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All developed social systems are stratified. No society is a mass of individuals. European society was organized along class, guilds, and religion (Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, etc.) India had castes, or more properly, jatis. Castes in India are different than classes in the West. Castes are not economically structured. The concept of human races has often been misused, and the whole issue has therefore come under intense criticism. A ...
Ethnography is a form of research focusing on the sociology of meaning through close field observation of sociocultural phenomena. Typically, the ethnographer focuses on a community, selecting informants who are known to have an overview of the activities of the community. The ethnographic method starts with selection of a culture, review of the literature pertaining to the culture, and identification of variables of interest--typically variables perceived as ...
A tribe, viewed historically or developmentally, consists of a social group existing before the development of, or outside of, states, though some modern theorists hold that contemporary tribes can only be understood in terms of their relationship to states. Archaeologists continue to explore the development of pre-state tribes. Current research suggests that tribal structures constituted one type of adaptation to situations providing plentiful yet unpredictable ...