Just shooting the breeze
Cowrie shells, now a commodity that can be bought at department stores, were once a precious item of trade.
Cowrie shells are normally seen on necklaces. You can grab one for pretty cheap in department stores.
But even though they’re pretty worthless nowadays, these tiny little shells were once a form of currency.
Let’s take a ride back into time. Continue reading “The Amazing History of Cowrie Shells”
So, this is kind of silly, but over the past few months, I’m been really into Vikings. And the reason why is because of the series Vikings.
I watched it daily via Netflix and got really into it. I started researching about them and studied maps of where they were from and where they raided (I absolutely nerded out).
When I visited my niece and nephews, I even pretended to be a Viking and chased them around their house. It was super childish, I know.
But what I’m trying to get at is that I was infatuated with Vikings.
However, I came across this article earlier this week that dismantled almost every fact that I thought I knew about Vikings. Continue reading “Vikings Are Not What We Thought”
Ever wonder what evolutionary psychology is? I did so I decided to do some research. Here are my findings and thoughts on the topic.
I was watching this show called “Warrior” the other day (well, I was actually re-watching it because it’s that dope). It’s based on this story that Bruce Lee created.
Anyway, this show has a lot of martial arts and fighting in it. This is one of the reasons why I like it so much.
As an example, in the very first scene, the main character gets into a fight with two racist immigrant officials. He uses his martial arts to beat them up and as I was watching this, I felt this aggression run through me.
And this feeling happened every time I watched a fight scene in this show (which is often). In one of the last scenes of the season finale, there was this big fight scene. And as soon as I finished watching it, I just had to hit something.
So the next day, I dusted off my old punching and hung up. I went 3 rounds with it and I felt great (I felt great in that I got to release all the aggression. Physically, I felt horrible).
But why did I feel this way? Why did my body shoot an injection of testosterone into me? Continue reading “What is Evolutionary Psychology?”
Economic universals are three issues that all economies want to solve. Regardless of where the economy is (in North America or Asia), it has to deal with these universals.
So, I’ve been reading up on anthropology a lot lately. More specifically, economic anthropology.
I wrote an article talking about it here.
But I came across this interesting theory while reading this one article.
The theory is called economic universals. When conducting research, anthropologists have to take this concept into consideration. Continue reading “What are Economic Universals?”
Economic anthropology looks at how people from different cultures make, buy, and share things.
However, you shouldn’t confuse economics with the topic at hand.
Economics mainly looks at how people and societies can earn more capital.
Economic anthropology, on the other hand, looks at the different economic systems used in the world.
Economic systems are the various ways that different cultures exchange goods. It also looks at how cultures place value on the economy. Continue reading “What is Economic Anthropology?”
Anthropology is the study of humans –culture, biological development, and social development. Ethnography is a way to study humans and cultures.
Anthropology was a course that I wanted to take in college. Every semester, I would try to sign up for a class, but the availability never matched up with my schedule. As a result, I never got the opportunity to take a course.
But a few years ago, I came across a book called Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. I was at the book store one day and picked it up to see what it was all about. I skimmed through it, looked at some of the pictures, and was interested.
The first couple of times reading it was overwhelming. It’s a big book with big ideas, and I’m a slow reader. I would complete a chapter and see that there are still hundreds more pages to read.
But the book is thought-provoking. And that’s why I kept reading it.
Harari does a good job of explaining human history and the various theories of it.
After completing the book, which is a blend of history, psychology and anthropology, I wanted to learn more about the latter topic (remember, it was a course I wanted to take).
I felt like Sapiens was a good intro to the social science, but nothing in-depth. There weren’t any anthropological theories in it, even though it talked a lot about history, culture, and society. Continue reading “What is Anthropology? And What’s Ethnography?”