Practice question · Sort into groups
Sort each statement about the same harvest ritual: emic or etic?
Groups: Emic (insider’s account) · Etic (analyst’s account)
- "Only the chief’s clan may open the first mound"
- The ritual redistributes surplus food to poorer households
- "The spirits will blight the yams if the dance is skipped"
- The opening rule publicly re-enacts the rank order each season
Hints
- One perspective uses local categories, the other analytical ones.
- Spirits and shame are local; cross-cultural comparison is not.
Show the answer
Emic (insider’s account): "The spirits will blight the yams if the dance is skipped", "Only the chief’s clan may open the first mound"
Etic (analyst’s account): The ritual redistributes surplus food to poorer households, The opening rule publicly re-enacts the rank order each season
Why
Emic statements live inside the local categories (spirits, shame, clans); etic ones translate the same acts into cross-cultural analytics (redistribution, rank, enforcement).
Practise Fieldwork and the Ethnographic Method
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