If you think that anthropology is limited to the study of stones and old bones, think again! Though anthropology does look at stones and bones, it also examines the politics, medicine, kinship, art, and religion of various peoples and times. This makes the study of anthropology a complex task, for it requires an understanding of the basics from numerous disciplines such as geology, biology, art, and psychology.
The four fields of anthropology are cultural anthropology, how people live in groups today, linguistics, the study of language, biological anthropology, the study of humans and other primates as physical beings today and in the past, and archaeology, the study of cultures in the past.
Regardless of the specific area being studied, the essence of anthropology is in the observation of different peoples and cultures — studying them as they really are instead of how you think they should or should not behave. It is only through this detailed study of all people that we gain the full picture of what it really is to be human.
Anthropology tries to bring the world’s peoples into human focus. Anthropologists do not come up with a theory and see if people live up to it. They go and live with people and see what they do.
