Anthropology: The study of humankind, in all times and places.

Applied anthropology: The use of anthropological knowledge and methods to solve practical problems, often for a specific client. Archaeology: The study of material remains, usually from the past, to describe and explain human behavior. Cultural anthropology: The branch of anthropology that focuses on humans as a culture-making species. Culture-bound: Theories about the world and reality based on the assumptions and values of one's own culture. Ethnography: The systematic description of a particular culture based on firsthand observation. Ethnologist: An anthropologist who studies cultures from a comparative or historical point of view, utilizing ethnographic accounts. Ethnoscientists: Anthropologists who seek to understand the principles behind native idea systems and the ways those principles inform a people about their environment and help them survive. Fact: An observation verified by several observers skilled in the necessary techniques of observation. Forensic anthropology: Field of applied physical anthropology that specializes in the identification of human skeletal remains for legal purposes. Holistic perspective: A fundamental principle of anthropology, that the various parts of culture must be viewed in the broadest possible context in order to understand their interconnections and interdependence. Hypothesis: A tentative explanation of the relation between certain phenomena. Informants: Members of a society in which the ethnographer works who help interpret what she or he sees taking place. Linguistic anthropology: The branch of cultural anthropology that studies human language. Paleoanthropologist: An anthropologist who studies human evolution from fossil remains. Participant observation: In ethnography, the technique of learning a people's culture through direct participation in their everyday life over an extended period of time. Physical anthropology: The systematic study of humans as biological organisms. Theory: In science, an explanation of natural phenomena, supported by a reliable body of data. Adaptation: A process by which organisms achieve a beneficial adjustment to an available environment; also the results of that process the characteristics of organisms that fit them to the particular set of conditions of the environment in which they are generally found. Cultural pluralism: Social and political interaction of people with different ways of living and thinking within the same society. Cultural relativism: The thesis that one must suspend judgement on other peoples' practices in order to understand them in their own cultural terms. Culture: The values, beliefs, and perceptions of the world shared by members of a society, that they use to interpret experience and generate behavior, and that are reflected in their behavior. Enculturation: The process by which a society's culture is passed from one generation to the next and individuals become members of their society. Ethnocentrism: The belief that the ways of one's own culture are the only proper ones.

Ethnohistory: The study of cultures of the recent past through oral histories; accounts left by explorers, missionaries, and traders; and analysis of such records as land titles, birth and death records, and other archival materials. Ethnologist: An anthropologist who studies cultures from a comparative or historical point of view, utilizing ethnographic accounts. Ethnoscientists: Anthropologists who seek to understand the principles behind native idea systems and the ways those principles inform a people about their environment and help them survive. Gender: The elaborations and meanings assigned by cultures to the biological differentiation of the sexes. Pluralistic societies: Societies in which there exist a diversity of cultural patterns. Social structure: The rule-governed relationships of individuals and groups within a society that hold it together. Society: A group of interdependent people who share a common culture. Subculture: A distinctive set of standards and behavior patterns by which a group within a larger society operates. Symbols: Sounds or gestures that stand for meanings among a group of people. Australopithecus: The genus including several species of early bipeds from southern and eastern Africa living between 4 .2 and about 1 million years ago, one of whom was directly ancestral to humans Bipedalism: A special form of locomotion on two feet found in humans and their ancestors. Evolution: Changes in the genetic makeup of a population over time. Genes: The inherited molecular code that specifies the biological traits and characteristics of each individual. Hominoids: The broad-shouldered tailless group of primates that includes all living and extinct apes and humans. Homo erectus: Upright man. A species within the genus Homo first appearing just after 2 million years ago in Africa and ultimately spreading throughout the Old World. Homo habilis: Handy man. The first fossil members of the genus Homo appearing 2.5 million years ago, with larger brains and smaller faces than australopithecines. Lower Paleolithic: Old Stone Age spanning from about 2.5 million to 250,000 or 200,000 years ago and characterized by Oldowan and Acheulean tools. Mousterian: The tool industry of the Middle Paleolithic used by all people in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa from 160,000 to 40,000 years ago.

Multiregional hypothesis: The hypothesis that modern humans originated through a process of simultaneous local transition from Homo erectus to modern sapiens throughout the inhabited world. Natural selection: The principle or mechanism by which individuals having biological characteristics best suited to a particular environment survive and reproduce with greater frequency than individuals without those characteristics. Neandertals: A distinct group of archaic Homo sapiens inhabiting Europe, Southwest Asia, and south-central Asia from approximately 125,000 to 30,000 years ago.