. 1. Describe an example of a cultural encounter that you have experienced in your own life and discuss the ways in which it may have expanded or challenged your own ideas about cultural norms, values, symbols, and mental maps of reality. Conclude by discussing what you might have learned about culture from that encounter.

2. Define human agency and how it relates to culture and power. Provide examples of how individuals engage in human agency. Next, discuss how human agency may be used to challenge various aspects of culture and power, providing a minimum of two examples for each. What are some of the implications of this relationship between agency and culture/power?

3. Explain why ethnography is considered both a science and an art.

4. While anthropologists have gone to lengths to show that languages are linguistically equal, languages often exist in a hierarchical manner within a given place. Compare how language and power intersect by discussing how non prestige languages may be marginalized. How are boundaries between language policed, and what happens when speakers “code switch” in different cultural contexts?

5. What is the relationship between race and ethnicity? What problems stem from race as a category? What is the biological basis for (1)skin color and (2) race? Do you identify racially or ethnically (or both)? What challenges/ privileges have you encountered as a result of your racial/ ethnic classification?