Critical Thinking In Anthropology - Annotated Bibliography Assessment Answers

Runco, M. A., & Acar, S. (2012). Divergent thinking as an indicator of creative potential. Creativity Research Journal, 24(1), 66-75.

Creative thinking, divergent thinking is used as a predictor certain criteria of performance tests due to its improved validity and reliability. The validity of direct thinking makes it preferable because it is presented as a matter of degree as compared to an all-or-nothing attribute. Divergent thinking involves generation of creative ideas of getting into the details and getting as many solutions as possible. It takes place in a spontaneous and non-linear manner, leading to the generation of ideas in a cognitive way. In most cases, psychologists have found out that divergent thinking is not dictated by intelligence, but rather the personal abilities such as curiosity and willingness to learn as well as persistence. Hence there are no bad ideas in divergent thinking because since anthropologists suspend judgmental ideas in order to gather as many ideas as possible. It is therefore important that anthropologists employ divergent modes of thinking coupled with curiosity as well as the willingness. This would be important so that they can be able to gather quality information.

Colzato, L. S., Szapora, A., Lippelt, D., & Hommel, B. (2014). Prior meditation practice modulates performance and strategy use in the convergent-and divergent-thinking problems. Mindfulness, 1-7.

Anthropologists need to come up with proper ideas in order to give an approach to dealing with convergent thinking in order to come up with a collection of ideas. However, in convergent thinking, an anthropologist should give a correct answer to the questions, especially if they do not need critical thinking and analysis. In this case, an individual should be able to come up with the best answer, especially with regards to the nature in which anthropological research presents itself. This follows after divergent thinking has been done such the crude information gathered is summarized into exact answers. In this case we need to be accurate in choosing one final and correct answer. However, in real time situations, one issue might be having several solutions which can make an anthropological find difficult in settling on a final answer while approaching a single problem. We therefore need to apply intelligence so that in the end, we can judge the best solution out of the several available range of solutions.

Haviland, W., Prins, H., McBride, B., & Walrath, D. (2013). Cultural anthropology: the human challenge. Cengage Learning.

The culture evolved from the way of their living in the local as well as global concepts. Culture is critical in determining the condition of families, rituals, social conflicts as well as gender norms. Creative reasoning thus enables anthropologists to go deep into the experiences that are centred on people by engaging to strong engagements. In this case, the researcher must explore culturally diverse practices across time and in different places. To get more and valuable information, creative thinking is employed via challenging the cultural norms and social practices in question, regardless of whether they are economic, colonial, gender or racial inequalities. This is the reason as to why we the anthropologists are able to study several communities and ethnic groups such as environmental activists, scientists as well as unregistered migrants.

Harris, P. (2015). Children make good anthropologists. Social Anthropology, 23 (2), 211-212.

In social anthropology, there is a wide application of realistic methods to examine some problems that are said to be philosophical concerning how humans and nature interacts. Thus, there is a need to focus on issues to do with the family, gender, and the production and circulation of necessities and luxuries; moral and religious ideas and ritual practices; notions of the human person and of health and illness. It is at this point that we the social anthropologists come in and determine the connections that exist between politics, culture, religion and economic development. At this point, we are able to apply personal empathy whereby we view anthropological research as a conversation in order to gather as much information as possible. It therefore becomes crucial for us to integrate these facts and come up with sound information.

Wolf-Meyer, M., & Cochran, C. (2015). Unifying minor sciences and minor literatures: Reproduction and revolution in quantum consciousness as a model for the anthropology of science. Anthropological Theory, 15 (4), 407-433.

Several characteristics of human behaviour can include the family structures; warfare and religion can be examined and understood by use of scientific research methods these concepts need to be properly used because many of the explanations in the social and behavioural sciences do not meet the minimum requirements of science. It is therefore important for anthropologists are rigorous and creative because the field itself is scientific in nature. As a result, if anthropology is to be regarded as a social science, then we need to evaluate different theories and explanations applied in a research. Such explanations should be critically analysed to determine their assumptions. Specific consideration also needs to be given to constructing testable hypotheses by which proposed or competing explanations can be evaluated.

Glaskin, K. (2016). Anthropology, Dreams and Creativity. The Ash gate Research Companion to Anthropology, 71.

The anthropologists need to set out the differences that exist between anecdotal and systematic evidence. First of all, anecdotal evidence relies on the experiences that a person had as well as the stories that he or she has been narrated. However, anecdotal evidence has some limitations as the researcher is not actually sure whether the information is accurate and representative of the research question or not.

If it happens that the anecdotal evidence comes straight the anthropologists’ personal experience it needs to be correct because they either know or saw it. However, the experience can be unusual due to an exception in a case whereby the observation noted, is true for a certain time and place, but does not represent the whole range of possibilities. As such, the differences between these choices are very important for application anthropological knowledge.

Denis, L. (2015). Kant's Observations and Remarks: A Critical Guide Ed. By Susan Meld Shell and Richard Velkley (review). German Studies Review, 38 (2), 414-416.

In order to have a clear understanding of human behaviour, anthropologists need to make clear, correct and accurate observations. You may think this overly academic, but as anthropologists read the contents in the ethnographies to get information, it dawns on them that the information contained inside is not reliable. Creative thinking, researchers should avoid this by reading while the mind is focused on the research question. Since most of the work in anthropology involves either developing theories or critiquing theories of other people, it is important to learn to critique such theories to have a deep understanding of anthropological facts. In such a case, the anthropologist is able to come up with skills that enable him or her to develop their individual theories.

Gowan, P. (2015). Contemporary intra-core relations and world systems theory. Journal of World-Systems Research, 10(2), 471-500.

Systems theory brings together natural and social sciences with an aim of understanding the society in its complexity, thus solving the problems associated with mind and body, subject and objects as well as form content. Instead of coming up with restricted closed categories into binaries, the anthropological approach needs to stay open in order to allow a non-restricted interactions. This is true for instance, when dealing with complex systems such as the ecosystem that have so many variables such as plants, microorganisms and animals. Such interactions are able to cope up with the changing conditions in order to create a balance and hence reliable outcomes. Thus we need to take note of the prevailing conditions and apply the right skills in gathering information for use in the research.