we do not have surviving data from those who are being described (or the events they participate in)?

35. Thick Description and Emics
Is thick description an antidote to the hazards of emic inaccessibility?
Or, does it merely underline the problems of getting “inside” the thoughts or cultures of others?

36. Geertz vs. Harris
Is Geertz’s apparent call for an emic-centered anthropology misguided after reading Harris?
passage: 14 (Geertz)

37. Anthropological Applications
How might these anthropological concepts be applied to what we have read so far?
Goethe
Dickens
James
Darwin
Guevara

38. Topic #1
Offer a general description of relativism. Consider some of its consequences and applications. Keep in mind that I don’t want to read some definition off the Internet; rather, I want the definition to come from your own reflections as mediated by our reading and discussion. Apply this idea to one or more texts we have read this term. You may wish to discuss your ideas with me before writing this part of the response.

39. Topic #2
Explain how (cultural or social) anthropology, as you understand it from our class, is linked to travel narratives (or could be). Like in topic one, rely upon your own knowledge to characterize the discipline of anthropology. Are any of our authors doing something that resembles anthropology? Try to be specific about passages in our reading.

40. Topic #3
Discuss the “constructed” sense of culture appearing in one or more of the works we have read. I urge using Geertz to help in this process since his text is the origin of this phrase. You might start by briefly describing what Geertz means by this idea.

41. Topic #4
Offer an overview of the emic/etic problem as discussed in our theoretical reading (probably Harris, but possibly Geertz). After describing it, describe some of the consequences for travel writing. I urge you to make some reference to our reading by finding a passage or two where it is relevant.

42. Topic #5
How might illness or disease serve as a metaphor in the Kinglake excerpt? You might start with a more general idea of disease as symbolic to establish some range of meaning, and then to narrow it to Kinglake. You might also take into account his own peculiar attitudes towards infection or the specific qualities or identities of the victims he names.

43. Topic #6
Discuss the idea of discomfort in travel by comparing two works, one of which should be Kinglake. I urge finding a main point structure for comparison.

44. Topic #7
Discuss Kinglake’s Eurocentric understanding of Egypt and its monuments. This could be approached as an expository paper in which you systematically deal with a few categories descriptively. Alternately, it could be an argumentative or comparative paper. Again, two or three main points would be advisable to give this answer a clear structure.

45. For Next Time Read: Kinglake, Eothen, Chapters XVIII-XX, pp. 118-138
Response #2 due date: May 2