tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post4704373396360337811..comments2024-03-29T02:36:26.151-07:00Comments on TalkToYoUniverse: Considering the Culture in ObjectsJuliette Wadehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02879627074920760712noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-63407036148714309692008-07-25T10:48:00.000-07:002008-07-25T10:48:00.000-07:00Yeah, I admit to a strong interest in these areas ...Yeah, I admit to a strong interest in these areas and have thought a lot on how to apply anthropology and linguistics to SF writing. I don't have any degrees in any of the above although I have taken a handful of applied linguistics classes at the undergraduate level and a few at the graduate level. I also read whatever I can find on biological anthropology, cultural anthropology, archaeology, sociolinguistics and anthropological linguistics. <BR/><BR/>For fun reading, I would love to get a hold of the entire _Language in Society_ series by Blackwell Publishing, but so far only have _Anthropological Linguistics_ and _Sociolinguistic Theory_.<BR/><BR/>Must get _Pidgin and Creole Linguistics_. Must get _An Introduction to Contact Linguistics_. Must get them all! Mwahahahahahaha!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06108862144262381587noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-13997228030887934762008-07-25T09:07:00.000-07:002008-07-25T09:07:00.000-07:00Thanks for coming, Byron.You're obviously already ...Thanks for coming, Byron.<BR/>You're obviously already involved in a lot of these topics. I totally agree with you about the idea of the significance of objects to the members of the culture. I hinted at that a bit, I think, and I'll talk about it again in the future, but I have to keep my posts to a manageable size!Juliette Wadehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02879627074920760712noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6320269312957801390.post-64661965037575516112008-07-25T08:37:00.000-07:002008-07-25T08:37:00.000-07:00Ah, material culture. I pretty much agree with yo...Ah, material culture. I pretty much agree with you.<BR/><BR/>I'd just like to add, to a certain extent, much like Clifford Geertz's (I love his paper on the Balinese cockfight) idea that anthropology should be about "getting inside the native's head," I think the role of a science fiction writer is at least in part to get inside the head of an alien or person from another culture. Objects can go a long way towards those ends.<BR/><BR/>I think there's primarily two broad approaches to take with objects from a cultural anthropological perspective. There's the more scientific side of anthropology which focuses more on the relationship between culture and environment and biology. That a culture has many people brandishing rawhide whips tells you that cows are a part of the culture. It also may indicate that the environment is such that having whips may be beneficial (keeping cows out of the road? a way to get back out if you fall in a pit -- i.e, there's pits in the environment that it's a danger to fall in). Or the whip may be primarily a status symbol which brings us to my next point.<BR/><BR/>On the more humanities-based side of cultural anthropology comes the question of what the object means to the culture. For example, is the hearth considered a place of grime and heat, a hell on Earth? Or is it considered a warm, fuzzy place, nurturing and comforting? Or maybe it's considered a woman's kingdom, the place where no man better thwart her because she is the law there? Or maybe it's all three depending on the the gender and social status of the individuals within that culture. This thinking about what the object means (I learned a lot about thinking this way from Geertz's Balinese Cockfight) fascinates me.<BR/><BR/>Also, there's a third way, the way the individual may think about the object differently from the culture as a whole( for example, a personal phobia of rivers, or a hatred of coffee because you were drinking coffee when your mother died) but I think that's just basic characterization rather than anthropology.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06108862144262381587noreply@blogger.com