The scene chosen for the assignment is the Starbucks Café at a local shopping mall. The time when the observation was done was 20:00 hours and the date was April 2, 2018. The customers thronging the café were observed and many interesting things were observed. The main aim of this observation was to notice the various etiquettes of the different cultures and subcultures. Culture, as mostly defined is the way of life. It encompasses the ways people eat, drink, sleep, sit, and converse and interacts with others. Defining culture from an anthropological point of view, culture is the “complex whole includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law and custom amongst other habits acquired by man as a member of the society” (Lysgård, 2013). Many anthropologists have defined in different ways one of which has been used here. Culture provides humans with a great advantage to enter into every place in nature. Its development and maintenance is what demarcates the humans from other living species on the earth. Another dynamic aspect of culture is that it varies from place to place and from time to time (Surber, 2018). The present paper shall discuss the observations done at the café and provide insights into the different aspects o culture. Four anthropological concepts have been identified while observing the scene that will be analyzed.

The coffee shop has chairs arranged in a circular order with customers having to face each other while they enjoy their snack and coffee. Customers are filling in every chair of the café with friends, families and colleagues accompanying them. The paintings hanging on the walls within the dimly lit interior of the café presents a sense of sophistication. Within a group of the customers, a woman is seen looking after her baby while the man, probably her husband is ordering the food. Within another group, probably friends, one being an Asian, they were discussing something related to a videogame or a movie as evident from their hand gestures and facial expressions. Then a middle-aged man was observed entering the café with his colleague probably because both had adorned formal suit and tie. They sat for around five minutes, had just a sip of coffee and then one of them paid the bill in cash and they left. Another group of customers who were at the café seemed to belong from a different community probably Asian. The woman and the little girl had flower garland attached to the pony and they had something on their forehead. They sat quite silently and the mother was seen instructing the little girl on how to sit properly and eat the sandwich.

After observing the scene for about 25 minutes, many interesting aspects of culture came to the fore. During the entire observation, many things happened at one given time and hence went unnoticed. However, the observation helped explain the various concepts of anthropology that was studied during the course. Four anthropological concepts shall be discussed in the paper that includes gender roles, kinship, market system and common interest association.

Gender role is that anthropological concept that defines the expectations a culture has of an individual’s role in the society as per their gender. In almost every society, the role of men and women has been preconceived (Alesina, Giuliano & Nunn, 2013). Women mostly are allotted the role of raising the children and men have the role to give financial support to the family along with providing security and safety. The woman looking after her baby and the husband ordering the food at the coffee shop demonstrated this concept.

Kinship as an anthropological concept refers to the blood relations people have. The prominence given to kinship differs from culture to culture. In Western culture, kinship is given minimum importance compared to the Eastern culture (Carsten, 2013). This might be because western people give prominence to career, success and achievements. In addition, the concept of joint family is not prevalent in the western culture as it is in the eastern part. Staying with a joint family influences the way kinship is viewed and valued. Within the observation, the family from the Asian ethnicity demonstrated the value of kinship. To an average American, it is hard to imagine a girl of 15 years of age having coffee at Starbucks with her parents. To add to that, she even follows her parents’ instructions on the ways to eat her snack and drink her coffee.

Market system is the anthropological concept that means buying any item or service in exchange of money.  In the contemporary world, people give as much value to the market system as they do to the social system. Money defines the social status of people (Caruso et al., 2013). The instance of the two formally suited individuals who were willing to pay handsome amount of money for things that held little value could be associated to this concept of market system.

Common interest association is an anthropological concept that could be defined as comprising a group that has a common interest binding them together. The common interest could be a movie, a game, a sport or even a political ideology. Common interest associations are formed across cultures because it is based on the liking and disliking of a particular thing (Lewis, 2017). The group of three friends, one of whom was an Asian display the traits associated with this concept. Despite belonging to different ethnicities, they shared a common interest that was either a movie or a videogame enthusiasm.

Reflecting back to this assignment, I feel that I was fortunate to have undertaken this course. It allowed me to observe the minutest nuances of people and the surrounding and understanding it from the perspective of cultural anthropology. The cultural scene observed at Starbucks helped me learn about the processes involved in ethnography. While observing the cultural scene, I was able to detect a common pattern amongst the customers who often visit the café. They all seemed oblivious of the surrounding environment as they were engulfed within their own world. However, one thing that gave me a satisfying feeling was the realization that no matter how busy and materialistic we become, we always find a time or two for ourselves.

References

Alesina, A., Giuliano, P., & Nunn, N. (2013). On the origins of gender roles: Women and the plough. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 128(2), 469-530.

Carsten, J. (2013). What kinship does—and how. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 3(2), 245-251.

Caruso, E. M., Vohs, K. D., Baxter, B., & Waytz, A. (2013). Mere exposure to money increases endorsement of free-market systems and social inequality. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 142(2), 301.

Lewis, I. (2017). Social and cultural anthropology in perspective: Their relevance in the modern world. Routledge.

Lysgård, H. K. (2013). The definition of culture in culture-based urban development strategies: antagonisms in the construction of a culture-based development discourse. International journal of cultural policy, 19(2), 182-200.

Surber, J. P. (2018). Culture and critique: An introduction to the critical discourses of cultural studies. Routledge.