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Synonyms

Cultural studies; Cultural/cross-cultural psychology; Cultural/social history; Ethnography; Ethnology; Folklore; Sociology

Definition

Anthropology is the comparative, multidisciplinary, and holistic study of humanity. Though practiced in many disciplines and organizations in and beyond academia, its core reference is to more specific academic disciplines and institutions such as ethnology in mainland Europe, social anthropology and physical anthropology in the UK, or the four fields of anthropology in the USA (sociocultural, biological, linguistic, and archaeological) (Barth et al., 2006). These include numerous thematic and specialist subdisciplines, such as development anthropology, medical anthropology, and cyberanthropology.

This article focuses mainly on sociocultural anthropology, which is the default meaning in most parts of the world. This has the following four defining features:

  • An empiricalbasis in long-term fieldwork supported by wide-ranging secondary research...

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Correspondence to Neil Thin .

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Thin, N. (2014). Anthropology. In: Michalos, A.C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_94

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_94

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-007-0752-8

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