Anthropologist's Digest

Tag: research

  • Who Gets to Be a Hero?

    Who Gets to Be a Hero?

    The Anthropology of Prestige In World War 2

    Hello all, and welcome back to my blog! After a busy summer, there should finally be more posts on the way, so stay tuned for more soon.

    I recently finished the very well-written nonfiction book A Higher Call by Adam Makos (and it is highly recommended). In this book, Makos writes of the lives of pilots during the Second World War, describing famous missions and the strategic failures that eventually led to the collapse of the Third Reich. A Higher Call deals heavily with the themes of honor and morality in war, two values that were tested in the skies above Europe and Africa.

    Reading this book, I was impressed by the number of aerial victories scored by many of the famous German Aces (known as Experten). Erich Hartmann, the highest scoring pilot of all time, took down 352 planes over 1,404 combat missions. Adolf Galland, commander of the famous JV-44 wing, scored 104 victories. Richard I. Bong took down 40 enemy planes in his P-38 fighter. All of these men were known as “Aces”. I’ve read a number of articles about these talented fighters, and one thing I noticed is that many of them hail from Europe or the United States. While the massive scale of aircraft production as well as the range of fighting in the European theater are obvious reasons for this, the trend of Western countries producing the largest numbers of recognized aces is something that I found interesting.

    The Mythic “Ace” Status

    Hailing from the French word used to describe someone elite, a flying ace is a military pilot credited with shooting down five or more enemy aircraft in air-to-air combat. Though it was a far more attainable status during WWII, when targets were in abundance, it has always been a prestigious title only held by the most skilled aviators. During the Second World War, estimates indicate that there were over 4,000 aces globally, with Nazi Germany and the United States producing the most. Due to the impressive nature of this status, wartime ministries on all sides aggressively cultivated the mythos of the ace to put a heroic face on the otherwise anonymous and industrialized slaughter of World War II.

    At this point in the article, you may be wondering why I have gone on about fighter planes and propaganda on an anthropology blog. The prestige surrounding aerial victories is precisely where anthropological themes come into play, though. In an earlier article, I explained the theme of collectivism vs. individualism, but I will briefly describe it here. Collectivist cultures prioritize the needs of the group, and the role of the individual often contributes to the functionality of their group. Individualist cultures, on the other hand, prioritize the individual. In these cultures, individuals often pursue their own goals instead of working towards group goals. During World War II, the collectivist-individualist spread of belligerents was as follows:

    Nazi GermanyTraditional Individualist
    United StatesStrongly Individualist
    United KingdomStrongly Individualist
    Australia & CanadaStrongly Individualist
    Soviet UnionIdeologically Collectivist
    Republic of ChinaStrongly Collectivist
    Empire of JapanStrongly Collectivist
    Fascist ItalyIn-Group Collectivist

    The Highest Honor

    The individualism-collectivism theme had an important role in how different countries’ pilots were honored. Nazi Germany is the most prominent example of an individualist prestige system during the war. Extreme hierarchical rewards characterized the “cult of aces” promoted in the Luftwaffe. Pilots earned medals in a preset order that required one to obtain every medal in a preset sequence. After receiving two Iron Cross medals, the Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe, and the German Cross in Gold, pilots who scored 20 aerial victories had the ultimate honor of wearing the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross. Earning the Knight’s Cross instantly transformed any Jagdflieger into a national hero. The pilot’s name and achievements were blasted across the nation through the daily Armed Forces Report radio broadcast, turning anonymous servicemen into household names overnight. The Nazi state printed millions of postcards and collector’s cards featuring images of pilots wearing their medals, and the propaganda magazine Signal regularly featured high-profile pilots on its cover. From there, aviators could earn milestone additions to their Knight’s Cross; oak leaves, swords, diamonds, and golden oak leaves were added, in that order, to the Knight’s Cross for additional victories. The achievement of these milestones, like the Cross, was highly publicized.

    Knights Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds

    Pilots who earned these honors were portrayed not as soldiers fighting under the Wehrmacht leadership, but as romantic, individualistic “knights of the air”. Emphasizing the pilots’ Aryan traits and devotion to the regime, the German propaganda machine was able to use these men to inspire the mass purchase of war bonds and maintain high civilian morale. Additionally, when the tide of the war turned and the Defense of the Reich campaign began, newspapers began to run stories detailing how single ace pilots “saved” cities by shooting down several Allied bombers in single nights. This served to counter the growing demoralization in the German public.

    While sometimes promoting shared credit and teamwork, the United States held the same individualistic values as Nazi Germany in terms of its pilots and propaganda. American propaganda was far less centralized than that of Germany, as most was produced through cooperation with Hollywood or other commercial entities. Still, top aces like Richard Bong (40 victories) and David McCampbell (34 victories) were brought back to the United States at the peak of their fame to be used as public relations assets. These national heroes were the faces of the War Bond system, travelling to cities and factories to sell government war bonds.

    Some interesting American Ace propaganda

    While aerial victories meant everything to pilots in America, Germany, Canada, Britain, and Australia, the situation was far different in collectivist countries, especially Japan. The Imperial Japanese Navy and Army Air Forces supported group-only victory credits. When an aerial victory was achieved, it was officially recorded in the air group (sentai) logbook not as an individual victory, but as a victory for the entire group. Rather than emphasize individual victories like Germany, Imperial Japan placed no emphasis on personal accomplishments. According to the popular Warbird’s Forum, except for high-ranking officers, the only medal awarded to Japanese soldiers was one that was awarded upon a pilot’s death. One aspect of the war unique to Japan that perfectly reflects the empire’s collective ideals is the Kamikaze. Rather than relying on skill to win dogfights, the Kamikaze program relied on the ultimate collective spirit of Japanese pilots. Erasing the role of the individual completely, a Kamikaze pilot’s sole purpose was to guide explosive-laden planes into enemy targets. In this display of ultimate devotion to the empire (the collective group), the individual was entirely unprioritized in order to benefit the survival of Japan.

    The contrast between the prestige systems of collectivist and individualist belligerents in the Second World War is stark. While the core values of individualist nations were reflected in their use of aces as heroes and knights, collective countries removed all focus from the individual. Such a difference shows just how deeply the cultural values and traditional beliefs of a nation and its people impact the development of political, social, and economic institutions.

    I hope you enjoyed this week’s post about something new! Stay tuned for another article soon.

  • A Look Into Cultural Influences on Attachment Styles

    Introduction

    Hello all, and welcome to my first post of the new year! Today, I am researching a rather niche topic that did not realize could be looked at through an anthropological lens: attachment styles. I recently learned about this psychological phenomenon during my studies in AP Psych class, and I found the science behind innate infant behaviors to be fascinating.

    A Brief History of Attachment Theory

    First developed by the 20th century psychiatrist John Bowlby, attachment theory postulates that infants must bond with a primary caregiver to properly develop socially and emotionally. Though the concept of attachment has been studied extensively in the last 100 years, developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth’s famous “strange situation” experiment paved the way for modern understanding. This experiment placed infants in an unfamiliar room with a caregiver before removing the caregiver and leaving the infants alone. After a while, the caregivers returned, and the reactions displayed by the infants were recorded. This study found that attachment to a caregiver typically is expressed in either a secure or insecure manner, with insecure attachment taking the form of anxious attachment, avoidant attachment, and disorganized attachment (anxious-avoidant). Though one’s attachment style manifests itself at an early age and is influenced mainly by primary caregiver interactions, these styles tend to stick with us into adulthood, and they continue to be evident in mature relationship dynamics.

    Cultural Influences

    Now that an understanding of the psychology behind attachment styles has been established, I will turn to a well-known meta-analytic study of existing “strange situation” experiments (Van Ijzendoorn & Kroonenberg) across cultures to examine cultural differences in attachment. This analysis blends psychology and anthropology in its classification of cultures as either collectivist or individualist (see earlier article). Examining almost 2000 instances of the strange situation across 8 different cultures, researchers found that levels of secure attachment were relatively uniform across cultures (with Britain having the highest percentage and China having the lowest). More interestingly, individualistic countries that value independence tended to have higher levels of disorganized attachment, while collectivistic countries tended to have high levels of resistant anxious attachment. Despite these findings, intercultural variations of attachment styles suggest that culture is not a necessarily a primary influence on attachment styles or parenting styles. Moreover, unique ways of life (such as the Israeli way of raising children in a kibbutz) can contribute to the development of attachment styles that can skew the overall outcome of studies such as this one. In conclusion, culture plays a role in the development of attachment styles, but unique traditions as well as differing parenting styles mean that more research needs to be done to make a definitive statement as to what extent culture truly affects attachment.

    Thank you for reading this month’s post! If you are interested in the concept of attachment styles and want to learn about what yours could be, check out this short survey that gives you a general idea of your style: https://www.attachmentproject.com/

    Note: I am in no way affiliated with the linked survey; I included it purely as an interesting resource.

  • Globalization: The Interconnected World of Today

    Globalization: The Interconnected World of Today

    Since 1980, world trade as a percentage of global GDP has almost doubled (Index Mundi), international migrant stock has more than tripled (United Nations), and the number of people using the internet has increased by thousands of times (ITU). As a reader of an anthropology blog, you may ask why I am sharing seemingly unrelated statistics that would fit much better in a blog about technology or global economics. However, these statistics are all proof that there is a force driving connection in the world of today: globalization.

    A Brief History of Globalization

    Globalization is defined as the process of connecting and integrating different economies, cultures, technology, and populations, increasing global interconnectivity. This is done through the means of technology, people, shared ideas, and trade, to name a few. Globalization can be observed in all walks of life around the world, and its presence is ever-increasing.

    Image Credit: NASA

    The spread of the globalization phenomenon can be traced back to early trade routes like the silk road. On these routes, merchants moved their goods across trade chains for thousands of miles across continents (Eurasia, in the case of the silk road). Though this did not directly establish links between cultures, a large-scale economic market spanning dozens of countries was established, paving the way for economic interconnection. Future widespread trade included the spice routes of seventh-century Arabs, connecting the east and the west as well as paving the way for the Age of Discovery. During this period (1400-1700), European nations greatly advanced globalization through their conquest of foreign nations, one of which later became the United States of America. Through the founding of Spanish and Portuguese trade routes to outposts in South and Central America, the Columbian Exchange, a web of trade routes bringing regionally specialized goods to new areas, opened a new worldwide colonial economy. While these advancements led to partial globalization, true globalization was not achieved until around the 20th century, when the industrial revolution opened a new era of trade dubbed the “First Wave of Globalization”. Over the years, the process of globalizing advanced and economic bonds were strengthened by innovations in technology (brought by the first and second industrial revolutions). Today, a new “Fourth Wave of Globalization” is continuing the upward economic trend as cybertechnology dominates world markets.

    Columbus’s exploration of the New World played a large role in establishing a global economy. (Image Credit: Kristijan Arsoy)

    Types of Globalization

    While my not-so brief overview of globalization’s lengthy history makes it sound like a primarily economic topic, globalization in the modern age takes many forms. Each of these comes with its own advantages and drawbacks.

    Political Globalization

    Starting with a type of which we have no shortage in the current day and age, political globalization describes the development of global policy and international government. In the modern interconnected world, tensions such as geopolitical conflicts (i.e. the Russo-Ukrainian conflict or the Arab Spring) have far-reaching effects that extend well beyond their borders (such as ethnic tensions that resulted from the revolutions). Additionally, world governments and allegiances such as the UN, EU, NATO, and the defunct Warsaw Pact have become increasingly active on the world stage in the last century. These bodies, primarily established to promote security and harmony in member countries, have led to an increased political interconnectivity that has brought previously closed-off countries with their own unique policies into shared-policy groups. Political globalization is seen by some as a force of positivity, as it fosters peace as well as economic connections, but it has been criticized by some as having caused a loss of sovereignty (i.e. British Eurosceptics such as Nigel Farage, who criticize the European Union’s undermining of state independence).

    Economic Globalization

    Economic globalization refers to the integration of national economies into the global economy. The modern technology market is a perfect example of this: a computer made of American raw materials and Chinese computer chips could be assembled in a Hungarian factory. This international economic integration has become a standard of modern manufacturing, and the outsourcing of different countries’ labor and resources creates economic ties that have merged multiple nations’ economies into one (or something that is on the way to being one). Global stock markets are another prime example of economic globalization; the fluctuation of a stock in one country could have an impact on investors and governments around the world. While economic globalization drives the growth of international markets and promotes healthy economic competition, the interconnectivity it brings increases the risk of a potential financial crisis having global consequences.

    Cultural Globalization

    Cultural globalization, the type most pertinent to the study of anthropology, is the spread and integration of cultures into other cultures. The internet (and its social media platforms) serves as the perfect vehicle for the spread of culture, something that can be seen in the global support for football team Manchester United or K-pop band BTS. Furthermore, mass global travel and tourism helps to spread cultural ideas and customs. Though cultural globalization can cause cultural homogenization and loss of unique traditions, with balance, the spread of cultures around the globe can help us gain a fuller understanding of viewpoints and ways of life through others’ perspectives.

    Applications to the Field of Anthropology

    The primary aspect of globalization pertinent to anthropology is the newfound connectedness of people and their ways of life (seen primarily in cultural globalization, but also through connections like business ties in economic globalization). Global interaction between cultures and individuals, a major theme in the study of anthropology, is greatly changing as globalization persists, and the field of anthropology must constantly adapt to keep up with global interconnection. Additionally, studying the reactions of people and cultures to globalization unlocks new perspectives that can reveal more about cultures as well as how globalization is working its way into their ways of life. This can be seen in many real-life studies such as Dr. Garett Cook’s research on indigenous villagers in Guatemala and how they work to maintain their traditions as globalization rapidly reshapes the environment they live in. All in all, anthropology can reveal much about globalism and help humanity adapt to the constantly shifting economic, political, and cultural landscape that is the world of today.

    All images were taken from Unsplash.com

  • Research Review: Semantics of Illness in AI Healthcare

    Research Review: Semantics of Illness in AI Healthcare

    Hello everyone, this is my first post in a while as school got off to a busy start, but I will be posting more frequently in the future, so stay tuned for more anthropology articles.

    I recently participated in a guided research program where I wrote my first research paper. Choosing a topic was slightly hard, but I eventually settled on medical anthropology. I had the most difficult task to deal with next: finding a research question. After looking into many different areas in which medical anthropology could be applied, my mentor and I looked into the development of artificial intelligence (AI) healthcare models and applications of anthropology to them.

    The concept of healthcare AI models is a relatively new one, as the technology needed to produce something effective enough to be worth developing has only just recently become available. Though experimental research could only be performed on existing prototype models (the soonest beta releases are years away), I wanted to look into issues that could arise in a fully functional healthcare model, specifically in regards to cultural differences. These theoretical issues would occur (most likely) primarily by way of cross-cultural differences in semantics or communication style.

    In terms of methodology, I interviewed six participants: a man and a woman each from Walnut Creek, USA; Istanbul, Turkiye; and Develi, Turkiye. The interviews were conducted as series of questions over international encrypted messaging app WhatsApp.

    Image credit: National Cancer Institute

    Semantic Differences

    Fortunately, there exists some research that looks into cultural differences in semantics of illness. Acclaimed Harvard professor Byron J Good’s The Heart of What’s the Matter: Semantics of Illness in Iran examines the Persian folk illness “heart distress” and its perceived causes in Iranian culture. The paper draws on observed semantic networks to trace how people describe their illness, and the result was that Iranians understand their illnesses very differently than Americans understand theirs. While outdated (it was published in 1977), Good’s study provided a strong theoretical basis for me to do more research. In a theoretical healthcare AI model, misdiagnoses could stem from semantic differences, resulting in an unintentionally biased model. This potential harm, should it become an issue, would be classified as structural violence, a form of social harm that prevents groups of people from having their essential needs met (Read more in the paper linked below).

    The first two interview questions were oriented towards semantic differences. The first asked participants to describe symptoms of a common cold to a doctor, and the second asked them to describe symptoms to an AI model. In theory, these two questions would reveal differences across cultures in both how patients interacted with physicians and how they interacted with AI. Provided symptoms were compared in a table (included below), and the style of descriptions (symptom vs biomedical, list vs na

    Cultural Comfort Differences

    The other two questions were less important to the study; these dealt with contextual differences in communication across cultures. The participants were asked to honestly give any sensitive or embarrassing symptoms that they would not feel comfortable sharing with an in-person physician. They were then asked if they would be more comfortable sharing these symptoms with an AI doctor. The purpose of these questions was to evaluate two things. First, if patients felt more comfortable sharing symptoms with a doctor and, consequently, omitted certain symptoms from a report to an AI model, misdiagnosis could occur from a skewed description. Second, if patients felt more comfortable sharing details with an AI model, they would be more likely to share full details and receive an accurate diagnosis as a result.

    Results

    It was hypothesized based on existing theory and assumptions that there would be a good deal of cultural differences in semantics of illness and comfortability interacting with an AI model. The results, however, showed minimal differences across the three cultures (see tables in the paper). There were little to no differences within the country of Turkey, and Turks tended to describe their symptoms and comfortability with in relatively similar ways. The only major difference within Turkey was that rural Turks tended to describe their illness in a symptomatic hybrid difference, while urban Turks tended to describe their illnesses in a list fashion. American and Turkish responses displayed similar levels of variation, as the only major difference between the countries was the symptoms of the common flu that they provided (more detail in the paper).

    There are many potential explanations for the high level of similarity between cultures, but experimental research is needed to verify any one of these explanations. A possible and likely reason that the results of my study were so different from Dr. Good’s is that globalization has made the world a much smaller place since 1977. With the technological revolution putting internet access into the hands of almost all people, information can be spread much more easily, and as a result, cultural mannerisms and ways of interacting bleed into each other more than they used to.

    This study was non-experimental and hypothesis-generating, so no conclusions can be drawn from the results. It does, however, raise interesting questions about how important cultural differences really are to the development of healthcare AI models.

    I would like to thank the team at Lumiere education for providing excellent services and making the experience of writing a paper much easier than it would have been if I had attempted to do it myself. I highly recommend them to anyone who needs guidance in writing and publishing their first paper.

    Read the paper here

  • Ethnography: The Emic and the Etic

    The Methodology of Ethnography

    The word ethnography is very general, being defined as the scientific description of the customs of individual people and cultures. It is primarily used, though, in reference to the methodology of ethnography. As a methodology, ethnography is a qualitative research method centered around studying cohorts or communities to understand social and cultural phenomena. Cultural immersion, external observation of cohorts, interviews, and collection of historical artifacts are the primary methods of research under ethnography. In the methodology of ethnography, two sub-methodologies exist: the emic and the etic. While some anthropologists favor either the emic or the etic, the two sub-methodologies compliment each other, and are often used together.

    Aleksander Stypczynski – Archaeologists at work in rural Uzbekistan

    The Emic

    The emic perspective involves gaining an insider perspective on a culture, examining their beliefs, values, and practices of that culture. This perspective is useful for identifying the motivations behind particular practices or traditions in a culture as understood by members of the culture. One of the primary benefits of the emic perspective is that it is useful for gaining an in-depth understanding of a certain culture. The primary fieldwork method of emic research is immersion into a culture, which involves living alongside members of a culture and participating in day-to-day activities and rituals with them. Unfortunately, the emic is not without drawbacks; only one culture can effectively be studied at once, leading to limited generalizability. Immersion in a culture over a long period of time can also cause a researcher to become biased, negatively impacting results. The emic is primarily employed by social scientists and anthropologists seeking to gain knowledge of a certain culture.

    The Etic

    In contrast, the etic is an outsider’s perspective, taking a more objective approach to examining cultures. This is typically done in a more scientific fashion, using standardized methods of data collection and evaluation to focus on more basic and general practices and traditions of a culture. In theory, since etic research is conducted from an outside point of view, the researcher can remain unbiased and objective. The etic also allows for researchers to compare two different cultures, and it is the primary method used to do so. Unfortunately, since etic research is so subjective and non-immersive, results fail to account for important contextual factors. Outside study may also lead researchers to interpret data incorrectly or make assumptions based on their cultural backgrounds. The etic is often employed in the same areas as the emic; it is used by anthropologists, social scientists, market researchers, and others seeking to understand cultural differences they are not familiar with.

    Conclusion

    In research, using the emic and the etic is not typically a “one or the other” type of situation. These sub-methodologies compliment each other and each serve their own purpose in research, often being used alongside each other to accomplish certain goals. In my own research paper that I will later write about, I am using etic as a primary methodology to compare different individuals’ opinions of medical AI based on where they are located. The emic is also being somewhat used, as I am a member of both cultures I am studying, and it offers me a way to understand exactly what factors are influencing participant’s responses. All in all, the emic and the etic are important for anthropologists who plan on doing research to understand, and they provide us with accurate ways to make conclusions about cultures when used correctly.

    Sources used

    McCutcheon, Russell T. “ Theoretical Background: Insides, Outsides, and The Scholar of Religion.” Emic / Etic, Kenyon College, www2.kenyon.edu/Depts/Religion/Fac/Adler/Reln101/McCutcheon%20-%20emic-etic.htm#:~:text=The%20emic%20perspective%2C%20then%2C%20is,International%20Phonetic%20Alphabet%20for%20example. Accessed 24 July 2025.

    Mostowlansky, Till, and Andrea Rota. “Emic and Etic.” Open Encyclopedia of Anthropology, 11 Mar. 2025, http://www.anthroencyclopedia.com/entry/emic-and-etic.