Test Bank
to accompany
C ULTURAL A NTHROPOLOGY
Eighth Edition
BARBARA MILLER
George Washington University
JACK HEATON

iii
CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Anthropology and the Study of Culture 1
Chapter 2: The Evolution of Humanity and Culture 13
Chapter 3: Researching Culture 24
Chapter 4: Making a Living 36
Chapter 5: Consumption and Exchange 48
Chapter 6: Reproduction and Human Development 59
Chapter 7: Disease, Illness, and Healing 71
Chapter 8: Kinship and Domestic Life 82
Chapter 9: Social Groups and Social Stratification 94
Chapter 10: Power, Politics, and Social Order 106
Chapter 11: Communication 118
Chapter 12: Religion 130
Chapter 13: Expressive Culture 142
Chapter 14: People on the Move 154
Chapter 15: People Defining Development 166

1
Chapter 1 Anthropology and the Study of Culture
MULTIPLE CHOICE
1. Anthropology is usually divided into four fields, but some people claim that a fifth, known as __________, should
be included.
A) interpretivist anthropology
B) functionalist anthropology
C) applied anthropology
D) theoretical anthropology
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
2. Biological anthropologists focus on __________.
A) the impact of colonialism on different cultures
B) cross-cultural patterns of contemporary human politics
C) human evolution and contemporary human variation
D) how culture is passed on from one generation to the next
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
3. Which subfield of archaeology provides insights into social change in Britain in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries?
A) archaeology of contemporary life
B) prehistoric archaeology
C) underwater archaeology
D) industrial archaeology
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

2
4. The field of anthropology that studies human language and communication is called __________.
A) biological anthropology
B) communication science
C) linguistic anthropology
D) applied anthropology
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
5. The Garbage Project has practical relevance because it provides information on __________.
A) how rural areas differ from urban areas
B) how long it has taken for garbage from prehistoric times to decompose
C) recent consumption patterns
D) how the poor of the world are creating the least garbage
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
6. What example of an applied use of biological anthropology is listed in the text?
A) cultural resource management
B) forensic anthropology
C) specialized testing for bilingual students
D) poverty reduction programs
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
7. Paul Farmer has done most of his work in __________.
A) Mexico
B) Haiti
C) Guatemala
D) Puerto Rico
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

3
8. A cultural relativist would view contemporary Nacirema culture as __________.
A) materialistic, aggressive, and without much worth
B) just as interesting and worthy of study as any other
C) more ethical than most others
D) adaptively superior to any other
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
9. The functionalist approach says that __________.
A) powerful structures shape culture
B) culture is like a biological organism with interacting parts
C) culture should be studied on the basis of how people make a living
D) cultures evolve from primitive to more advanced, or civilized
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
10. The French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss is associated with the theoretical perspective known as
__________.
A) functionalism
B) holism
C) French structuralism
D) cultural relativism
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
11. A major theoretical debate exists in cultural anthropology today between __________.
A) applied anthropologists and archaeologists
B) cultural materialists and interpretivist anthropologists
C) ecological anthropologists and economic anthropologists
D) psychological anthropologists and medical anthropologists
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

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12. The cultural materialist perspective uses a three-level model of culture that includes __________.
A) infrastructure, structure, and superstructure
B) class, “race,” and gender
C) ethnicity, age, and class
D) structure, agency, and change
Answer: A
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
13. The cultural materialist interpretation of the Hindu belief in sacred cows addresses __________.
A) their ritual purity
B) their role in social relationships
C) their economic value
D) their symbolic value
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
14. The theoretical approach, which is the view that powerful structures such as economics, politics, and media
shape cultures and create entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, is referred to in the textbook as
__________.
A) the infrastructure
B) cultural determinism
C) cultural imperialism
D) structurism
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
15. Which of the following phrases is from the definition of culture used in the text?
A) “that complex whole”
B) “total socially acquired life-way”
C) “patterned repetitive ways of thinking, feeling, and acting”
D) “learned and shared behavior and beliefs”
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

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16. Among Tejano immigrants in the United States, making tamales symbolizes __________.
A) a connection with the homeland in Mexico
B) the triumph of culture over nature
C) the importance of corn in Tejano culture
D) a woman’s role as a “good wife”
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
17. A recent mental health disorder in Japan related to sleep is __________.
A) insomnia
B) nightmares about work
C) falling asleep during the day
D) sleeping sickness
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
18. Culture __________.
A) is more developed in contemporary North America than in contemporary China
B) first emerged among humans around 10,000 years ago
C) is predominantly transferred through genes
D) shapes natural, biological functions
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
19. The increased spread of international ties and spread of Western capitalism worldwide is referred to as
__________.
A) internationalization
B) capitalization
C) globalization
D) holism
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

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20. The opening of a Western-style clothing retail store in a previously isolated area has resulted in the popularity of
blue jeans among local youth. Many of the wearers have replicated local fabric designs in paint on the jeans. What
model of cultural interaction does this scenario best represent?
A) clash of civilizations
B) Westernization
C) ethnocentrism
D) localization
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
21. People who have a longstanding connection with their home territory predating colonialism are referred to as
__________.
A) ethnic groups
B) indigenous people
C) local groups
D) racial groups
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
22. San peoples of Southern Africa fought a long legal battle to gain profits from __________.
A) diamond mines on their land
B) oil deposits on their land
C) a new diet pill
D) documentaries of their lifestyle
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
23. A study of landowners in a culture could be described as being focused on a microculture based on what factor?
A) class
B) ethnicity
C) gender
D) institution
Answer: A
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Apply What You Know

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7
24. The tendency to apply one’s own cultural values in judging the behavior and beliefs of people raised in other
cultures is known as __________.
A) cultural relativism
B) cultural universalism
C) ethnocentrism
D) egocentrism
Answer: C
Learning Objective: 1.3 Summarize the distinctive features of cultural anthropology.
Topic: Distinctive Features of Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
25. The main goal of cultural anthropology is to __________.
A) understand why people behave and think the way they do
B) predict culture change
C) understand the evolution of culture from nonhuman primates to human primates
D) learn how to make positive changes to cultures
Answer: A
Learning Objective: 1.3 Summarize the distinctive features of cultural anthropology.
Topic: Distinctive Features of Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
TRUE/FALSE
26. Cultural anthropology studies effects of biological heredity on human behavior.
Answer: False
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
27. Most North American anthropologists agree that general anthropology consists of five fields.
Answer: False
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
28. Two theoretical trends were influenced by postmodernism: structurism and functionalism.
Answer: False
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts

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29. Cultural constructionism is a theoretical position that stands in opposition to cultural relativism.
Answer: False
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
30. Cultural materialists attempt to learn about culture by examining the material aspects of it, such as the
environment and how people make a living within a particular environment.
Answer: True
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
31. Basic natural functions—such as eating, drinking, sleeping, and eliminating—are done and thought about the
same way everywhere, as opposed to cultural functions such as language.
Answer: False
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
32. The American Anthropological Association’s 2014 involvement in the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is an
example of anthropology applied to an institutional microculture.
Answer: True
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
33. Both globalization and localization can be seen in the spread of McDonald’s restaurants.
Answer: True
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts

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34. The four models of cultural interaction are: clash of civilizations, McDonaldization, hybridization, and
localization.
Answer: True
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
35. A study of middle schools in the southwestern Rocky Mountain region of the United States found that Mexican
immigrant girls are marginalized, in part because they are not interested in or good at sports.
Answer: True
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
ESSAY
36. What is applied anthropology and what are two examples of it?
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. Applied anthropology is the use of anthropological knowledge to prevent or solve problems or to shape
and achieve policy goals
2. Example: Forensic anthropology.
3. Example: Cultural resource management.
4. Example: Delivering health care in rural Haiti.
Learning Objective: 1.1 Define what is anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Anthropology’s Four Fields
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
37. State the overall goal(s) of cultural anthropology and provide two examples of how cultural anthropologists have
contributed to achieving the goal(s).
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. Cultural anthropology is the study of living peoples and their cultures, including variation and change.
It studies both similarities and differences.
2. Example: Franz Boas introduced cultural relativism.
3. Example: Margaret Mead encouraged interest in anthropology among the general public.
4. Example: Claude Lévi-Strauss proposed understanding culture by studying the themes in myths.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts

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10
38. Describe one way cultural anthropology has changed since the late nineteenth century.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. It has moved away from the idea that cultures evolve from “primitive” to modern forms.
2. The idea of cultural relativism encouraged understanding cultures on their own terms.
3. French structuralism and related traditions introduced the value of studying myths, beliefs, symbols,
and other systems of meaning.
4. The field has gained a diversity of perspective from work by non-European anthropologists and
traditions such as feminist anthropology and gay and lesbian anthropology.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Analyze It
39. Describe the cultural materialist perspective and an example of the perspective applied to a cultural practice.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. The cultural materialist believes culture is shaped by material factors.
2. Culture is divided into a three-level system: infrastructure, structure, and superstructure.
3. The example given in the text is the sacred cows of Hinduism. A cultural materialist emphasizes
practical benefits they provide, and de-emphasizes the beliefs associated with them.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
40. What does the theory of agency emphasize? Why is it contrasted with structurism? How does it address the issue
of poverty?
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. The theory of agency emphasizes the role of individual choices in shaping a person’s life.
2. It is contrasted with structurism because that perspective maintains that large forces such as the
economy may prevent individuals from exercising free will.
3. In the case of poverty, the perspective will focus on ways individuals work to improve their conditions
and mitigate the negative effects of their circumstances
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Analyze It
41. Describe and contrast two ways anthropologists have approached the definition of culture.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. Sir Edward Tylor defines it as a “complex whole” of “acquired habits.”
2. Karl Marx and cultural materialists consider it a product of material circumstances.
3. Clifford Geertz and interpretivists argue culture consists of elements such as beliefs, symbols, and
moods.
4. The text uses the definition of “learned and shared behavior and beliefs.”
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Analyze It

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42. Using examples from the text, describe two ways that culture shapes a “natural” human function.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. Eating: Cheese is considered an acceptable food in some places, but not others.
2. Drinking: Consumption of alcohol in U.S. fraternities is understood to create and reinforce social
bonds.
3. Sleeping: Corporate culture in North America places a value on sleeping relatively little.
4. Eliminating: Locations in Europe have public outdoor street urinals; the function is kept more private
in other cultural contexts.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
43. Define the concept of holism and provide a cultural example.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. It is related to the idea that cultures are internally integrated.
2. It teaches that a focus on individual elements of culture may be misleading because no one element can
be properly understood without understanding its context in the greater whole.
3. The example given, of warfare in highland Papua New Guinea, describes the links between warfare,
wives, and political power.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
44. What is a microculture and what are three examples of how microcultures can be formed?
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. A microculture is a distinct pattern of learned and shared behavior within a larger culture.
2. Example: class, based on economic position in a society.
3. Example: ethnicity, a sense of common identity among a group based on common heritage or other
characteristic.
4. Example: gender, culturally defined roles for men and women.
5. Example: institutions; cultures can form within schools, prisons, or militaries.
Learning Objective: 1.2 Recognize what is cultural anthropology.
Topic: Introducing Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts

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12
45. Describe the difference between absolute cultural relativism and critical cultural relativism. Choose an issue and
consider it from each of the two perspectives.
Answer: The ideal answer will include:
1. Absolute cultural relativism is the position that people outside of a culture have no grounds on which
to criticize its values or beliefs.
2. Critical cultural relativism is the position that beliefs and practices can be questioned by distinguishing
between who is helped and who is harmed by those cultural elements.
3. Example: The absolute cultural relativist perspective would claim outsiders should not question the
Nazi Holocaust because it was a product of another culture.
4. Example: A critical cultural relativist perspective would describe the Holocaust in terms of whom it
harmed, the power structure involved, and the relationship between the cultures.
Learning Objective: 1.3 Summarize the distinctive features of cultural anthropology.
Topic: Distinctive Features of Cultural Anthropology
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Skill Level: Analyze It

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Chapter 2 The Evolution of Humanity and Culture
MULTIPLE CHOICE
1. Most nonhuman primate species are __________.
A) arboreal and terrestrial
B) arboreal, quadrupedal, and diurnal
C) terrestrial, bipedal, and nocturnal
D) arboreal, bipedal, and nocturnal
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 2.1 Identify what living nonhuman primates tell us about human culture.
Topic: Nonhuman Primates and the Roots of Human Culture
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
2. __________ is the term applied to nonhuman primates whose diet is not specialized.
A) Frugivore
B) Folivore
C) Gummivore
D) Omnivore
Answer: D
Learning Objective: 2.1 Identify what living nonhuman primates tell us about human culture.
Topic: Nonhuman Primates and the Roots of Human Culture
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
3. The only great ape found in Asia is the __________.
A) chimpanzee
B) orangutan
C) bonobo
D) gorilla
Answer: B
Learning Objective: 2.1 Identify what living nonhuman primates tell us about human culture.
Topic: Nonhuman Primates and the Roots of Human Culture
Difficulty Level: Easy
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
4. Gorillas live in what type of social group?
A) single-male, multi-female
B) male only
C) fission-fusion
D) solitary
Answer: A
Learning Objective: 2.1 Identify what living nonhuman primates tell us about human culture.
Topic: Nonhuman Primates and the Roots of Human Culture
Difficulty Level: Moderate
Skill Level: Remember the Facts

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