The Development of Cognitive Anthropology

Abstract

In an historical account of the growth and development of the field of cognitive anthropology, Roy D'Andrade examines how cultural knowledge is organised within and between human minds. He begins by examining the research carried out during the l950s and l960s which was concerned with how different cultures classify kinship relationships and the natural environment, and then traces the development of more complex and sophisticated cognitive theories of classification in anthropology which took place in the l970s and l980s. In an analysis of more recent developments, the author considers work involving cultural models, emotion, motivation and action. He concludes with a summary of the theoretical perspective of cognitive anthropology.

Economic Development and Local Ecological Knowledge: A Deadlock? Quantitative Research from a Native Amazonian Society

“…We used the cultural consensus model to measure individual theoretical ethnobotanical knowledge (D'Andrade, 1995;Reyes-García et al, 2005a;Romney et al, 1986). This model is based on the assumption that there is a culturally correct answer for every question, that it is the same for all informants, and is defined as the answer given by most people (Romney and Weller, 1984).…”

Comparing US and Japanese Elementary School Teachers' Facility for Linking Rational Number Representations

“…The study of cognitive ethnography rests on the notion that the ways in which participants organize and rationalize their organizations of representations can reveal the underlying basis of cultural understandings (D'Andrade, 1995;Spradley, 1979). That is, as participants organize representations for domains such as rational numbers into categories that make sense to them, their organization of the content reveals not only the underlying knowledge they possess, but also that which they share with others of their own culture.…”

Identifying and Reaching Populations at Risk: The Paradox of Breast Cancer Control

“…It would be valid to take these themes as discrete elements or loosely related cultural theories that independently and additively contribute to avoidance of preventive care [8]. However, this analysis would be incomplete.…”