1. Franz Boas (1858-1942)

2.  Boas started the article showing the development of the methods of inquiry from the second half of the last century up to the present. http://www.sciography.com/franz-boas.htm

3. EVOLUTIONARY THOUGHT DIFFUSION AND MIGRATION  became the leading idea during the second half of the last century  Spencer, Morgan, Tylor and Lubbock (to name a few)  the idea of a general, uniform evolution of culture in which all parts of mankind participated.  became the counterpart of the evolutionary thought and provided new ideas for the present century  Foy, and Graebner with Elliot Smith and Rivers  In the present time, ethnological research is based on the concept of migration and dissemination rather than upon that of evolution.

4. Evolutionary point of view  that the development is explained in the full manner: the decorative forms are arranged in such order that the most representative forms are placed at the beginning.  William Henry Holmes  Boas’s critique on these two possibilities is that neither the one nor the other theory can be established without actual historical proof.

5. Diffusionist point of view  was taken up in detail particularly in America, which was applied to a much wider sense by Foy and Graebner  Radical English diffusionists like Smith and Rivers believed that all civilization had diffused from Egypt  Boas’ attack to the diffusionists’ idea is that historical contact is demanded for enormously large areas.

6. The Approach  Boas’s approach was to be purely inductive  He insisted that cultures could only be understood with respect to their unique historical development

7. The Approach  General Conclusion is that the history of human civilization does not appear to us as determined entirely by psychological necessity that leads to a uniform evolution the world over. It is rather that each cultural group has its own unique history, dependent partly upon the peculiar inner development of the social group, and partly upon the foreign influences to which it has been subjected.

8. Two points of analysis  (1) the process of gradual differentiation  (2) the process of leveling down differences between neighboring cultural centers Ilustration: comparison of the treatment of Zuni civilization - Frank Hamilton Cushing - modern students (Elsie Clews Parsons, A.L. Kroeber and Leslie Spier)

9.  Cushing believed that is was possible to explain Zuni culture entirely on the basis of the reaction of the Zuni mind to its geographical environment, and that the whole of the Zuni culture could be explained as the development which followed necessarily from the position in which the people were placed. Frank Hamilton Cushing and Zuni Indians J.W. Black, 1882, Smithsonian Institution (Wikimedia Commons )Wikimedia Commons http://www.sialis.org/zuni.htm

10.  Conclusively described that the deep influence which Spanish ideas have had on Zuni culture, give us one of the best examples of acculturation. http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicag o/E/bo3638666.html http://www.yosemite.ca.us/library/kroeber/

11.  theorized that all complex cultural traits diffused from Egypt  Boas’s critique on this idea is that it is very unlikely that ancient Mediterranean customs could be found at the present time particularly unchanged in different parts of the globe, as Smith’s theory demands. Grafton Elliot Smith http://acravan.blogspot.com/2013/04/rewriting-mystery.html

12.  Parallelism - critiqued by Boas by saying that there should not be too much inclination to look for these similarities in detailed customs but rather in certain dynamic conditions which are due to social or psychological causes that are liable to lead to similar results

13.  Parallelism - Two examples indicated in the article are: (1) relation between food supply and population; and (2) those cases in hiwch a certain problem confronting man may be solved by a limited number of methods only (for instance, marriage). A regular sequence of these may accompany both the (a) the development of the psychological or social status and (b) the development of rationalism.

14.  The key aspect of Boas’ theoretical position is equifinality. Here, he argues that the present similar traits in many societies is not necessarily evidenced either for psychic unity or large-scale diffusion. They may be the result of convergent evolution and independent invention.

15.  Generally, Boas’ ideas towards other principles show that he does not entirely disapprove them. It is evident that he provided his own explanation.

16.  Boas partly agreed and is interested with the diffusionist, he just does not believe that culture traits takes the form of what the radical diffusionist like Smith believed it does.  Boas also has a part with the evolutionists (where they see all cultures as sharing the same developmental program). Boas believed that each individual has its own unique developmental arrangement (or as Ruth Benedict puts it, “configuration”).

17.  With Boas insisting that cultures could only be understood with respect to their unique historical development, building a theory (which involves comparison and generalization), seems unlikely that there could ever be a broad theoretical propositions that can be generated.