550 ETHNOLOGY 



the varieties of man with their geographical distribution, is often 

 spoken of as "ethnology," but this is to be deprecated, as the sys- 

 tematist deals with bodily as opposed to social characteristics; Dr. 

 Brinton l termed this division " ethnography." 



The second group of anthropological studies deals with every- 

 thing that bears upon the domestic and social life of men. A de- 

 scription of a single group of mankind is sometimes described as 

 ethnography, and in this sense it should be a monographic study 

 including alike the physical and psychical characters of, and all 

 that is made, done, and thought by, the group under consideration. 

 Ethnology is now becoming recognized as the term for the compara- 

 tive study of groups of men, but it is by no means easy to distin- 

 guish theoretically between ethnology and sociology, for by its 

 etymology the latter signifies the science of the social man. Some 

 authors make ethnology a part of sociology, others consider socio- 

 logy a department of ethnology, while a few regard them as con- 

 vertible terms. 



The simplest way out of the difficulty is frankly to admit that no 

 hard and fast line can be drawn between the two subjects, but, 

 indeed, this is always the case between allied sciences. Who can now 

 define chemistry so as to separate it from physics, or delimit botany 

 from zoology? Ultimately we have to recognize that our several 

 studies of nature are merely so many "spheres of influence;" for 

 the sake of convenience we attempt to pigeon-hole our investiga- 

 tions, but sooner or later the artificial barriers are broken down. 



For example, perhaps very few sociologists would consider that 

 a study of implements, boats, or houses falls within their province, 

 but it is otherwise with the ethnologist. These objects are not 

 regarded by him as, so to speak, merely superior claws, feet, or 

 shells for individual men, but as the organs by which social man 

 lives and by which he acts upon his fellows. The ethnologist rightly 

 busies himself in part with these as he realizes that every implement 

 or construction has a history, and he endeavors by patient inquiry 

 to discover how and where it first arose and the influences that have 

 modified its form or affected its ornamentation. The superiority of 

 metal over stone, or of one kind of metal over another, or for cer- 

 tain purposes of the bow and arrow over the spear, of the cross-bow 

 over the long-bow, and of guns over bows; or the social effects of a 

 canoe or of a communal house, or those caused by hunting or agricul- 



1 Dr. Brinton's fly-sheet of a proposed classification of the anthropologic 

 sciences was published in the Proceedings of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, 1892: I reprinted it as Appendix A in The Study of 

 Man. Anthropology was divided by Dr. Brinton into (1) Somatology Physical 

 and Experimental Anthropology; (2) Ethnology Historic and Analytic An- 

 thropology; (3) Ethnography Geographic and Descriptive Anthropology; 

 (4) Archeology Prehistoric and Reconstructive Anthropology. 



