What are the different between Anthropology and Archaeology.
Anthropology can be defined as a study of human nature, human society and
human past , Anthropology is a discipline of infinite curiosity about human
being , the term anthropology comes from the Greek word ‘Anthropus’ for man, human and
logos for study.(Aschultz,2009:3)
Anthropology
is the study of humanity in the widest possible sense, this means anthropology
study about human as biological organism and as people with distinctive and
unique characteristics The history of anthropology refers primarily to the 18thc
and 19thc precursors of the modern anthropology; this term itself
innovated as a New Latin scientific word during the Renaissance which meant
always the study or science of man. Archaeology has number of sub disciplines
such as archaeology, social or cultural anthropology, linguistic anthropology
and biological or physical anthropology.(Renfrew,1991:14)
Generally
anthropology is the study of people through out the world their evolutionary, history,
how they behave to different environment, communicate and socialize with other.
The study of anthropology concerned with both biological features that makes us
human (such as physiology, genetic makeup, nutrition, history and evolution)
and with social aspect such as language, culture, politics, family and religion
Archaeology is scientific study of the human past of ancient
human behaviour from the earliest times right up to the present. The
archaeologists are unique among scientist in that they study changes of human
culture over long period of time. Etymologically the term archaeology is
derived from two Greek words “archaeos” which means “ancient or past” and logos
which means “study”. The history of archaeology was started in the 8thc
B.C when Greek writer called Hesiod wrote that human has passed through great
five history, the earliest was an age of God when “people dwelt in ease” the
last an age of war when “everyone work terribly had experienced great sorrow.( Fagan,2009:5)
Archaeology
is the cultural anthropology of human past involving analysis of material
remains left behind by earlier societies
(Schultz et al,2009:11)
Generally archaeology is the scientific
study of human culture by using past human remains of previous human society
example of these remain are human artfact,item like tools,jewerly,potery
fossils of human ,ecofact,features and structures
Both deal with or study human through material remain, Anthropology used
material remain to study human society as a whole at different aspect such as
social anthropology, culture anthropology, biological anthropology, for example
biological anthropology involves the study of human biological evolution and
varieties among different population by using remain so anthropology used past
material remains to predict the existence and nature of the concurrent society
to know how they exist. Also archaeology study human through culture remain or
material remains of mans past such as artifacts, fossils, features and ecofact
by doing so help reflect how past society can be related with concurrent
society. So material remains acted as abase to predict and understand the
contemporary society.
Both use practice in their field,
anthropology use practice in their field for example use of carbon14 for
excavation of certain phenomena also conduct laboratory practice such as to
examine fossils remains of certain living organism in order to know it
existence, type of organism, or the way it lived. Also archaeology use practice
in their study of a certain society for example using different survey
technique and research to correct data at various place, so anthropology does
no necessary depend only on the written document but also can be go beyond and
use speculative information to reconstruct human life for example from research
and survey also archaeology it self can be used as methodology both supplementary
and complimentary to anthropological information.(Ember,2003:23-29)
The source of information
are related , for example ethnographic technique, both anthropologist and
archaeologist can use ethnographic technique in their field, Ethnologist seek
to understand how, why people today and in the recent past differ in the
customary ways of thinking and acting. It is concerned with pattern and
behavior such as marriage, custom, king ship organization ,religion, political
and economic system, Ethnologist also study dynamic of culture thus how culture develop and change .The aim
of anthologist is large the same as archaeologist and anthropologist
,ethnologist however generally use data corrected through observation and
interviewing of living people, archaeologist on the other hand most work with
fragment remain of past cultures on the basis of with fragment remains of past
culture and the basis of which they can
only make influence of prehistoric people .(Embe,et al,2003:6)
Both studies about the origin of
human, both disciplines explains about the origin of ancient human their
characteristics and the way they respond to their environment, anthropology as
an holistic field can explain how the ancient man lived in the relation to his
environment through reflecting on social economic and ecological activities performed
by ancient man. like wise archaeology as both temporal and multiple scope
concern the explanation of earliest mans life through past culture remains .for
stance archaeologist by speculating the
past material remains such as art fact, ecofact ,structures and features, all
together with common archaeological dating technique may correlate with the
origin of past.(schultzl,et al,2009:10)
Anthropology and
archaeology study about culture as well as its evolution, as to determine if
the human culture has been changing and the reasons for the change,
Anthropology studies both learned manners and ideas acquired by certain people
of society, culture makes us unique among creature .Human being are more
dependent than any other species on learning to survival because we have no
instincts that automatically protect us and help us find food and shelter. From
anthropological perspective, the concept of culture is central to explain why
human being are what they are and why they do what they do. Likewise archaeologist
tries to reconstruct and preserve the cultural legacy of the past human.(Schultz,et
al,2009:4)
Despite the existing similarities between anthropology and archaeology,
in some facet they vary from one another in the following ways:-
Descriptions; this means
anthropology refer to comprehensive study of all aspects of human beings
including their development in the widest sense, this study human being as
biological organism and people which distinctive and unique characteristics of
culture while archaeology refer to scientific study of the human past of the
ancient human behavior from the earliest times right up to the present, this
has such as most archaeology is part of much wider discipline understanding of
the past through excavation of past human behavior.
Anthropology
is very comprehensive discipline in understanding of human behavior in the
wider sense compared to archaeology, this means that archaeology is sub
discipline of anthropology in this sense only explore human behavior partially
including past remain while anthropology focus on human culture from the
beginning of human life to the present in broader view.
Fields; anthropology have
number of disciplines in order to understand human being more comprehensively
thus why has number of sub disciplines such as cultural anthropology, archaeology,
linguistic anthropology and physical anthropology while archaeology also have
number of sub discipline such as underwater archaeology, environmental
archaeology, historic archaeology and others this show that anthropology is
more broader in understanding human culture than archaeology because is sub
discipline of anthropology.
Conclusively Anthropology and
archaeology have long history; archeology it has a long history as it begin
when people have speculated about human origins and remote past for centuries
as early as 8thc B.C due to this archaeology really begin in the
European which was hasten intellectual curiosity in the world wide but now days
archaeology become more advance due to development of technology hence methods
of remote sensing, surveying, satellite pictures and Geographical Information
System are used like wise anthropology traced back from the ancient Greek
historical and philosophical of writings about human nature and organization of
human society, anthropologist regard Herodotus as Greek historian who lived
about 400B.C was the first historian to use and describe the culture of various
people of Persia.
REFERENCES
Ember, C.R & Ember, M. (2003). Anthropology: A Brief Introduction. (5th
Ed). (USA: Hamilton Printing Co).
Fagan,
B.M. (2009).Archaeology: A Brief Introduction. (10th Ed). (Santa Barbara: University of Carfonia).
Renfrew, C & Bahn, F. (1991). Archaeology theories, methods and practice
(5th Ed). London:
Schultz, E.A & Lavenda, R.H. (2009). Cultural Anthropology: A Perspective on the
Human Condition (7th Ed). (New
York: Oxford University Press).
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