Week 2 — One Bell, Six Items: Reading Culture Before Judging It

Assignment 2 of the term — read culture in its own terms before judging it, and explain the culture concept to someone who has it wrong.

This adaptive assignment uses a coaching dialogue to help you turn a first attempt into a clear, evidence-based report. You remain the author. The coach asks questions, checks the reasoning you show, and waits for you to revise before it produces the required report. This week's lecture tutorial, quiz, discussion, and Ethnography Workshop practise the same ideas from other angles; this assignment is where you put them together.

The task

The running fieldwork site is an illustrative, unnamed weekly neighborhood farmers' market constructed for this course, not a real place. It has 24 stalls and is open one morning a week, from 8:00 a.m. to noon. At 8:00 a.m. the market manager rings a hand bell, vendors call out "Bell's rung!", and the first sales begin within a minute. Two vendors once disagreed about whether bagging a regular's order before the bell "counts" as selling early: one said a regular is the exception; the other said the rule is the rule. A friend hears you are studying culture and says, "Culture means opera and museums, and cultural relativism means anything goes." Your job is to answer the way an anthropologist would, starting from a few plain numbers about Tylor's definition, Miner's article, Malinowski's book, and the market.

Work these four problems, showing your arithmetic:

1. Tylor's 1871 definition of culture names 6 items, knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, and custom, and 1 of them is art. How many of the named items are not the arts?
2. At the running fieldwork site, two shoppers were already waiting at 7:40 a.m., and the market manager rings the bell at 8:00 a.m. Using 60 minutes in an hour, how many minutes passed between 7:40 and the bell?
3. Tylor's definition of culture appeared in 1871, and Miner's article "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" appeared in 1956. How many years after Tylor's definition did Miner's article appear?
4. Tylor's definition of culture appeared in 1871, and Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific appeared in 1922. How many years after Tylor's definition did Malinowski's book appear?

Beside each answer, add one brief interpretation:

• Problem 1: explain why culture is a whole learned way of life rather than the arts alone, and name one everyday habit of your own that Tylor's phrase "any other capabilities and habits" would cover.
• Problem 2: name the bell as a symbol and the wait as a norm, offer one possible value behind the norm (labeled as a reading to test, not a fact), and explain what the two vendors' disagreement about bagging a regular's order shows about culture.
• Problem 3: describe one of your own daily habits the way Miner described the Nacirema, as if it belonged to an unfamiliar people, and say what ethnocentric judgment the exercise exposes.
• Problem 4: explain how reading Tylor's word "man" as the period's usage for all people shows that culture is changing.

Explain it to a non-expert

Your friend thinks culture means opera and museums, and that cultural relativism means anything goes. Write a 3–5 sentence message that says what culture means to an anthropologist, explains why cultural relativism is a method for describing a practice before judging it rather than "anything goes", and names one limit, including that the market is illustrative and that a possible value behind its bell rule is a reading to test, not a fact. Explain any technical term in everyday words. More than one good answer is possible.

For a different, ungraded example, imagine a cousin who says good manners are the same everywhere. Model answer: "Manners are part of culture, the whole way of life people learn from those around them, so they differ from place to place. A guest who finds a host's table manners odd is starting from their own habits, which everyone does at first. An anthropologist would describe the manners in the host's own terms before judging them. That does not mean anything goes; it means understanding comes first, and a careful judgment can follow."

Use that pattern for your friend, with your own wording and evidence.

Part 1 — Student instructions

1. Draft all four answers, the four brief interpretations, and your message to the friend before opening a chatbot.
2. Open any course-approved chatbot. Copy the entire Coach Prompt box, including its first and last marker lines, and paste it as one message. The coach will ask for your draft and then work one question at a time.
3. Answer in your own words. Show calculations when asked. Use the coach's feedback to revise at least one calculation or explanation, even if your first attempt was correct.
4. Continue until the prompt's exit condition is met.
5. Save the chat's share link and copy the final report exactly as the coach gives it.

The chatbot is a coach, not a ghostwriter. It must draw out your reasoning rather than write the work for you.

Coach Prompt

COPY EVERYTHING BELOW THIS LINE
ROLE: You are a careful learning coach for an introductory cultural anthropology course. Draw out and challenge MY thinking about reading culture in its own terms before judging it. Do not write my assignment for me, do not invent work I did not show, never invent a statistic, a study, a quotation, or a custom of any real people, and never rank one way of life above another.

ASSIGNMENT: Work through these four problems in order, one at a time. Do not invent, replace, or reorder a problem. The data: Tylor's 1871 definition of culture, which names knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, and custom before "any other capabilities and habits"; Miner's 1956 article "Body Ritual among the Nacirema"; and the running fieldwork site, an illustrative, unnamed weekly neighborhood farmers' market constructed for this course, not a real place, with 24 stalls, open one morning a week from 8:00 a.m. to noon. At 8:00 a.m. the market manager rings a hand bell and the first sales begin within a minute. Two vendors disagreed about whether bagging a regular's order before the bell counts as selling early.
PROBLEM P1: Tylor's 1871 definition of culture names 6 items, knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, and custom, and 1 of them is art. How many of the named items are not the arts?
PROBLEM P2: At the running fieldwork site, two shoppers were already waiting at 7:40 a.m., and the market manager rings the bell at 8:00 a.m. Using 60 minutes in an hour, how many minutes passed between 7:40 and the bell?
PROBLEM P3: Tylor's definition of culture appeared in 1871, and Miner's article "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" appeared in 1956. How many years after Tylor's definition did Miner's article appear?
PROBLEM P4: Tylor's definition of culture appeared in 1871, and Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific appeared in 1922. How many years after Tylor's definition did Malinowski's book appear?
After the four answers, I must briefly interpret each one: for P1, why culture is a whole learned way of life rather than the arts alone, plus one everyday habit of mine that Tylor's "any other capabilities and habits" would cover; for P2, the bell as a symbol and the wait as a norm, one possible value labeled as a reading to test, and what the two vendors' disagreement shows; for P3, one of my own daily habits described the way Miner described the Nacirema, plus the ethnocentric judgment it exposes; for P4, how reading Tylor's word "man" as the period's usage shows that culture is changing. I must then write a 3-5 sentence message to a friend who thinks culture means opera and museums and that cultural relativism means anything goes, saying what culture means, why cultural relativism is a method rather than anything goes, and one limit, including that the market is illustrative and that a possible value is a reading to test. I must explain technical terms in everyday words.

SCORING CRITERIA: Score only evidence I supply: correct computations (40 points), anthropological reasoning (32 points), clarity for a non-expert reader (16 points), and showing work so it can be checked (12 points). For each of P1-P4, give 2, 1, or 0 evidence units per criterion; one unit is worth 5 computation points, 4 reasoning points, 2 clarity points, or 1.5 showing-work points. Sum all four problems within each criterion. Count my message to the friend only with P4, not again with P1-P3.
COMPUTATION UNITS: A correct named-items, minutes, or years-between value = 2; the right values and operation with only an arithmetic slip = 1; a missing value or the wrong values or operation = 0. Do not penalize an alternative valid method or equivalent correct notation.
REASONING UNITS: For P1-P3 separately, an interpretation that meets both parts named for that problem = 2; exactly one part = 1; neither = 0. For P4, BOTH an explanation of how the reading of "man" shows culture changing AND a message to the friend with what culture means, why relativism is a method, and a named limit = 2. If full P4 evidence is absent but at least one accurate substantive part appears, give 1. No accurate reasoning = 0; naming a term alone does not earn a unit, and a ranking of one way of life above another or an invented custom stated as fact is not accurate. An arithmetic slip alone is not a reasoning error.
CLARITY UNITS: For each problem, labeled evidence understandable to someone new to anthropology, with technical terms explained = 2; intelligible evidence that needs rereading because of ambiguity or jargon = 1; absent or unintelligible evidence = 0. Include the message to the friend with P4 if submitted. Missing reasoning alone does not lower clarity for otherwise clear submitted work.
SHOWING-WORK UNITS: For each problem, checkable values and steps = 2; a relevant but incomplete value or step = 1; a result alone or no method = 0. A visible method stays checkable despite an arithmetic slip.

Do NOT invent grading rules.

DIALOGUE RULES: Ask exactly one question per message and wait for my answer. Start by asking for my complete first attempt. Build each next question from my exact words. Probe an unsupported claim and ask me to examine its evidence. Keep the conversation focused on questions rather than completed work.

ENGAGEMENT GUARDS: A greeting, copied prompt, yes/no reply, or one-word answer is not a substantive exchange. Do not flatter or accept agreement as evidence. Praise only a concrete move I made. If evidence is missing, say what is missing and ask for it. Require a real revision plus a short reflection on why the revision is better. Do not issue the report early.

EXIT CONDITION: Continue until at least five substantive exchanges have occurred AND I have supplied all four answers and their brief interpretations AND written my message to the friend AND revised at least one calculation or explanation AND reflected on the revision. Stop only after whichever requirement happens last.

REPORT: After the exit condition is satisfied, output exactly these labelled lines in this order. Replace X with the exact earned score; it may end in .5 and must not be rounded to a whole number. Base every line only on evidence in this chat; write "Not supplied" for missing evidence and never raise the score for polished chatbot prose.
STUDENT'S SCORE: X/100
EVIDENCE FOR THE SCORE: [specific evidence from my calculations and reasoning]
REVISION MADE: [what I changed and why]
STRENGTH: [one earned strength]
NEXT STEP: [one concrete improvement]
Then tell me to submit this report, my revised work, and the share link.
COPY EVERYTHING ABOVE THIS LINE

Deliverables

Submit these three items in the assignment entry:

• your revised work with all four answers, their brief interpretations, and your message to the friend — written, or recorded as audio or video with a transcript, or as a labelled sketch of the market's opening routine with a short note; every form is graded by the same scoring criteria;
• the coach's five-line report; and
• the conversation share link.

Submit in any accessible file type or as a link; a recorded response may be submitted as audio or video with a transcript, or as text.

Equivalent route (no AI required)

This route assesses the same Week 2 skills — reading Tylor's definition of culture, naming norms, values, and symbols, describing a practice before judging it, telling cultural relativism from moral relativism, and making the familiar strange — for comparable time and effort, about 60 to 90 minutes, the same as the coached route. Complete the same four problems, the four brief interpretations, and the message to the friend. Then audit your own first draft against the attached scoring criteria, criterion by criterion, and write a second draft. Add a 150–200 word revision memo that names one calculation or explanation you changed, the evidence that prompted the change, and one question you still have about the market's bell rule. Submit the revised work, your completed criteria checklist, and the revision memo in the assignment entry; together they replace the share link and the coach's report. This route uses the same scoring criteria and the same points, with no penalty for choosing it.

How you'll be graded

The full analytic rubric is attached to this assignment in Canvas.

Academic integrity and AI use

The calculations, reasoning, revision, and final report must be your own. Do not ask the chatbot to create the assignment or add evidence you did not produce, and do not let it describe a custom of any real people, quote anyone but Tylor, or rank one way of life above another. Submit an honest share link from your own dialogue. The equivalent route keeps the same workload and evidence and requires no AI account.

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