ABSTRACT
This chapter explains cultural analysis and makes explicit some of the implicit assumptions involved in anthropological ways of thinking and conducting research. Cultural analysis is a way of looking at and analyzing the world, and for us, ethnography as methodology is intertwined and personally inextricable from that analytic mode. Cultural analysis refers to a mode of inquiry that encompasses a philosophical and epistemological heritage. While motivations and needs are ubiquitous marketing terms, the sine qua non legitimizing market research projects, they are also, per anthropological analysis, analytic constructs tied to psychological models of behavior. Moreover, the perception of anthropology as archaeology is a surprisingly common one, at least in the United States. However troubling, one of the easiest ways to clear matters up remains a quick reference to Margaret Mead. That Margaret Mead had other concerns as an anthropologist, concerns that befit a cultural anthropologist rather than an anthropologist-as-archaeologist, is generally appreciated, if not fully understood.
