Anthropology is ‘the science of humanity,’ which studies human beings in aspects ranging from the biology and evolutionary history of Homo sapiens to the features of society and culture that decisively distinguish humans from other animal species. Learn more about the history and branches of anthropology in this article.
Physical anthropology is the branch that concentrates on the biology and evolution of humanity. The branches that study the social and cultural constructions of human groups are variously recognized as belonging to cultural anthropology (or ethnology), social anthropology, linguistic anthropology, and psychological anthropology.
Anthropology - Cultural, Biological, Archaeology: Cultural anthropology is that major division of anthropology that explains culture in its many aspects. It is anchored in the collection, analysis, and explanation (or interpretation) of the primary data of extended ethnographic field research. This discipline, both in America and in Europe, has long cast a wide net and includes various ...
Anthropology - Culture, Society, Human Behavior: A distinctive “social” or “cultural” anthropology emerged in the 1920s. It was associated with the social sciences and linguistics, rather than with human biology and archaeology. In Britain in particular social anthropologists came to regard themselves as comparative sociologists, but the assumption persisted that anthropologists were ...
Cultural anthropology, a major division of anthropology that deals with the study of culture in all of its aspects and that uses the methods, concepts, and data of archaeology, ethnography and ethnology, folklore, and linguistics in its descriptions and analyses of the diverse peoples of the world.
Anthropology - Cultural, Archaeological, Biological: The anthropology of religion is the comparative study of religions in their cultural, social, historical, and material contexts.