Ethnocentrism and cultural relativism
Everyone sees the world through their own culture. Anthropology trains people to notice that lens and look past it.
Ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism is judging other cultures by the standards of one's own and assuming one's own ways are normal or superior. It is natural to some degree, since our culture feels like 'just how things are', but it leads to misunderstanding and has been used to justify colonial rule and discrimination.
Cultural relativism
Cultural relativism is the practice of understanding a culture on its own terms, asking what a custom means and how it fits into people's lives before judging it. It is a method for understanding, not a claim that anything goes. Anthropologists can still criticise practices that cause harm, but only after understanding them.
Worked example: eating with hands
A visitor from a culture where people eat with forks may first see eating with the hands as unhygienic. A relativist approach asks how the practice works: hands are washed carefully, the right hand is used, and many people say touching food connects them to it. What looked like a lack of manners turns out to be a different, carefully regulated set of manners.
Flashcard
Judging other cultures by one's own standards
Check your understanding
A tourist calls a local greeting custom 'strange and backward' after one day in a country. This shows: