Anthropology

The Self and the Person in Contemporary Anthropology

What is anthropology? What is its view about the concept of self?

 Anthropology is the study of people, past and present. It focuses on understanding the human condition in
its cultural aspect.
 In a general sense, anthropology is concerned with understanding how humans evolved and how they differ
from one another.
 It is a very dynamic field, and anthropological literature offers several different definitions of self.
 Katherine Ewing described the self as encompassing the “physical organism, possessing psychological
functioning and social attributes. This definition portrays the self as implicitly and explicitly existing in the
mind compromised of psychological, biological, and cultural processes.
 Joseph LeDoux conceptualized the implicit and explicit aspects of the self.
 The aspect of the self that you are consciously aware of is the explicit self while the one that is not
immediately available to the consciousness is the implicit aspect.
 The self is not static; it is added to and subtracted from by genetic maturation, learning, forgetting, stress,
ageing, and disease.

Self as representation

 Ewing asserted that a self is illusory. People construct a series of self- representations that are based on
selected cultural aspects of person and selected chains of personal memories.
 People from all cultures have been observed to be able to rapidly project different self- representations,
depending on the context of the situation. The person is unaware of these shifts; however, he/she will still
experience wholeness and continuity despite these shifts.

The Self Embedded in Culture

 Independent and interdependent constructs

 Self-construals are also imbedded in culture.
 Construal is an interpretation of the meaning of something; hence, in this sense the meaning of self.
 The independent construct is characteristic of individualistic culture. Individualistic culture represents the
self as separate, distinct, with emphasis on internal attributes or traits, skills, and values.
 The interdependent construct is typical of the collectivist culture in East Asia stressing the essential
connection between the individual to other people.
 Catherine Raeff believed that culture can influence how you view: relationship, personality traits,
achievement, and expressing emotions.
 Relationships
 Culture influences how you enter into and maintain relationships.
 Personality Traits
 Culture influences whether (and how) you value traits, like humiliity, self-esteem, politeness,
assertiveness, and so on, as well as how you perceive hardships or how you feel about relying on
others.
 Achievement
 Culture influences how you define success and whether you value certain types of individual and
group achievements.
 Expressing emotions
 Culture influences what will affect you emotionally, as well as how you express yourself, such as
showing your feelings in public or keeping it private.