Anthropology and Culture in the Study of Engineering

Well after reading Dr. Nolan's reading, I really find funny the story of Tunisia, I felt so bad about Dr. Nolan's friend, who was shouting at the farmer for no reason, which could have never happened if they only knew that the word Tunis makes reference to two different places. The third case of study seemed very interesting, we could never imagine how a steel axe could change the social and cultural values of a society, especially because it is hard to think of a culture that was shaped around a tool like an axe. Nonetheless, it was the second case of study the one that I liked the most. I had never heard about the 'FulBe', my first impression about them when I began reading was that they were a little crazy, or that perhaps Dr. Grayzel had made a mistake, but then after concluding the reading, everything made sense to me. When thinking about money and basically in financial terms, the way the FulBe act is just ridiculous, but when we get to know their cultural values and their conception of the world we can easily understand that their actions are completely logical if you are focused on fulfilling their cultural values of course.

Well, anthropology is related to engineering because the way we understand other peoples and a society may affect the way engineering is performed. Culture and society have proved to be difficulties that an engineer must overcome. Although mathematics and physics are the same everywhere, the way they are applied are not, engineering and science really depend on the context. For some of us the Earth turns around the sun, but maybe for some other people the sun turns around the earth. For this reason understanding different cultures and societies affects engineering, because they need to be taken into account when making decisions inside different contexts.

I really liked the reading, hope the speaker is good as well!