Question 1
Ethnocentrism is defined as the conviction that one’s individual culture is the finest. Naïve realism is the conviction that persons everywhere view the world in a similar manner. Ethnocentrism and naïve realism among individuals present barriers to cross-cultural understanding. This is because people believe that their culture is the right one for everybody and disregard other peoples’ culture. Individuals can avoid ethnocentric viewpoint by controlling their views of other person’s culture and appreciating the diversity of culture.
Question 2
Tacit culture is that cultural understanding that is outside our awareness. Explicit culture on the other hand is defined as the portion of culture knowledge individuals have, and can communicate easily. Anthropologists can discover these kinds of culture through research and cross examination of the society.
Question 3
Ethnographic fieldwork distinctive feature is that the researcher participates fully in the community activities of the community he/she is researching on. The similarity of this research with other researches is that there must be data collection.
Question 4
Language largely influences and shapes people’s thoughts, attitudes and beliefs by bringing people of the same language together. As language unites people together it will in turn shape how they behave, think and their attitudes.
Question 5
Globalization influences cultural change by bringing people from different cultures to work together influencing each other’s cultural practices.
Question 6
A number of people view the notion of a technological society being the summit of human advancement as ethnocentric. This is because technology has a destructive effect on the cultural values and norms and threatens to outdo the ideas of the old folks in the society. These people therefore view this belief of technology being the basis for human advancement as ethnocentric.
