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Hunter Gatherer

Hunter gatherer

A hunter-gatherer society is in anthropological terms one whose predominant method of subsistence involves the direct procurement of edible plants and animals from the wild (or "foraging"), without significant recourse to the domestication of either. The demarcation between hunter-gatherers and other societies which rely on more managed techniques such as agriculturalism and pastoralism is not a clean one, as many societies typically utilise a range of strategies to obtain the foodstuffs required to sustain their community.

Historical context

The hunter-gatherer economy was employed by all human societies up towards the end of the Palaeolithic period. The transition into the subsequent Neolithic period is chiefly defined by the development of nascent agricultural practices. The spread of agriculture originated in several different areas and periods, starting from approximately 12,000 years ago, and it proceeded at different rates. Many groups continued to practice hunter-gatherer ways of life, although their numbers have progressively declined as a result of pressure from growing agricultural communities. In many instances territories which were formerly unrestricted to hunter-gatherers were encroached upon by the farming settlements of early agrarian communities. In the resulting competition for land use, hunter-gatherer societies either adopted these practices or relocated to other areas. Since the colonial period, genocide has been another common way for colonizers to gain possession of hunter-gatherer territories. The few contemporary hunter-gatherer groups which exist today usually live in areas seen as undesirable for agricultural use.

Habitat and population

Hunter-gatherer societies tend to be relatively mobile, given their reliance upon the ability of a given natural environment to provide sufficient resources in order to sustain their population, and the variable availability of these resources owing to local climatic and seasonal conditions. Their population densities tend to be lower than those of agriculturalists, since cultivated land is capable of sustaining population densities 60–100 times greater than land left uncultivated. Individual bands tend to be small in number, but these may gather together seasonally to temporarily form a larger group. Hunter-gatherer settlements may be either permanently or temporarily based, or some combination of the two, depending in part upon the range of territory the community needs to cover. Shelter constructions typically use impermanent building materials, particularly when the community leads a nomadic existence. Natural rock shelters may also be used, where they are available.

Methods of study

Archaeological evidence must be used to learn about prehistoric hunter-gatherers, and ethnographic studies, as well as historical information, provide information about living or historic hunter-gatherers. When possible, archaeology and ethnography have been combined, since the 1960s, under the name ethnoarchaeology, to provide more insight into the hunter-gatherer past. The new sciences of evolutionary biology and paleoethnobotany are also providing insights.

Common characteristics

Hunter-gatherer societies also tend to have non-hierarchical social structures, but this is not always the case. Some are more nomadic or mobile (usually in environments with fewer resources), and they generally are not able to store surplus food. Thus, full-time leaders, bureaucrats, or artisans are rarely supported by these societies. Others, such as the Haida of present-day British Columbia, lived in such a rich environment that they could remain sedentary, and other groups that live in the North American northwest coast can similarly remain sedentary for a majority of the year. These groups demonstrate more hierarchical social organization. Typically, men hunt and women gather, but this is not a given. At the 1966 "Man the Hunter" conference, anthropologists Richard B. Lee and Irven DeVore suggested that egalitarianism was one of several central characteristics of nomadic hunting and gathering societies because mobility requires minimization of material possessions throughout a population; therefore, there was no surplus of resources to be accumulated by any single member. Other characteristics Lee and DeVore proposed were flux in territorial boundaries as well as in demographic composition. At the same conference, Marshall Sahlins presented a paper entitled, "Notes on the Original Affluent Society," in which he challenged the popular view of hunter-gatherers living lives "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short," as Thomas Hobbes had put it in 1651. According to Sahlins, ethnographic data indicated that hunter-gatherers worked far fewer hours and enjoyed more leisure than typical members of industrial society, and they still ate well. Their "affluence" came from the idea that they are satisfied with very little in the material sense. This, he said, constituted a Zen economy. One way to divide hunter-gatherer groups is by their return systems. James Woodburn uses the categories "immediate return" hunter-gatherers (egalitarian) and "delayed return" (nonegalitarian). Immediate return foragers consume their food within a day or two after they procure it. Delayed return foragers store the surplus food (Kelly, 31).

Problems with generalizing

The line between agricultural and hunter-gatherer societies is not clear cut. Many hunter-gatherers consciously manipulate the landscape through cutting or burning undesirable plants while encouraging desirable ones, some even going to the extent of slash-and-burn to create habitat for game animals. Some agriculturalists also hunt and gather (e.g. farming during the frost-free season and hunting during the winter). Still today many in developed countries will go hunting for food and for leisure.

Symbolic culture

Examples of the relatively few hunter-gatherer symbolic systems that have survived are ochre remains, Mousterian paired markings, the hand prints and stencils of Arnhem Land, the markings of Koonalda Cave in Australia, and cave painting. These appear to be more ritualistic than practical. (Many of them constitute rock art.) We have little idea of what the more fleeting symbols used in communicating across a hunting territory looked like, although the 8,000-6,500 year old European [http://www.omniglot.com/writing/vinca.htm Vinca script] may give us a tantalising glipse of what such marks may have looked like. The archaeological evidence for multi-hole flutes dating from 36,000 years ago suggests that music and musical systems must have been known among many prehistoric hunter-gatherers (see [http://www.everything-science.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=82&Itemid=2&PHPSESSID=15fbfd3ae2d66117748dbd0988eeefcb Everything Science]). A possibly older flute has been found, but its identity is not widely accepted (see [http://cogweb.ucla.edu/ep/FluteDebate.html Is this bone a Neanderthal flute?]). Some conclusions may be drawn from historic and modern hunter-gatherers: body decoration, singing, and storytelling were likely forms of prehistoric hunter-gatherer cultural expression (in everyday life or the performance of rituals). There is some archaeological evidence for complex forms of sewing using pattern-cutting, as well as strong archaeological evidence for stone carving and etchings on bone. It is unlikely that we will ever know all of the aspects of prehistoric hunter-gatherer culture.

Modern context

It has recently been claimed that, in most cases, these groups do not have a continuous history of hunting and gathering, and that in many cases their ancestors were agriculturalists who were pushed into marginal areas as a result of migrations and wars. These theories imply that, because the "pure hunter-gatherer" "disappeared" not long after colonial contact began (see European Colonization of Africa, European colonization of the Americas, European Colonization of Australia), nothing can be learned about prehistoric hunter-gatherers from studies of modern ones (Kelly, 24-29); however, specialists who study hunter-gatherer ecology (see Cultural ecology) vehemently disagree. There are contemporary hunter-gatherer peoples whose contact with external societies, and whose way of life continues with very little external influence. One such group are the Pila Nguru or the Spinifex People of Western Australia, whose habitat in the Great Victoria Desert has proved unsuitable for European agriculture (and even pastoralism). Another are the Sentinelese of the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean, who live on North Sentinel Island and to date have maintained their independent existence, repelling attempts to engage with and contact them.

Social movements

There are some modern social movements related to the hunter-gatherer lifestyle:
- freeganism involves gathering of discarded food in the context of an urban environment
- gleaning involves the gathering of food that traditional farmers have left behind in their fields
- anarcho-primitivism, which strives for the abolishment of civilization and the return to a life in the wild
- paleolithic diet, which strives to achieve a diet similar to that of ancient hunter-gatherer groups.

References

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Further reading


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See also


- Bushmen
- Pygmies
- Inuit
- Spinifex People
- Neolithic Revolution
- Indigenous peoples
- Human migration

External links


- [http://www.pygmies.info/ African Pygmies] Culture and photos of these African hunter-gatherers. Category:Anthropology Category:Economies ja:狩猟採集社会

Anthropology

Anthropology (from the Greek word άνθρωπος, "humane") consists of the study of humankind (see genus Homo). It is holistic in two senses: it is concerned with all humans at all times, and with all dimensions of humanity. A primary trait that traditionally distinguished anthropology from other humanistic disciplines is an emphasis on cross-cultural comparisons. This distinction has, however, become increasingly the subject of controversy and debate, with anthropological methods now being commonly applied in single society/group studies. In the United States, anthropology is traditionally divided into four sub-disciplines:
- physical anthropology, which studies primate behavior, human evolution, and population genetics; this field is also sometimes called biological anthropology.
- cultural anthropology, (called social anthropology in the United Kingdom and now often known as socio-cultural anthropology). Areas studied by cultural anthropologists include social networks, diffusion, social behavior, kinship patterns, law, politics, ideology, religion, beliefs, patterns in production and consumption, exchange, socialization, gender, and other expressions of culture, with strong emphasis on the importance of fieldwork, i.e living among the social group being studied for an extended period of time;
- linguistic anthropology, which studies variation in language across time and space, the social uses of language, and the relationship between language and culture; and
- archaeology, which studies the material remains of human societies. Archaeology itself is normally treated as a separate (but related) field in the rest of the world, although closely related to the anthropological field of material culture, which deals with physical objects created or used within a living or past group as mediums of understanding its cultural values. More recently, some anthropology programs began dividing the field into two, one emphasizing the humanities and critical theory, the other emphasizing the natural sciences and empirical observation.

Historical and institutional context

:Main Article: History of anthropology The anthropologist Eric Wolf once characterized anthropology as the most scientific of the humanities, and the most humanistic of the sciences. Understanding how anthropology developed contributes to understanding how it fits into other academic disciplines. Contemporary anthropologists claim a number of earlier thinkers as their forebearers and the discipline has several sources. However, anthropology can best be understood as an outgrowth of the Age of Enlightenment. It was during this period that Europeans attempted systematically to study human behavior. Traditions of jurisprudence, history, philology and sociology developed during this time and informed the development of the social sciences of which anthropology was a part. At the same time, the romantic reaction to the Enlightenment produced thinkers such as Herder and later Wilhelm Dilthey whose work formed the basis for the culture concept which is central to the discipline. These intellectual movements in part grappled with one of the greatest paradoxes of modernity: as the world is becoming smaller and more integrated, people's experience of the world is increasingly atomized and dispersed. As Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels observed in the 1840s: :All old-established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries, whose introduction becomes a life and death question for all civilized nations, by industries that no longer work up indigenous raw material but raw material drawn from the remotest zones; industries whose products are consumed, not only at home, but in every quarter of the globe. In place of the old wants, satisfied by the production of the country, we find new wants, requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands and climes. In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal interdependence of nations. Ironically, this universal interdependence, rather than leading to greater human solidarity, has coincided with increasing racial, ethnic, religious, and class divisions, and new – and to some confusing or disturbing – cultural expressions. These are the conditions of life with which people today must contend, but they have their origins in processes that began in the 16th century and accelerated in the 19th century. Institutionally anthropology emerged from natural history (expounded by authors such as Buffon). This was the study of human beings - typically people living in European colonies. Thus studying the language, culture, physiology, and artifacts of European colonies was more or less equivalent to studying the flora and fauna of those places. It was for this reason, for instance, that Lewis Henry Morgan could write monographs on both The League of the Iroquois and The American Beaver and His Works. This is also why the material culture of 'civilized' nations such as China have historically been displayed in fine arts museums alongside European art while artifacts from Africa or Native North American cultures were displayed in Natural History Museums with dinosaur bones and nature dioramas. This being said, curatorial practice has changed dramatically in recent years, and it would be wrong to see anthropology as merely an extension of colonial rule and European chauvinism, since its relationship to imperialism was and is complex. Anthropology grew increasingly distinct from natural history and by the end of the nineteenth century the discipline began to crystallize into its modern form - by 1935, for example, it was possible for T.K. Penniman to write a history of the discipline entitled A Hundred Years of Anthropology. At the time, the field was dominated by 'the comparative method'. It was assumed that all societies passed through a single evolutionary process from the most primitive to most advanced. Non-European societies were thus seen as evolutionary 'living fossils' that could be studied in order to understand the European past. Scholars wrote histories of prehistoric migrations which were sometimes valuable but often also fanciful. It was during this time that Europeans first accurately traced Polynesian migrations across the Pacific Ocean for instance - although some of them believed it originated in Egypt. Finally, the concept of race was actively discussed as a way to classify - and rank - human beings based on inherent biological difference. In the twentieth century academic disciplines began to organize around three main domains. The "sciences" seeks to derive natural laws through reproducible and falsifiable experiments. The "humanities" reflected an attempt to study different national traditions, in the form of history and the arts, as an attempt to provide people in emerging nation-states with a sense of coherence. The "social sciences" emerged at this time as an attempt to develop scientific methods to address social phenomena, in an attempt to provide a universal basis for social knowledge. Anthropology does not easily fit into one of these categories, and different branches of anthropology draw on one or more of these domains. Drawing on the methods of the natural sciences as well as developing new techniques involving not only structured interviews but unstructured "participant-observation" – and drawing on the new theory of evolution through natural selection, they proposed the scientific study of a new object: "humankind," conceived of as a whole. Crucial to this study is the concept "culture," which anthropologists defined both as a universal capacity and propensity for social learning, thinking, and acting (which they see as a product of human evolution and something that distinguishes Homo sapiens – and perhaps all species of genus Homo – from other species), and as a particular adaptation to local conditions that takes the form of highly variable beliefs and practices. Thus, "culture" not only transcends the opposition between nature and nurture; it transcends and absorbs the peculiarly European distinction between politics, religion, kinship, and the economy as autonomous domains. Anthropology thus transcends the divisions between the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities to explore the biological, linguistic, material, and symbolic dimensions of humankind in all forms.

Anthropology in the U.S.

Anthropology in the United States was pioneered by staff of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Smithsonian Institution's Bureau of American Ethnology, such as John Wesley Powell and Frank Hamilton Cushing. Academic Anthropology was established by Franz Boas, who used his positions at Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History to train and develop multiple generations of students. Boasian anthropology was politically active and suspicious of research dictated by the U.S. government or wealthy patrons. It was also rigorously empirical and skeptical of over-generalizations and attempts to establish universal laws. Boas studied immigrant children in order to demonstrate that biological race was not immutable and that human conduct and behavior was the result of nurture rather than nature. Drawing on his German roots, he argued that the world was full of distinct 'cultures' rather than societies whose evolution could be measured by how much or how little 'civilization' they had. Boas felt that each culture has to be studied in its particularity, and argued that cross-cultural generalizations like those made in the natural sciences were not possible. In doing so Boas fought discrimination against immigrants, African Americans, and Native North Americans. Many American anthropologists adopted Boas' agenda for social reform, and theories of race continue to be popular targets for anthropologists today. Boas's first generation of students included Alfred Kroeber, Robert Lowie, and Edward Sapir. All of these scholars produced richly detailed studies which were first to describe Native North America. In doing so they provided a wealth of details used to attack the theory of a single evolutionary process. Their focus on Native American languages also helped establish linguistics as a truly general science and free it from its historical focus on Indo-European languages. The publication of Alfred Kroeber's textbook Anthropology marked a turning point in American anthropology. After three decades of amassing material the urge to generalize grew. This was most obvious in the 'Culture and Personality' studies carried out by younger Boasians such as Margaret Mead and Ruth Benedict. Influenced by psychoanalytic psychologists such as Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, these authors sought to understand the way that individual personalities were shaped by the wider cultural and social forces in which they grew up. While such works as Coming of Age in Samoa and The Chrysanthemum and the Sword remain popular with the American public, Mead and Benedict never had the impact on the discipline of anthropology that some expected. Boas had planned for Ruth Benedict to succeed him as chair of Columbia's anthropology department, but she was sidelined by Ralph Linton and Mead was limited to her offices at the AMNH.

Anthropology in Britain

Whereas Boas picked his opponents to pieces through attention to detail, in Britain modern anthropology was formed by rejecting historical reconstruction in the name of a science of society that focused on analyzing how societies held together in the present. The two most important names in this tradition were Alfred Reginald Radcliffe-Brown and Bronislaw Malinowski, both of whom released seminal works in 1922. Radcliffe-Brown's initial fieldwork in the Andaman Islands was carried out in the old style, but after reading Émile Durkheim he published an account of his research (entitled simply The Andaman Islanders) which drew heavily on the French sociologist. Over time he developed an approach known as structural-functionalism, which focused on how institutions in societies worked to balance out or create an equilibrium in the social system to keep it functioning harmoniously. Malinowski, on the other hand, advocated an unhyphenated 'functionalism' which examined how society functioned to meet individual needs. Malinowski is best known not for his theory, however, but for his detailed ethnography and advances in methodology. His classic Argonauts of the Western Pacific advocated getting 'the native's point of view' and an approach to field work that became standard in the field. Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown's success stem from the fact that they, like Boas, actively trained students and aggressively built up institutions which furthered their programmatic ambitions. This was particularly the case with Radcliffe-Brown, who spread his agenda for 'Social Anthropology' by teaching at universities across the Commonwealth. From the late 1930s until the post-war period a string of monographs and edited volumes appeared which cemented the paradigm of British Social Anthropology. Famous ethnographies include The Nuer by Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard and The Dynamics of Clanship Among the Tallensi by Meyer Fortes, while well known edited volumes include African Systems of Kinship and Marriage and African Political Systems.

Anthropology in France

Anthropology in France has a less clear genealogy than the British and American traditions. Most commentators consider Marcel Mauss to be the founder of the French anthropological tradition. Mauss was a member of Durkheim's Annee Sociologique group, and while Durkheim and others examined the state of modern societies, Mauss and his collaborators (such as Henri Hubert and Robert Hertz) drew on ethnography and philology to analyze societies which were not as 'differentiated' as European nation states. In particular, Mauss's Essay on the Gift was to prove of enduring relevance in anthropological studies of exchange and reciprocity. Throughout the interwar years, French interest in anthropology often dovetailed with wider cultural movements such as surrealism and primitivism which drew on ethnography for inspiration. Marcel Griaule and Michel Leiris are examples of people who combined anthropology with the French avant-garde. During this time most of what is known as ethnologie was restricted to museums, and anthropology had a close relationship with studies of folklore. Above all, however, it was Claude Lévi-Strauss who helped institutionalize anthropology in France. In addition to the enormous influence his structuralism exerted across multiple disciplines, Lévi-Strauss established ties with American and British anthropologists. At the same time he established centers and laboratories within France to provide an institutional context within anthropology while training influential students such as Maurice Godelier and Francoise Heritier who would prove influential in the world of French anthropology. Much of the distinct character of France's anthropology today is a result of the fact that most anthropology is carried out in nationally-funded research laboratories rather than academic departments in universities.

Anthropology after World War Two

Before WWII British 'social anthropology' and American 'cultural anthropology' were still distinct traditions. It was after the war that the two would blend to create a 'sociocultural' anthropology. In the 1950s and mid-1960s anthropology tended increasingly to model itself after the natural sciences. Some, such as Lloyd Fallers and Clifford Geertz, focused on processes of modernization by which newly independent states could develop. Others, such as Julian Steward and Leslie White focused on how societies evolve and fit their ecological niche - an approach popularized by Marvin Harris. Economic anthropology as influenced by Karl Polanyi and practiced by Marshall Sahlins and George Dalton focused on how traditional economics ignored cultural and social factors. In England, British Social Anthropology's paradigm began to fragment as Max Gluckman and Peter Worsley experimented with Marxism and authors such as Rodney Needham and Edmund Leach incorporated Lévi-Strauss's structuralism into their work. Structuralism also influenced a number of development in 1960s and 1970s, including cognitive anthropology and componential analysis. Authors such as David Schneider, Clifford Geertz, and Marshall Sahlins developed a more fleshed-out concept of culture as a web of meaning or signification, which proved very popular within and beyond the discipline. In keeping with the times, much of anthropology became politicized through the Algerian War of Independence and opposition to the Vietnam War; Marxism became a more and more popular theoretical approach in the discipline. By the 1970s the authors of volumes such as Reinventing Anthropology worried about anthropology's relevance. In the 1980s issues of power, such as those examined in Eric Wolf's Europe and the People Without History - were central to the discipline. Books like Anthropology and the Colonial Encounter pondered anthropology's ties to colonial inequality, while the immense popularity of theorists such as Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault moved issues of power and hegemony into the spotlight. Gender and sexuality became a popular topic, as did the relationship between history and anthropology, influenced by Marshall Sahlins (again) who drew on Lévi-Strauss and Fernand Braudel to examine the relationship between social structure and individual agency. In the late 1980s and 1990s authors such as George Marcus and James Clifford pondered ethnographic authority, particularly how and why anthropological knowledge was possible and authoritative. This was part of a more general trend of postmodernism that was popular contemporaneously. Currently anthropologists have begun to pay attention to globalization, medicine and biotechnology, indigenous rights, and the anthropology of Europe.

Politics of anthropology

Anthropology's traditional involvement with nonwestern cultures has involved it in politics in many different ways. Some political problems arise simply because anthropologists usually have more power than the people they study. Some have argued that the discipline is a form of colonialist theft in which the anthropologist gains power at the expense of subjects. The anthropologist, they argue, can gain yet more power by exploiting knowledge and artifacts of the people she or he studies while the people she or he studies gain nothing, or even lose, in exchange. An example of this exploitative relationship can been seen in the collaboration in Africa prior to World War II of British anthropologists and colonial forces. More recently, there have been newfound concerns about bioprospecting, along with struggles for self-representation for native peoples and the repatriation of indigenous remains and material culture. Other political controversies come from American anthropology's emphasis on cultural relativism and its long-standing antipathy to the concept of race. As mentioned above, Boas was a well-known social reformer whose activism and anthropological teaching went hand in hand. The development of sociobiology in the late 1960s was opposed by cultural anthropologists such as Marshall Sahlins, who argued that these positions were reductive. While authors such John Randal Baker continued to develop the biological concept of race into the 1970s, the rise of genetics has proven to be central to developments on this front. As genetics continues to advance as a science, biological anthropologists such as Jonathan Marks have continued to refine their opposition to folk notions of race while addressing recent developments in biology. Finally, anthropology has a history of entanglement with government intelligence agencies and anti-war politics. Boas publicly objected to US participation World War I and the collaboration of some anthropologists with US intelligence. In contrast, many of Boas' anthropologist contemporaries were active in the war effort in some form, including dozens who served in the Office of Strategic Services and the Office of War Information. In the 1950s, the American Anthropological Association provided the CIA information on the area specialities of its members, and a number of anthropologists participated in the U.S. government's Operation Camelot during the war in Vietnam. At the same time, many other anthropologists were active in the antiwar movement and passed resolutions in the American Anthropological Association (AAA) condemning anthropological involvement in covert operations. Anthropologists were also vocal in their opposition to the war in Iraq although their was no consensus amongst all practitioners of the discipline. Professional anthropological bodies often object to the use of anthropology for the benefit of the state. Their codes of ethics or statements may proscribe anthropologists from giving secret briefings. The British Association for Social Anthropology has called these scholarships ethically dangerous and divise For example, the British Association for Social Anthropology has condemned the CIA's Pat Roberts Intelligence Scholars Program, which anonymously funds anthropology students at US universities in preparation for those students to spy for the United States government. The AAA's current 'Statement of Professional Responsibility' clearly states that "in relation with their own government and with host governments... no secret research, no secret reports or debriefings of any kind should be agreed to or given." Anthropology is the study of human diversity--diversity of body and behavior, in the past and present. Anthropology consists of four subfields or subdisciplines: Physical anthropology--studies the diversity of the human body in the past and present. It includes how we acquired the structure of our body over time, that is human evolution, as well as differences and relationships between human populations today and their adaptations to their local environments. It also sometimes includes the evolution and diversity of our nearest relatives, the primates (apes and monkeys). Cultural anthropology--studies the diversity of human behavior in the present. This is what most anthropologists do and what most of the public sees when they look at "National Geographic" magazine or the "Discovery" channel on TV. Cultural anthropologists travel to foreign societies (although it is possible to do anthropology on your own society!), live among the people there, and try as much as they can to understand how those people live. Archaeology--studies the diversity of human behavior in the past. Since it studies how people lived in the past, these people are not available for us to visit and talk to...or at least, not people who are currently living in the same way that their ancestors did in the past. Therefore, archaeologists must depend on the artifacts and features that the people produced in the past and attempt to reconstruct their vanished way of life from those remnants of their culture. Linguistic anthropology--studies the diversity of human language in the past and present. While language is naturally a part of culture, it is such a huge topic that anthropologists have separated it into its own area of study. Linguistic anthropologists are concerned about the development of languages, perhaps even back to the first forms of language, and how language changes over time. They are also interested in how different contemporary languages differ today, how they are related, and how we can learn about things like migration and diffusion from that data. They also ask how language is related to and reflects on other aspects of culture. Other sciences study humans too, of course. History, economics, psychology, sociology, even biology and chemistry can study humans. How is anthropology different? The answer is the anthropological perspective, that is, the way that anthropology approaches the subject and thinks about or studies humans and their behavior. The anthropological perspective has three components: (1) cross-cultural or comparative--anthropology investigates humans in every form that they take. We are interested to see the entire spectrum of human bodies and behaviors, trying to learn the range of humanity--all the ways that we can be human. By seeing humans in their every manifestation, and comparing those manifestations to each other, we can ask what is possible for humans and what is necessary for humans. (2) holistic--anthropology tries to relate every part of culture to every other part. We understand that the various parts of culture are connected to each other and that certain combinations tend to occur or not to occur (for example, there are no hunting and gathering cultures that traditionally lived in cities...that's just impossible!). We are also interested in how a people's cultures is connected to their environment; again, without high technology, you are not going to see farming or cities in the middle of the desert or the arctic. (3) relativistic--this is the most profound yet controversial part of the anthropological perspective. Relativism means that the rules or norms or values of a culture are relative to that specific culture. In other words, say, monogamy may be normal or preferred in one culture, but polygamy may be normal or preferred in another. The point is that different cultures believe different things or value different things or even mean different things with perhaps identical-looking behaviors or objects. In one culture, waving your hand might be a greeting, and in another culture it might be an insult. When you go to another culture, or even just interact with another culture (for example, when you are doing international business), you cannot assume that other people understand things the same way you do. In fact, you should assume that they don't! And you certainly should not judge or evaluate them from your own culture's perspective--if you were in a headhunter society, you might think they were horrible people for keeping heads in their house, but if they came to visit you, they might think you were a horrible person for not having heads in your house! The point is that, if we want to understand other people properly, we must see what their behaviors or words or concepts mean to them, not what they would mean to us. Meaning is relative to the culture that creates that meaning. This is not to say that all things are true or even that all things are good. Some things are true (like the world being round) no matter what people think; those are facts. And "good" is a value judgment, so it has no place in anthropology. What we are saying in relativism is that all value judgments are made from cultural perspective, and if you were to take a different cultural perspective, you would understand or judge the exact same phenomenon in the exact opposite way! How does anthropology study culture? One other way that anthropology is unique among the sciences that study humans is by its emphasis on "fieldwork'" You cannot get to know another culture just by reading about it or watching movies about it. At best, you could learn what other people have already discovered, but you could not learn anything new. So anthropology requires actually going to that society and living with and living like that society as much as possible. This is called participant observation. This depends crucially on making friends with people in the society, who will teach you and include you in their activities--and informant. Then, as much as possible, you will try to eat their food, speak their language, and live their lives, often actually residing with a family in that society. It is not easy work, and it is not always fun, but there is no better way to learn.

Anthropological fields and subfields


- Biological anthropology (also Physical anthropology)
  - Forensic anthropology
  - Paleoethnobotany
- Cultural anthropology (also Social anthropology)
  - Applied anthropology
  - Cross-Cultural Studies
  - Cyber anthropology
  - Development anthropology
  - Environmental anthropology
  - Economic anthropology
  - Ecological anthropology
  - Ethnography
  - Ethnomusicology
  - Gender
  - Human behavioral ecology
  - Medical anthropology
  - Psychological anthropology
  - Political anthropology
  - Anthropology of religion
  - Public anthropology
  - Urban anthropology
  - Visual anthropology
- Linguistic anthropology
  - Synchronic linguistics (or Descriptive linguistics)
  - Diachronic linguistics (or Historical linguistics)
  - Ethnolinguistics
  - Sociolinguistics
- Archaeology

External links


- [http://www.aaanet.org/ The American Anthropological Association Homepage] - the webpage of the largest professional organization of anthropologists in the world.
- [http://www.worldcatlibraries.org/wcpa/ow/09dbb3346fc1c2a4.html Race] - a book by John Randal Baker discussing the origins of racial classification and oppositions to the concept.
- [http://www.antropologi.info Anthropology.Info]
- [http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20001120&c=2&s=price Anthropologists as Spies] - an article by David Price examining the relationship between American Anthropology and US intelligence services.
- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/4603271.stm Pat Roberts Intelligence Program] - a BBC article on the program
- [http://www.antropologi.info/blog/anthropology Social and Cultural Anthropology in the News] - (nearly) daily updated blog
- [http://www.anthrobase.com Anthrobase.com] - Collection of anthropological texts
- [http://www.cybercultura.it Cybercultura] - Collection of web resources about anthropology of cyberspace
- [http://www.anthropology.net Anthropology.net] - A community orientated anthropology web portal with user run blogs, forums, tags, and a wiki.

See also


- List of anthropologists
- Important publications in anthropology Category:Mammalogy Category:Behavioural sciences ko:인류학 ms:Antropologi ja:人類学 simple:Anthropology th:มานุษยวิทยา zh-min-nan:Jîn-lūi-ha̍k

List of subsistence techniques

Subsistence means living in a permanently fragile equilibrium between alimentary needs and the means for satisfying them; or in common parlance, it means "just getting by". The following is a list of subsistence techniques:
- Hunting and Gathering techniques, also known as Foraging:
  - freeganism — involves gathering of discarded food in the context of an urban environment
  - gleaning — involves the gathering of food that traditional farmers have left behind in their fields
- Cultivation:
  - Horticulture — plant cultivation, based on the use of simple tools.
  - subsistence agriculture — agricultural cultivation involving continuous use of arable (crop) land, and is more labor-intensive than horticulture.
- Pastoralism, the raising of grazing animals:
  - Pastoral nomadism — all members of the pastoral society follow the herd throughout the year.
  - Transhumance or agro-pastoralism — part of the society follows the herd, while the other part maintains a home village.
  - Ranch agriculture — non-nomadic pastoralism with a defined territory
- Alternative ends : people devote their time, resources, and energy to five broad categories of ends — subsistence, replacement, social, ceremonial, and rent.
  - Subsistence fund — work is done to replace calories lost through life activities.
  - Replacement fund — work is expended maintaining the technology necessary for life.
  - Social fund — work is expended to establish and maintain social ties.
  - Ceremonial fund — work is expended to fulfill ritual obligations.
  - Rent fund — work is expended to satisfy the obligations owed political or economic superiors.
- Distribution and Exchange:
  - Redistribution
  - Reciprocity — exchange between social equals.
  - Potlatching — a widely studied ritual in which sponsors (helped by their entourages) gave away resources and manufactured wealth while generating prestige for themselves.
  - LETS — Local Exchange Trading Systems.

See also


- List of alternative lifestyles
- List of things which are neither production nor consumption
- Staple food
- Society

Foraging

Foraging just means looking for food (or, metaphorically, anything else). However, it has acquired an important technical meaning within the science of behavioral ecology where it refers to predator-prey interactions (note that in ecology, prey can be plant as well as animals). It is also an important study in social anthropology, particular in relation to societies that follow, wholly or in part, the hunter-gatherer way of life. Robert MacArthur and Eric Pianka in 1966 first proposed an optimal foraging theory, arguing that because of the key importance of successful foraging to an individual's survival, it should be possible to predict foraging behaviour by using decision theory to determine the behaviour that would be shown by an "optimal forager" - one with perfect knowledge of what to do to maximise usable food intake. While the behaviour of real animals inevitably departs from that of the optimal forager, optimal foraging theory has proved very useful in developing hypotheses for describing real foraging behaviour. Departures from optimality often help to identify constraints either in the animal's behavioural or cognitive repertoire, or in the environment, that had not previously been suspected. With those constraints identified, foraging behaviour often does approach the optimal pattern even if it is not identical to it. There are many versions of optimal foraging theory that are relevant to different foraging situation. These include:
- The optimal diet model, which describes the behaviour of a forager that encounters different types of prey and must choose which to attack
- Patch selection theory, which describes the behaviour of a forager whose prey is concentrated in small areas with a significant travel time between them
- Central place foraging theory, which describes the behaviour of a forager that must return to a particular place in order to consume its food, or perhaps to hoard it or feed it to a mate or offspring. In recent decades, optimal foraging theory has frequently been applied to the foraging behaviour of human hunter-gatherers. Although this is controversial, coming under some of the same kinds of attack as the application of sociobiological theory to human behaviour, it does represent a convergence of ideas from human ecology and economic anthropology that has proved fruitful and interesting. Important contributions to foraging theory have been made by:
- Eric Charnov, who developed the marginal value theorem to predict the behaviour of foragers using patches;
- Sir John R. Krebs, with work on the optimal diet model in relation to tits and chickadees;
- John Goss-Custard, who first tested the optimal diet model against behaviour in the field, using redshank, and then proceeded to an extensive study of foraging in the Common Pied Oystercatcher.

References


- MacArthur, R. H. and Pianka, E. R. (1966). On the optimal use of a patchy environment. American Naturalist, 100, 603-609.
- Stephens, D. W., & Krebs, J. R. (1986). Foraging theory. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.
- Winterhalder, B. and Smith, E. A. (Eds.). (1981). Hunter-gatherer foraging strategies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

External links


- [http://www.pygmies.info/gathering.html Foraging in the rainforest] African Pygmies food gathering Category:Survival skills

Agriculture

working the land in the traditional way, with horse and plough]] Agriculture is the process of producing food, feed, fiber and other desired products by the cultivation of certain plants and the raising of domesticated animals (livestock). The practice of agriculture is also known as "farming", while scientists, inventors and others devoted to improving farming methods and implements are also said to be engaged in agriculture. More people in the world are involved in agriculture as their primary economic activity than in any other, yet it only accounts for four percent of the world's GDP.

Overview

GDP, Indonesia]] Agriculture can refer to subsistence agriculture, the production of enough food to meet just the needs of the farmer/agriculturalist and his/her family. It may also refer to industrial agriculture, (often referred to as factory farming) long prevalent in "developed" nations and increasingly so elsewhere, which consists of obtaining financial income from the cultivation of land to yield produce, the commercial raising of animals (animal husbandry), or both. Agriculture is also short for the study of the practice of agriculture—more formally known as agricultural science. Agricultural students are known (sometimes derisively) as "Aggies". Increasingly, in addition to food for humans and animal feeds, agriculture produces goods such as cut flowers, ornamental and nursery plants, timber or lumber, fertilizers, animal hides, leather, industrial chemicals (starch, sugar, ethanol, alcohols and plastics), fibers (cotton, wool, hemp, and flax), fuels (methane from biomass, biodiesel) and both legal and illegal drugs (biopharmaceuticals, tobacco, marijuana, opium, cocaine). Genetically engineered plants and animals produce specialty drugs. In the Western world, the use of gene manipulation, better management of soil nutrients, and improved weed control have greatly increased yields per unit area. At the same time, the use of mechanization has decreased labour requirements. The developing world generally produces lower yields, having less of the latest science, capital, and technology base. Modern agriculture depends heavily on engineering and technology and on the biological and physical sciences. Irrigation, drainage, conservation and sanitary engineering, each of which is important in successful farming, are some of the fields requiring the specialized knowledge of agricultural engineers. Agricultural chemistry deals with other vital farming concerns, such as the application of fertilizer, insecticides (see Pest control), and fungicides, soil makeup, analysis of agricultural products, and nutritional needs of farm animals.Plant breeding and genetics contribute additionally to farm productivity. Advanced seed engineering has allowed strains of seed to become perfect in every farming situation. Seeds can now germinate faster and adapt to shorter growing seasons in different climates. Present-day seed can resist the spraying of pesticides that kill all green-leaf plants. Hydroponics, a method of soilless gardening in which plants are grown in chemical nutrient solutions, may help meet the need for greater food production as the world's population increases. The packing, processing, and marketing of agricultural products are closely related activities also influenced by science. Methods of quick-freezing and dehydration have increased the markets for farm products (see Food preservation; Meat packing industry). Mechanization, the outstanding characteristic of late 19th and 20th century agricultural evolution, has eased much of the backbreaking toil of the farmer. More significantly, mechanization has enormously increased farm efficiency and productivity (see Agricultural machinery). Animals, including horses, mules, oxen, camels, llamas, alpacas, and dogs; however, are still used to cultivate fields, harvest crops and transport farm products to markets in many parts of the world. Airplanes, helicopters, trucks and tractors are used in agriculture for seeding, spraying operations for insect and disease control, Aerial topdressing, transporting perishable products, and fighting forest fires. Radio and television disseminate vital weather reports and other information such as market reports that concern farmers. Computers have become an essential tool for farm management. Aerial topdressing] According to the National Academy of Engineering in the US, agricultural mechanization is one of the 20 greatest engineering achievements of the 20th century. Early in the century, it took one American farmer to produce food for 2.5 people, where today, due to engineering technology (also, plant breeding and agrichemicals), a single farmer can feed over 130 people [http://www.greatachievements.org/greatachievements/ga_7_2.html]. This comes at a cost, however, of large amounts of energy input, from unsustainable, mostly fossil fuel, sources. Animal husbandry means breeding and raising animals for meat or to harvest animal products (like milk, eggs, or wool) on a continual basis. In recent years some aspects of industrial intensive agriculture have been the subject of increasing discussion. The widening sphere of influence held by large seed and chemical companies, meat packers and food processors has been a source of concern both within the farming community and for the general public. There has been increased activity of some people against some farming practices, raising chickens for food being one example. Another issue is the type of feedgiven to some animals that can cause Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy in cattle. There has also been concern because of the disastrous effect that intensive agriculture has on the environment. In the US, for example, fertilizer has been running off into the Mississippi for years and has caused a dead spot in the Gulf of Mexico, where the Mississippi empties. Intensive agriculture also depletes the fertility of the land over time and the end effect is that which happened in the Middle East, were some of the most fertile farmland in the world was turned into a desert by intensive agriculture. The patent protection given to companies that develop new types of seed using genetic engineering has allowed seed to be licensed to farmers in much the same way that computer software is licensed to users. This has changed the balance of power in favor of the seed companies, allowing them to dictate terms and conditions previously unheard of. Some argue these companies are guilty of biopiracy. Soil conservation and nutrient management have been important concerns since the 1950s, with the best farmers taking a stewardship role with the land they operate. However, increasing contamination of waterways and wetlands by nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus are of concern in many countries. Increasing consumer awareness of agricultural issues has led to the rise of community-supported agriculture, local food movement, slow food, and commercial organic farming, though these yet remain fledgling industries.

History

organic farming Archaeobotanists have traced the selection and cultivation of specific food plant characteristics, such as a semi-tough rachis and larger seeds, to just after the Younger Dryas (about 9,500 BC) in the early Holocene in the Levant region of the Fertile Crescent. Limited anthropological and archaeological evidence both indicate a grain-grinding culture farming along the Nile in the 10th millennium BC using the world's earliest known type of sickle blades. There is even earlier evidence for conscious cultivation and seasonal harvest: grains of rye with domestic traits have been recovered from Epi-Palaeolithic (10,000+ BC) contexts at Abu Hureyra in Syria, but this appears to be a localised phenomenon resulting from cultivation of stands of wild rye, rather than a definitive step towards domestication. It is not until ca. 8,500 BC, in middle-Eastern cultures referred to as Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB), where there is the first definite evidence for the emergence of a widespread subsistence economy that was dependent on domesticated plants and animals. In these contexts lie the origins of the eight so-called founder crops of agriculture: firstly emmer wheat, einkorn wheat, then hulled barley, pea, lentil, bitter vetch, chick pea and flax. These eight crops occur more or less simultaneously on PPNB sites in this region, although the consensus is that wheat was the first to be sown and harvested on a significant scale. There are many sites that date to between ca. 8,500 BC and 7,500 BC where the systematic farming of these crops contributed the major part of the inhabitants' diet. From the Fertile Crescent agriculture spread eastwards to Central Asia and westwards into Cyprus, Anatolia and, by 7,000 BC, Greece. Farming, principally of emmer and einkorn, reached northwestern Europe via southeastern and central Europe by ca. 4,800 BC (see, among others, Price, D. [ed.] 2000. Europe's First Farmers. Cambridge University Press; Harris, D. [ed.] 1996 The Origins and Spread of Agriculture in Eurasia. UCL Press). Europeing an alfalfa field]] The reasons for the earliest introduction of farming may have included climate change, but possibly there were also social reasons (e.g. accumulation of food surplus for competitive gift-giving). Most certainly there was a gradual transition from hunter-gatherer to agricultural economies after a lengthy period when some crops were deliberately planted and other foods were gathered from the wild. Although localised climate change is the favoured explanation for the origins of agriculture in the Levant, the fact that farming was 'invented' at least three times, possibly more, suggests that social reasons may have been instrumental. In addition to emergence of farming in the Fertile Crescent, agriculture appeared by at least 6,800 BC in East Asia (rice) and, later, in Central and South America (maize, squash). Small scale agriculture also likely arose independently in early Neolithic contexts in India (rice) and Southeast Asia (taro). Southeast Asia. Baked clay. Field Museum]] Full dependency on domestic crops and animals (i.e. when wild resources contributed a nutritionally insignificant component to the diet) was not until the Bronze Age. If the operative definition of agriculture includes large scale intensive cultivation of land, mono-cropping, organised irrigation, and use of a specialized labour force, the title "inventors of agriculture" would fall to the Sumerians, starting ca. 5,500 BC. Intensive farming allows a much greater density of population than can be supported by hunting and gathering and allows for the accumulation of excess product to keep for winter use or to sell for profit. The ability of farmers to feed large numbers of people whose activities have nothing to do with material production was the crucial factor in the rise of standing armies. The agriculturalism of the Sumerians allowed them to embark on an unprecedented territorial expansion, making them the first empire builders. Not long after, the Egyptians, powered by effective farming of the Nile valley, achieved a population density from which enough warriors could be drawn for a territorial expansion more than tripling the Sumerian empire in area. The invention of a three field system of crop rotation during the Middle Ages vastly improved agricultural efficiency. After 1492 the world's agricultural patterns were shuffled in the widespread exchange of plants and animals known as the Columbian Exchange. Crops and animals that were previously only known in the Old World were now transplanted to the New and vice versa. Perhaps most notably, the tomato became a favorite in European cuisine, while certain wheat strains quickly took to western hemisphere soils and became a dietary staple even for native North, Central and South Americans. By the early 1800s agricultural practices, particularly careful selection of hardy strains and cultivars, had so improved that yield per land unit was many times that seen in the Middle Ages and before, especially in the largely virgin lands of North and South America. With the rapid rise of mechanization in the 20th century, especially in the form of the tractor, the demanding tasks of sowing, harvesting and threshing could be performed with a speed and on a scale barely imaginable before. These advances have led to efficiencies enabling certain modern farms in the United States, Argentina, Israel, Germany and a few other nations to output volumes of high quality produce per land unit at what may be the practical limit.

Crops

Seed Testing

Seeds are tested for various qualities to ensure a high quality harvest, and to limit or prevent the spread of undesirable and invasive species. Seed test types Descriptions of various tests done on seed Seed related databases ISTA, the International Seed Testing Association, maintains a list of links to Seed Organizations worldwide:
- http://www.seedtest.org/en/content---1--1014--329.html

World production of major crops in 2004

In millions of metric tons, based on FAO estimates[http://faostat.fao.org/faostat/form?collection=Production.Crops.Primary&Domain=Production&servlet=1&hasbulk=0&version=ext&language=EN]: By crop types :Cereals 2,264 :Vegetables and melons 866 :Roots and Tubers 715 :Milk 619 :Fruit 503 :Meat 259 :Oilcrops 133 :Fish 130 (2001 estimate) :Eggs 63 :Pulses 60 :Vegetable Fiber 30 By individual crops :Sugar Cane 1,324 :Maize 721 :Wheat 627 :Rice 605 :Potatoes 328 :Sugar Beet 249 :Soybean 204 :Oil Palm Fruit 162 :Barley 154 :Tomato 120

Crop improvement

Tomato Tomato
- See main article on Plant breeding Domestication of plants is done in order to increase yield, improve disease resistance and drought tolerance, ease harvest and to improve the taste and nutritional value and many other characteristics. Centuries of careful selection and breeding have had enormous effects on the characteristics of crop plants. Plant breeders use greenhouses and other techniques to get as many as three generations of plants per year so that they can make improvements all the more quickly. Plant selection and breeding in the 1920s and '30s improved pasture (grasses and clover) in New Zealand. Extensive radiation mutagenesis efforts (i.e. primitive genetic engineering) during the 1950s produced the modern commercial varieties of grains such as wheat, corn and barley. For example, average yields of corn (maize) in the USA have increased from around 2.5 tons per hectare (40 bushels per acre) in 1900 to about 9.4 t/ha (150 bushels per acre) in 2001, primarily due to improvements in genetics. Similarly, worldwide average wheat yields have increased from less than 1 t/ha in 1900 to more than 2.5 t/ha in 1990. South American average wheat yields are around 2 t/ha, African under 1 t/ha, Egypt and Arabia up to 3.5 to 4 t/ha with irrigation. In contrast, the average wheat yield in countries such as France is over 8 t/ha. Higher yields are due to improvements in genetics, as well as use of intensive farming techniques (use of fertilizers, chemical pest control, growth control to avoid lodging). [Conversion note: 1 bushel of wheat = 60 pounds (lb) ≈ 27.215 kg. 1 bushel of corn = 56 pounds ≈ 25.401 kg] In industrialized agriculture, crop "improvement" has often reduced nutritional and other qualities of food plants to serve the interests of producers. After mechanical tomato-harvesters were developed in the early 1960s, agricultural scientists bred tomatoes that were harder and less nutritious (Friedland and Barton 1975). In fact, a major longitudinal study of nutrient levels in numerous vegetables showed significant declines in the last 50 years; garden vegetables in the U.S. today contain on average 38 percent less vitamin B2 and 15 percent less vitamin C (Davis and Riordan 2004). Very recently, genetic engineering has begun to be employed in some parts of the world to speed up the selection and breeding process. The most widely used modification is a herbicide resistance gene that allows plants to tolerate exposure to glyphosate, which is used to control weeds in the crop. A less frequently used but more controversial modification causes the plant to produce a toxin to reduce damage from insects (c.f. Starlink). There are specialty producers who raise less common types of livestock or plants. Aquaculture, the farming of fish, shrimp, and algae, is closely associated with agriculture. Apiculture, the culture of bees, traditionally for honey—increasingly for crop pollination. See also : botany, List of domesticated plants, List of vegetables, List of herbs, List of fruit

Environmental problems

Agriculture may often cause environmental problems because it changes natural environments and produces harmful by-products. Some of the negative effects are:
- Nitrogen and phosphorus surplus in rivers and lakes.
- Detrimental effects of herbicides, fungicides, insecticides, and other biocides.
- Conversion of natural ecosystems of all types into arable land.
- Consolidation of diverse biomass into a few species.
- Erosion
- Depletion of minerals in the soil
- Particulate matter, including ammonia and ammonium off-gasing from animal waste contributing to air pollution
- Weeds - feral plants and animals
- Odor from agricultural waste
- Soil salination in dry areas.

Policy

Agricultural policy focuses on the goals and methods of agricultural production. At the policy level, common goals of agriculture include:
- Food safety: Ensuring that the food supply is free of contamination.
- Food security: Ensuring that the food supply meets the population's needs.
- Food quality: Ensuring that the food supply is of a consistent and known quality.
- Conservation
- Environmental impact
- Economic stability

Methods

There are various methods of agricultural production:
- aeroponics
- aerial topdressing
- agricultural machinery
- animal husbandry
- aquaculture
- beekeeping
- crop rotation
- Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO, factory farming)
- composting
- dairy farming
- detasseling
- domestication
- fencing
- fertilizers
- greenhouse
- harvest
- heliciculture
- hybrid seed
- hydroponics
- Integrated Pest Management (IPM)
- irrigation
- livestock
- market gardening
- monoculture
- no-till farming
- organic farming
- plant breeding
- pollination management
- precision farming
- ranching
- season extension
- seed saving
- shepherding
- subsistence farming
- succession planting
- sustainable agriculture
- terracing
- vegetable farming
- tillage
- weed control

References


- Wells, Spencer: The Journey of Man : A Genetic Odyssey. Princeton University Press, 2003. ISBN: 069111532X
- Crosby, Alfred W.: The Columbian Exchange : Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492. Praeger Publishers, 2003 (30th Anniversary Edition). ISBN: 0275980731
- Collinson, M. (editor): A History of Farming Systems Research. CABI Publishing, 2000. ISBN: 0851994059
- Davis, Donald R., and Hugh D. Riordan (2004) Changes in USDA Food Composition Data for 43 Garden Crops, 1950 to 1999. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, Vol. 23, No. 6, 669-682.
- Friedland, William H. and Amy Barton (1975) Destalking the Wily Tomato: A Case Study of Social Consequences in California Agricultural Research. Univ. California at Sta. Cruz, Research Monograph 15.·

See also


- Agricultural and Food Research Council, UK
- Agricultural education
- Agricultural science
- Agricultural sciences basic topics
- Arid-zone agriculture
- Barnyard
- Community-supported agriculture
- International agricultural research
- Family farm hog pen
- Farm equipment
- Land Allocation Decision Support System
- List of domesticated animals
- List of subsistence techniques
- List of sustainable agriculture topics
- Permaculture
- Timeline of agriculture and food technology.
- USA agriculture

External links


- [http://www.fao.org www.fao.org] — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations World Agricultural Information Centre
  - [http://www.fao.org/waicent/portal/statistics_en.asp www.fao.org] — The UN Statistical Databases
  - [http://www.fao.org/ag/ FAO Agriculture Department] and its [http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/y5160e/y5160e00.HTM State of Food and Agriculture 2003-2004] with a focus on the impact of biotechnology
  - [http://www.greenfacts.org/gmo/index.htm GM Crops in Agriculture] – A summary for non-specialists of the above FAO report by GreenFacts.
-
- [http://imperium.lenin.ru/~kaledin/tmp/agricltr.txt Agriculture: Demon Engine of Civilization] by John Zerzan
- [http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/index.html History of farming in Nebraska, USA]

Specific countries


- [http://www.agr.gc.ca/ www.agr.gc.ca] — Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada
- [http://www.nationalpak.com www.nationalpak.com] — Agriculture of Pakistan
- [http://www.nationalacademies.org/agriculture/ www.nationalacademies.org] — Agriculture at the United States National Academies
- [http://www.usda.gov/ www.usda.gov] — United States Department of Agriculture
  - [http://www.fas.usda.gov/currwmt.html Current World Production, Market and Trade Reports] from the Foreign Agricultural Service
  - [http://www.ers.usda.gov/ USDA's main source of economic information and research] from the Economic Research Service
  - [http://www.ars.usda.gov/ In-house Research Arm] from the Agricultural Research Service
  - [http://www.nal.usda.gov/ National Agricultural Library]
- [http://www.trader-china.com/Agriculture/index.html Agriculture Directory] ko:농업 ja:農業 nb:Landbruk simple:Agriculture

Foodstuff

Food is any substance that can be consumed, including liquid drinks. Food is the main source of energy and of nutrition for animals, and is usually of animal or plant origin. The study of food is called food science. In English, the term food is often used metaphorically or figuratively, as in food for thought. Food can also be a system of communication, a collection of images, a protocol of usages, situations, and behavior. Food is what brings the memory of our past into our contemporary life.

Legal definition

Western food law defines four categories of object as food:
- any substance or product, whether processed, partially processed or unprocessed, intended to be, or reasonably expected to be ingested by humans whether of nutritional value or not;
- water and other drinks;
- chewing gum;
- articles and substances used as an ingredient or component in the preparation of food. Links to official legal definitions of food:
- [http://www.fda.gov/opacom/laws/fdcact/fdcact1.htm US federal definition of food]
- [http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts1990/Ukpga_19900016_en_2.htm#mdiv1 UK definition of food]
- [http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc&lg=EN&numdoc=32002R0178&model=guichett EU definition of food]

Human eating habits

Historical development

Humans are commonly believed to be omnivorous animals that can consume both plant and animal products. Evidence suggests that early Homo Sapiens employed Hunter-gatherer as their primary means of food collection. This involves combining stationary plant and fungal food sources (such as fruits, grains, roots, and mushrooms) with mobile animals which must be hunted and killed in order to be consumed. Additionally, it is believed that humans have used fire to prepare food prior to eating since their divergence from Homo erectus, possibly even earlier. At least ten thousand years ago, humans developed agriculture, which has Timeline of agriculture and food and altered the kind of food people eat. This has led to a variety of important historical consequences, such as increased [[population]], the development of [[cities, and the wider spread of infectious diseases. The types of food consumed, and the way in which they are prepared has varied widely by time, location, and culture.

Meals

A portion of food or the act of eating a portion of food is considered a meal. Often named and patterned, meals play a role in an important social occasion, such as the celebration of many key cultural and religious festivals. A meal can be used as means for feeding a single individual or shared and eaten simultaneously by two or more people. The number of meals consumed by individuals in a day, their size, composition, when and how they are prepared and eaten varies greatly around the world. This diversity can be attributed to a number of local factors, including climate, ecology, economy, cultural traditions and industrialisation. In societies where the availability of food has risen above subsistence levels and beyond staple foods, meals are also sold pre-prepared for immediate consumption in restaurants and other similar retail premises. Food eaten in smaller quantities between the culturally normative meals is regarded as snack food. :See also: Appetite, Buddhist cuisine, Eucharist, Fast food, Fasting, Gault Millau restaurant guide, Halaal, I-tal, Kashrut, Michelin restaurant guide, Muslim dietary laws, Potluck, Totemism.

Food production or acquisition

Food is traditionally obtained through farming, ranching, and fishing, with hunting, foraging and other methods of subsistence locally important for some populations, but minor for others. In the modern era in developed nations, food supply is increasingly dependent upon agriculture, industrial farming, aquaculture and fish farming techniques. These techniques aim to maximize the amount of food produced while minimizing the cost. The techniques include a reliance on mechanized tools, from the threshing machine and seed drill, to the tractor and combine. Developed tools have been combined with the use of pesticides to promote high crop yields and to combat insects or mammals which reduce yield. More recently, there has been a growing trend towards more Sustainable agricultural practices. This approach - which is partly fuelled by consumer demand - encourages biodiversity, local self-reliance and Organic farming methods. Major influences on food production are international policy, e.g. the World Trade Organization and Common Agricultural Policy, national government policy or law and war. Food for livestock is fodder and traditionally comprises hay or grain. :See also: mariculture, horticulture, agribusiness, gardening. gardening

From plants


- Seeds
  - Cereals from grasses, including barley, maize, oats, rice, rye, and wheat
  - Cereals from non-grasses, including buckwheat, amaranth, and quinoa
  - Legumes, including beans, peas, and lentils
  - Nuts, including coconuts, almonds, and pine nuts
  - Oilseeds, including sesame, sunflower, and hemp
- Vegetables (see also list of vegetables)
  - Root vegetables, including potatoes, cassava, and turnips
  - Leaf vegetables, including amaranth, spinach, and kale
  - Sea vegetables, including dulse, kombu, and dabberlocks
  - Stem vegetables, including bamboo shoots, nopales, and asparagus
  - inflorescence vegetables, including globe artichokes, broccoli, and daylilies
  - Fruit vegetables, including pumpkin, okra, and eggplant
- Fruits (see also list of fruits)
- Herbs and spices (see also list of herbs and spices) list of herbs and spices

From animals


- Dairy products, including milk
- Eggs, including roe and caviar
- Insects, including honey
- Meat, including beef, frogs' legs, goat, horse, kangaroo, lamb, mutton, pork, veal, rodents, human (i.e. cannibalism)
- Offal, including blood
- Poultry, including chicken, turkey, duck, goose, pigeon or dove, ostrich, emu, guinea fowl, pheasant, quail
- Seafood, including finfish such as salmon and tilapia, and shellfish such as mollusks and crustaceans
- Snails
- Game, this includes all animals hunted for food.

From neither animals or plants


- Salt
- Mushrooms, which are a type of fungi
- Seaweed, which is a protist
- Water, including mineral water and spring (water)

Food preparation

spring (water) While some food can be eaten without preparation, many foods undergo some form of preparation for reasons of safety, palatability, or flavor. At the simplest level this may involve washing, cutting, trimming or adding other foods or ingredients, such as spices. It may also involve mixing, heating or cooling, pressure cooking, fermentation, or combination with other food. Most food preparation takes place in a kitchen. The preparation of animal-based food will usually involve slaughter, evisceration, hanging, portioning and rendering. :See also: Barbecue, Eating utensils, Frankfurt kitchen, Hangi, Oven, Microwave oven, Refrigeration, Food preparation utensils.

Food manufacture

Early food processing techniques were limited by the available food preservation, packaging and transportation. Early food processing mainly involved salting, curing, curdling, drying, pickling and smoking. An early processed food product was cheese. During the industrialisation era in the 19th century, food manufacturing arose. This development took advantage of new mass markets and emerging new technology, such as milling, preservation, packaging and labelling and transportation. It brought the advantages of pre-prepared time saving food to the bulk of ordinary people who did not employ domestic servants. At the start of the 21st century, a two-tier structure has arisen, with a few international food processing giants controlling a wide range of well known food brands; with a populous number of small local or national food processing companies. :See also: Best before, Canning, Coloring, Food quality, Snap freezing, Additives, Flavoring, Enzymes, Genetically modified food, Pasteurization, Shelf-life, Ultra-high temperature processing.

Types of manufactured food


- Drinks: beer, juice, soft drink, squash, wine.
- Bread is a staple food for many nations, being made of risen dough of wheat or other cereals.
- Cakes and cookies
- Cheese is a curdled milk product, of which many varieties exist.
- Dessert is a course, usually sweet, and generally served after the main course, e.g. Ice cream.
- French fries, Chips
- Functional food
- Jam and Jelly
- Pasta
- Pie
- Pizza
- Processed meats
- Sandwiches
- Salad
- Sauce
- Sausage

Food trade

Food is now traded on a global basis. The variety and avail