Chapter 14 Test Bank

KNOWLEDGE OF KEY TERMS AND CONCEPTS

Multiple Choice

1. For anthropologists, materiality refers to

a) having the quality of being physical or material.

b) technologically simple objects.

c) only objects that are aesthetically pleasing.

d) American Indian objects.

2. For anthropologists the most important aspect of any object is

a) its aesthetic quality.

b) the value of the object at an auction.

c) how it emerges from and exists within a set of human social relationships.

d) how the use of its raw materials affects the environment.

3. Which of the following groups is a prominent American Indian rights group founded in 1968?

a) NAGPRA

b) American Indian movement

c) World Heritage movement

d) civil rights movement

4. On the north coast of Papua New Guinea, a religious cult leader name Barjani was remembered through which object?

a) his shoes

b) his hat

c) his staff

d) his cloak

5. The idea that things have social lives refers to

a) a belief in animism because objects are often linked to particular spirits.

b) most objects that anthropologists study are either relics or sacred objects.

c) the fact that objects are deeply intertwined with people’s lives.

d) they are imbued with life via sacred ceremonies.

6. Which of the following is not a UNESCO World Heritage site?

a) the pyramids of Giza

b) Fez, Morocco

c) the New York Stock Exchange

d) Mesa Verde, Colorado

7. A key way that objects are used to manipulate people comes through

a) commodity fetishism.

b) advertising.

c) stealing and various kinds of fraud.

d) austerity.

8. Who is least likely to be involved in a cultural resource management project?

a) archaeologists

b) cultural anthropologists

c) art museum curators

d) historical society members

9. What is repatriation?

a) the return of human remains and artifacts to the communities of the people to whom the originally belonged

b) the government allowance of restoration and maintenance on UNESCO World Heritage sties

c) specific, targeted advertising geared toward former consumers of a particular brand

d) indigenous people’s demonstration of patriotism evidenced through the display of their cultural artifacts

10. Advertisers have trained American consumers to focus on the newest and most exciting products through their

a) constant innovations and improvements.

b) attempts to constantly frame their products as new and improved.

c) removal and destruction of old stock to make way for new products.

d) disparaging remarks about celebrities.

12. Cultural resource management experts would likely be in charge of preserving or protecting

a) a famous opera score.

b) an endangered plant species.

c) a recently discovered ancient temple.

d) a set of religious objects.

13. What was a major problem for anthropologists when they were just studying objects in museum collections?

a) The objects may or may not have been genuine.

b) Museum visitors would often destroy key elements of collections.

c) The objects were viewed as isolated from their cultural context.

d) The collections were so large, it was impossible to sort through everything.

Fill in the Blank

14. Anthropologist George W. Stocking Jr., suggested that researchers should try to look at objects in several ____________________, beyond just height, width, and depth, including time, power, wealth, and aesthetics.

dimensions

15. The social life of ____________________ refers to the changing meanings and significance that objects take on over years, decades, and even centuries.

things

16. A culture of ____________________ is a term that refers to the cultural perspectives and social processes that shape and are shaped by how goods and services are bought, sold, and used in contemporary capitalism.

mass consumption

17. ____________________ includes research and planning aimed at identifying, interpreting, and protecting sites and artifacts of historic or prehistoric significance.Cultural resource management

18. The ____________________ is the 1990 law that established the ownership of human remains, grave goods, and important cultural objects as belonging to the Native Americans whose ancestors once owned them.

Native American Graves and Repatriation Act (NAGPR)

19. Just as people pass through different socially recognized phases of life, objects have “____________________” with recognizable phases, from their creation, exchange, and uses to their eventual discard.

careers

True/False

20. Repatriation is the act of returning human remains or cultural artifacts to the communities of descendants of the people to whom they originally belonged.

a) True

b) False

21. Anthropologists have found that people imprint themselves and their pasts onto objects.

a) True

b) False

22. The stereotype that Tahitian women were sexually promiscuous emerged almost overnight after the arrival of Captain Samuel Wallis in 1767, when Tahitians recognized that the British had steel that the crew would exchange for sexual favors.

a) True

b) False

23. The objects in a college student’s dorm room have great personal meaning for the student but may mean something entirely different to everyone else in the dormitory.

a) True

b) False

COMPREHENSION OF FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS

Multiple Choice

24. Which of the following is an ethnocentric reaction to African art?

a) The subject matter is too mystical to be exhibited publicly.

b) The craftsmanship is poor because Africans have no artistic skill.

c) The art is both beautiful and dramatic.

d) The pieces are fakes.

25. The earliest engagement anthropologists had with material culture happened

a) in the flea markets of Paris, where artists like Picasso bought African art objects that inspired many of their paintings.

b) in the great palaces of Asia in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and China.

c) in the gift shops of the world’s great art museums, which sold cheap examples of primitive art.

d) in museums where objects from around the world were originally seen as evidence of how primitive or civilized different societies were.

26. What is one key difference in how tribes and federal government agencies view heritage management?

a) Tribes emphasize spiritual connections to the past while government agencies see heritage resources as tangible places and things.

b) Government agencies view heritage sites as important land for future development and tribes view them as key archaeological sites.

c) Tribes often advocate for GIS mapping and technological investigation of the sites while government agencies prefer traditional archaeological methods of exploration.

d) Government agencies would prefer to hire cultural anthropologists to manage heritage sites while tribes advocate that tribal leadership should control the sites.

27. To illustrate the dimensions that all objects possess, the textbook discusses a “shiny new bicycle.” Why is this example useful to illustrate dimensionality?

a) Bicycles have been around for a while, but they are becoming an important commodity since Americans started producing them in factories again.

b) Actually, any object would do just as well, but most Americans are familiar with bicycles.

c) The latest iPhone would have been a better choice because it would emphasize the latest technology.

d) Bicycles are typically only available to the highest social classes in any society.

28. Which of the following is not a reason George Stocking was interested in objects found in museums?

a) They could tell us about the interaction between the collectors and makers of the objects.

b) They could offer a window into local symbolic systems of meaning.

c) They reflected the Western culture of mass consumption

d) They were historical archives in and of themselves.

29. Which of the following in not true about NAGPRA?

a) It requires the repatriation of human remains and artifacts found with those remains to the families of the dead individuals.

b) It requires all museums and related institutions that hold human remains or cultural objects from any native group to inform native leaders of their holdings.

c) It only covers material from American cultural groups.

d) It is part of UNESCO’s heritage sites program.

30. Why were Tahitians most interested in acquiring Europeans’ iron stores?

a) They were attracted to iron’s aesthetic value.

b) They were attracted to the abilities of iron for cutting and chopping.

c) They wished to harness some of the Europeans’ symbolic power.

d) They wished to exchange the iron with other Polynesians.

31. Which of the following is not one of the ways that objects change over time?

a) the form, shape, color, material, and use may change from generation to generation

b) an object changes significance and meaning as its social and physical contexts change

c) a single object changes significance and meaning as it changes hands

d) an object always becomes less valuable and less significant as it ages and deteriorates over long periods of time

32. Which of the following would not be considered part of material culture?

a) earrings

b) trash

c) wheat fields

d) a set of steak knives

33. What does it mean to “consume” an object?

a) to boil it with salt and pepper

b) to purchase and use it

c) to desire it after viewing an advertisement

d) to recycle it once it no longer serves its function

34. What does four hundred years of skirt length data tell us about changes in manufactured objects?

a) Skirt length has always been tied to women’s propriety

b) Skirts get shorter when cloth is more expensive

c) Some manufactured objects simply change with time

d) Only the most powerful people can really drive trends

Fill in the Blank

35. Possessing ____________________ is a key means through which people define and express who they are.

consumer goods

36. The Tahitians’ obsessive desire for iron from Europeans demonstrated how ____________________ can change objects’ meanings and value.

context

37. Thrones, staffs, shrines, and distinctive or ornamented objects are often used to display people’s ____________________ and ____________________.

power / status

38. When a museum returns human remains or cultural artifacts in their collections back to the communities to whom they originally belonged, they are engaging in____________________.

repatriation

39. ____________________ is the research and planning aimed at identifying, interpreting, and protecting sites with historic significance.

Cultural resource management

True/False

40. For the most part, anthropologists are only interested in practical objects.

a) True

b) False

41. A pair of sneakers likely means the same thing to the person who buys them and the person that sells them.

a) True

b) False

42. Most anthropologists see the consumption of an object or commodity as an antisocial act.

a) True

b) False

43. Anthropologists care about how objects are created but not really how they are discarded.

a) True

b) False

44. Objects and visual images have many things in common because both can be used to construct meaning for people.

a) True

b) False

APPLICATION OF ANTHROPOLOGICAL CONCEPTS

Multiple Choice

45. Just before World War II anthropologists Alfred Kroeber and Jane Richardson published one of the earliest analyses of a modern commodity, focusing in particular on women’s skirts. If you were going to build on their study by examining basketball shorts and jerseys, which of the following would you collect data about?

a) the size of men’s basketball shoes and how these are related to the average height of American men

b) how the makers of basketball jerseys have focused on primary colors

c) the length of basketball shorts from one period to another

d) the association between jersey quality and success in shooting baskets

46. If anthropologists wanted to study the United States’ culture of mass consumption, which of the following would be least important to them?

a) an antique, homemade sweater displayed in a textiles exhibit at a museum

b) a second-hand sweater purchased at a thrift shop

c) a machine-produced sweater sold at the mall

d) a hand-knit sweater available at a local arts fair

47. In which of the following cases would you be most likely to consult an expert in cultural resource management?

a) recataloguing a sculpture collection

b) excavating a prehistoric site

c) planning a historical homes tour of your town

d) curating a photography exhibit on the making of local handicrafts

48. A century ago, studies of objects were largely studies of material culture and the technology available to people living in small-scale societies with simple technologies. The modern anthropological approach to objects has

a) caused anthropologists to accept that museum collections are accurate representatives of the technologies of the time.

b) led anthropologists to recognize that objects do not change meaning over time.

c) pushed anthropologists to take a critical approach to the motives of the collectors of these early museum collections.

d) led to the removal of all objects in museums that are associated with indigenous peoples.

49. Which of the following is not an example of people using objects to legitimate their social standing?

a) collectors displaying well-known paintings and sculptures in their homes

b) chiefs carrying a particular staff

c) ministers wearing clerical (clergy) collars

d) college students wearing backpacks

Short Answer

50. How does the example of Barjani’s bowler hat illustrate that objects have “social lives”?

51. How can a bicycle be thought of as a symbolic construction?

52. If you wanted to study the influence and power of beer commercials on college students and other younger adults, who would you interview and why would you focus on this group of people?

Essays

53. Consider any object belonging to your roommate or someone down the hall from your dorm room. Explain how this object has several dimensions and how these dimensions would help you understand your subject’s outlook, goals, aspirations, and identity in the world.

54. Choose a mundane object present in your classroom and outline its “career.”

55. When Samsung and Apple ads run on TV and web pages they often present their own product as superior to the other. Most of the time we assume they are comparing their products for our benefit. But if viewed in another way, they are reinforcing a number of assumptions, perspectives, or interpretations that both companies share and that both firms want you as a consumer to accept without any thought. What might these shared assumptions, perspectives, and interpretations be, and how does each company convey this message?

OPPORTUNITIES FOR ANALYSIS AND SYNTHESIS

Essays

56. What difference has it made in the kinds of questions anthropologists ask about objects when the discipline stopped thinking of museum collections as being simply evidence of how simple societies interacted with their physical and social environment and began asking how did these particular objects come to be in the museum in the first place?

57. What role do you think the anthropology of material objects could play in how advertisers and manufacturers design and present their products to the public?

58. When colleges and universities hold convocations and graduations, the faculty members come into the ritual space in procession wearing cap and gown, each representing the highest academic degree, general field of study, and the university where the professor’s highest degree was granted. Most faculty members understand the color symbolism of their caps and gowns, but students and their parents often do not. What meaning is being conveyed to students and parents if they do not understand what the different colors encode? Does it matter if faculty members do not know what the different gowns and hoods represent?

59. Why are objects and images powerful in shaping the way people think about themselves and their personal identities?