Sociocultural anthropology
[1] Sociocultural anthropologists recognise a change in the nature of the field and that a previous focus on traditional tribal perspectives has shifted to a contemporary understanding.
Cultural anthropology focuses on how individuals make sense of the world around them using knowledge, beliefs, morals, arts, laws and customs of groups.
The discipline arose through the expansion of European colonial empires, and its practices and theories have been questioned and reformulated along with processes of decolonization.
New challenges have emerged as public debates about multiculturalism and the increasing use of the culture concept outside of the academy and among peoples studied by anthropology.
Radcliffe-Brown and Bronislaw Malinowski marked the point of differentiation between social and cultural anthropology in 1930, evident in texts from this period.
Their comparative anthology aimed to provide a basis for sociological knowledge by classifying kin-based bans instead of relying on empirical observation.
Structuralism was applied to anthropology by Lévi-Strauss to reaffirms the coexistence between the individual and society and categorise information about cultural systems by the formal relationships among their elements.
Ethical issues surrounding the allies involvement were topical among anthropologists and institutional development and practiced methodologies were altered by programs in 'developing countries'.
[13] During the 1970s, public spending was increased in most industrialised counties which expanded social rights, produced dramatic rises in wealth, living standards and overall equity.
[12] The job market of the 2000s is centralised around those occupations that are income generating, reducing the number of university students in the social science fields.
[15] Sociocultural anthropological study of the 21st century, produces facts created by an intersection of cultural classification systems and heterogenous and dynamic societies.
The influence of the media produces accessibility for all to gather experience and evidence, however charged political conditions sway social discourse.
[18] Sociocultural anthropology divides into a broader national level and minority of subcultural groups to ethnographically study societies and cultures.
[19] An interplay of social, political, economic, demographic, cultural and geographical factors remain central to the movement of individuals.
[19] Boas (1920) in his article The Methods of Ethnology (1920) states that it is the migration and dissemination of peoples rather than evolution that provides the basis for ethological research.
Sociocultural anthropology is closely aligned with sociology sharing theoretical generalisation for social science and reflection of human lives.
[12] Since the 1960s, anthropologists have recognised the importance of collaboration through reflections on experiences in the field, on relationships with informants and on contexts used to gather material.
Marxism validates the necessity for conventional field work, exploring the intersection between empirical observation and theoretical frameworks with the aim of improving each.
