Chapter 6:

PATTERNS OF
SUBSISTENCE
ADAPTATION
ADAPTATION

•The adaptation
establishes a moving
balance between
the needs of a
population and the
potential of its
environment
ADAPTATION

• Tsembaga, New guinea

highlanders support themselves
chiefly through horticulture
• In 1968, Roy Rappaport published
Pigs for the Ancestors, practice
slash-and-burn agriculture
ADAPTATION

• The interaction process

between changes an
organism make in its
environment and
changes the
environment makes in
organism.
ADAPTATION

Sickle cell anemia

ADAPTATION

Falciparum malaria
ADAPTATION

• Egalitarian Society
-the important characteristic of
food foraging society
-each sex carry its own carried its
own activities
-what available to one is available
to all
ADAPTATION

Food producing society

• Promote the development of new

varieties of particular plants and
animals, which came to increasing
important for people’s subsistence
ADAPTATION

Pastoralism: The Bakhtiari

• Pastoralist live in societies that view
animal husbandry as a proper way
to make a living and consider
movement of all or part of the
society a normal and natural life.
• The pastoral life of bakhtiari
revolves around two seasonal
migrations to find better gazing
land
ADAPTATION

Nonindustrial cities in the

modern world

• Tenochtitlan is a good example of

the kind of urban settlement
characteristic of most ancient, non
industrial civilization
THE UNIT OF
ADAPTATION
 THE UNIT OF ADAPTATION

• ORGANISMS • ENVIRONMENT
 THE UNIT OF ADAPTATION

BIOLOGICAL CULTURAL

Different organisms • individual skills

within the population
may have • personalities
somewhat differing
genetics • knowledge
endowments
 THE UNIT OF ADAPTATION

ORGANISM ENVIRONMENT INTERACTING

SYSTEM
THE UNIT OF ADAPTATION

• Environments do
not determine
culture, but they
do present certain
possibilities and
limitations.
Evolutionary
Adaptation
Evolutionary Adaptation

• Adaptation also must be

understood from a historical point
of view, for organism to fit into an
ecosystem, they must have the
potential to adjust to or become a
part of it.
Evolutionary Adaptation

• Ecosystem – a system or a
functioning whole composed of
both the physical environment and
the organism living within it.
• Comanche is a group of native
American who travel to hunt for
their foods.
• Comanche acquired horses and
guns from Whites, which greatly
enhanced their hunting prowess.
Evolutionary Adaptation

Comanche is a Native American

group of hunters from the great
plains.
Evolutionary Adaptation

Comanche and Cheyenne, yet

their cultural background was quite
different; formerly they were settled
farmers with social, political and
religious institutions quite unlike to
Comanche in their ancestral
homeland.
Evolutionary Adaptation

• Cheyenne- Indian- horseback

Evolutionary Adaptation

Convergent Evolution in cultural

evolution the development of
similar adaptations to similar
conditions by peoples whose
ancestral culture were quite
different.
Evolutionary Adaptation

Parallel Evolution -is the

independent evolution of similar
traits, starting from a similar
ancestral condition. Frequently this
is the situation in more closely
related lineages, where several
species respond to similar
challenges in a similar way.
Culture Areas
Culture Areas

Culture Areas -also called cultural

area, culture province, or ethno-
geographic area, in anthropology,
geography, and other social
sciences, a contiguous
geographic area within which most
societies share many traits in
common.
Culture Areas

Cheyenne and Comanche were

faced a common environment in
which the buffalo was an obvious
and practical source of food as
well as materials for clothing and
shelter.
Cheyenne switch - from hunting to
farming
Culture Areas

The Great Basin Shoshone is both

hunters and gatherers (farmers). They
are also travelers but few families only,
unlike to Comanche the travelers
have a big amount of members who
travel.
 Culture Areas

• Paiutes is also
hunters-gatherers
living under the
same
environmental
condition as the
Shoshone, but
Paiutes managed their food resources
more actively by diverting small streams to
irrigate wild crops.
 Culture Areas

Julian H. Steward
North American
Anthropologist Who
Studied how people live in
past thousand years ago.
Culture Areas

Cultural Ecology the study of

interactions of specific human
cultures with their environment.
 THE FOOD-
FORAGING WAY OF
LIFE
➢Hunting
➢Fishing
➢Gathering wild plant food
THE FOOD FORAGING OF LIFE

• 10,000 years ago, 90% of people

have been food foragers.
• Food foragers-people do not know
farm or practice animal husbandry.
• Can be found in World marginal
areas.(frozen arctic tundra, deserts,
and forest)
• Food foraging life is difficult.
THE FOOD FORAGING OF LIFE

• Primitive, backward or under

developed.
• Many assume that food foraging as
a way of life is an old way of living.
• In reality, food foraging societies
are very highly developed, but in a
way quite different from industrial
societies.
• Thomas Hobbes- a philosopher
study about food foraging.
THE FOOD FORAGING OF LIFE

• food foraging society is far from

solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and
short.
• A lot more time with their family,
social life and spiritual life than
working.
 THE FOOD FORAGING OF LIFE

The Ju/’hoansi African Kalahari Desert Tribe

THE FOOD FORAGING OF LIFE

The Ju/’hoansi Tribe

➢ They spend 20 hour – 23 hour maximum
work week
➢ They interact with their neighbors like
Bantu farmers.
➢ Learn to ride bike.
Mbuti of republic of congo’s
➢ Do not exist in isolation.
➢ Modern food forangers
➢ maintaining the traditional way.
 Food Foragers in
Industrial Society
(united States)
➢ Proof that food
foraging did not
disappear
➢ The do it for
pleasure
CHARACTERISTICS
FOOD-FORANGING
OF LIFE
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

• Food foragers are by definition people

who do not farm or practice animal
husbandry. Hence, they must
accommodate their place of
residence to naturally available food
sources.
• Most foraging societies do not
establish permanent year-round
settlements.
• Foraging population densities are very
low compared to other subsistence
patterns.
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

Anthropologists have identified three

major variations of the foraging
subsistence pattern
1. Pedestrian
(diversified hunting and gathering on foot)
2.Equestrian
(concentrating on hunting large mammals
from horseback)
3.Aquatic
(concentrating on fish and/or marine mammal
hunting usually from boats)
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

Pedestrian Foraging
• pedestrian foragers lived on all
continents except Antarctica.
• Surviving pedestrian foragers have
been heavily impacted by large-
scale agricultural societies.
• The pedestrian hunting and
gathering way of life was highly
mobile.
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

• pedestrian foragers are

comparatively peaceful and have
very democratic political systems
that usually lack fulltime leaders.
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

Equestrian Foraging
• Equestrian foragers have evolved
in only two areas of the world--the
Great Plains of North America and
the sparse grasslands of Southern
Argentina.
• The equestrian foraging societies
became male dominated and
warlike.
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

• Their societies acquired

hierarchical , almost military-like
forms
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

Aquatic Foraging
• Aquatic foragers focus their
subsistence activities on fish,
mollusks, crustaceans, and/or
marine mammals.
• The most well known aquatic
foragers lived on the Northwest
Coast of North America from the
Klamath River of California to the
Aleutian Islands of Alaska.
CHARACTERISTICS FOOD-FORANGING OF LIFE

• Today, many aquatic foraging

societies continue exploiting
marine resources but as part of the
international economy.
• Apparently, , no aquatic foragers
still solely practice their traditional
subsistence patterns
Summary:

PRACTICAL
➢ Priority always comes first.
➢ Less desires
➢ Hard work is important
Summary:

SMALL SIZE OF LOCAL

GROUPS
➢ Usually includes Less than 100
people.
➢ Carrying capacity of the land
➢ Density of social relation
Summary:

SOCIAL DENSITY
➢ Carrying capacity of resources
➢ Number of people and their
interaction.
➢ More people more opportunities
for conflict.
Summary:

REGULATION OF
POPULATION SIZE
➢ Controlling population
➢ Widely birth interval
➢ Number of off springs remains low
FOOD SHARING
FOOD SHARING

• A second key feature of

human social organization
associated with food
foraging is the sharing of
food between adults,
something quite rare
among nonhuman
primates.
FOOD SHARING

• Ju/’hoansi, women
have control over
the food they collect
and can share it
whomever they
choose. Men by
contrast, are
constrained by rules
that specify how
much meat is to be
distributed to whom.
 FOOD SHARING

• Food sharing among non-human primate, adults all

involve groups of male chimpanzees cooperating in
a hunt and later sharing the spoils frequently with
adult females as well.
 FOOD SHARING

• Shift in food habits

from frequent to
infrequent meat
eating.
• Change occurred 2.5
million years ago.
• The final distinctive feature of food foraging
economy is the importance of the camp as
the centre of daily activity.
 CULTURAL
ADAPTATION AND
MATERIAL
TECHNOLOGY
CULTURAL ADAPTATION AND MATERIAL
TECHNOLOGY

Mbuti archers and hunters

CULTURAL ADAPTATION AND MATERIAL
TECHNOLOGY

• Haunting style equipment plays

a role in determining population
size and movements.
• Mbuti hunt with nets requires the
cooperation of 7 to 30 families;
hence their camp are relatively
large.
• Archers come together and
hunt
Egalitarian Society
• the important characteristic of
food foraging society
• each sex carry its own carried its
own activities
• what available to one is available
to all
Food producing
society
• Promote the development of new
varieties of particular plants and
animals, which came to increasing
important for people’s subsistence
Pastoralism: The Bakhtiari
Pastoralist live in societies that view
animal husbandry as a proper way
to make a living and consider
movement of all or part of the
society a normal and natural life.

The pastoral life of bakhtiari

revolves around two seasonal
migrations to find better gazing
land
The Settled Life of
Farmers
• Development of permanent home.
• They invent equipments.
• Sedentary living
1. Harvesting
2. Digging tools
3. Pottery
4. Cooking
5. Clothing
6. House made of stones, wood, and
bricks
 • It influence the
society/ social
structure.
• The population starts
to grow.
• They share resources.

• Gardening and irrigation starts.

• Periodically feast began.
Swidden Farming
• shifting cultivation, refers to a
technique of rotational farming in
which land is cleared and then left
to regenerate after a few years.
• An extensive form of horticulture in
which the natural vegetation is cut
the splash is subsequently burn and
crop then are planted among the
ashes
• Ecological sophisticated, and
sustainable way of raising food
• Requires the input of more energy
than come our to the system.
• Good example is provided by the
“mekranoti kayapo indians of
brazil’s amazon Forest”.
Swidden Farming
 GARDENS OF
MEKRANOTI OF
KAYAPO
➢Part II Culture and
Survival: Communicating,
Raising children and
Staying alive
GARDENS OF MEKRANOTI OF KAYAPO

• “SLASH AND BURN AGRICULTURE”

• “If the burn is too early, the rains will
leach out the minerals in the ash
before planting time. If too late the
debris will be too wet to burn properly.
The insects and weeds that could
plague the plants will not die and few
minerals will be released into the soil. If
the winds are too weak, the burn will
not cover the entire plot. If they are
too strong, the fire can get out of the
hand.”
GARDENS OF MEKRANOTI OF KAYAPO

Manioc stem

Sweet
potatoes
 GARDENS OF MEKRANOTI OF KAYAPO

HOURS WORKS
8.5 HOURS GARDENING
6.0 HOURS HUNTING
1.5 HOURS FISHING
1.0 HOURS GATHERING WILD
FOODS
33.5 HOURS ALL OTHER JOBS
Intensive Agriculture
and Non Industrial
Cities
• With the intensification of agriculture,
some farming communities grew into
cities where individuals who
previously had been engaged in
farming were freed to specialize in
other activities.
• Thus, craft specialist such as
carpenters, blacksmiths, sculptors,
basket-makers, and stonecutters
contribute to vibrant, diversified life
of the city.
 AGRICULTURAL
DEVELOPMENT AND
THE ANTHROPOLOGIST
➢Part II Culture and
Survival: Communicating,
Raising children and
Staying alive
AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
ANTHROPOLOGIST

BOLIVIAN ALTIPLANO
AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
ANTHROPOLOGIST

LAKE TITICACA
AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
ANTHROPOLOGIST

TIWANAKU
AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
ANTHROPOLOGIST

ALAN
KOLATA
AZTEC CITY OF LIFE
AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

HERNANDO CORTES
AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

AZTEC SOCIAL ORDER

AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

AZTEC CITY
AZTEC CITY OF LIFE

CHINAMPA
Nonindustrial cities
in the modern
world
• Tenochtitlan is a good example of
the kind of urban settlement
characteristic of most ancient, non
industrial civilization
Technotitlan City