Emic and etic

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Emic and etic (also known as "nemic" and "netic" when used in an inter-cultural marketing context) are terms used by some in the social sciences and the behavioral sciences to refer to two different kinds of data concerning human behavior. An "emic" account of behavior is a description of behavior in terms meaningful (consciously or unconsciously) to the actor. An "etic" account is a description of a behavior in terms familiar to the observer. Scientists interested in the local construction of meaning, and local rules for behavior, will rely on emic accounts; scientists interested in facilitating comparative research and making universal claims will rely on etic accounts.

The terms were first introduced by linguist Kenneth Pike, who argued that the tools developed for describing linguistic behaviors could be adapted to the description of any human social behavior. Emic and etic are derived from the linguistic terms phonemic and phonetic respectively.

The terms were also championed by anthropologists Ward Goodenough and Marvin Harris with slightly different definitions (Goodenough was primarily interested in understanding the culturally specific meaning of specific beliefs and practices; Harris was primarily interested in explaining human behavior).

The term etic to refer to the detached observer's view, and the term emic for that of the normal participant. The labels are coined by utilizing the last half of the terms phonetics and phonemics which are current in the linguistic field in the approximate sense implied here, but with the new terms generalized to cover other areas of behavior. In political theory an act viewed etically has been called an "operation," but when viewed emically, it has been called a "practice." Several characteristics of an etic view differentiate it from an emic one. It is useful to list some of them, including those implied in previous paragraphs. The etic view is an alien view--the structuring of an outsider. The emic view is domestic, leading to units which correspond to those of an insider familiar with and participating in the system. The etic view is cross-cultural in that its units are derived by comparing many systems and by abstracting from them units which are synthesized into a single scheme which is then analytically applied as a single system. The emic view is monocultural with its units derived from the internal functional relations of only one individual or culture at a time. The etic view is, therefore, classificatory or typological, since its units lead to a classifying grid through which each system can in turn be seen as comprised of units related to that grid. The emic view, however, is structural, since its units are derived from internal relations, rather than a potentially irrelevant but prior grid of relations. Hence the etic view approaches a new situation with units--or at least components of units--prepared in advance, ready to be found in that situation, whereas the emic approach leads to units which are known only after that particular situation has been analyzed. Etic criteria are absolute, or--if somewhat relative--are relative to an a priori absolute or quasi-absolute grid. Emic criteria are relative to the place the units have in the particular systems. The etic criteria are frequently, therefore, measurable as such, without reference to the system which they are embedded, while emic criteria are contrastive, and observable only in reference to differential responses which they elicit in relation to other units of the system. Etic systems are the creation of the analyst, conceptual tools ready to be applied to data so that one can begin to observe them as an alien and reach toward an appreciation of the emic structuring of that data. Emic systems are discovered by the analyst, as units reacted to or constituting the reaction of native participants in events. Participants discover these units by being "born into" a system--by suddenly finding themselves in a series of events which they at first do not comprehend. Here they gradually learn to act as normal participants, as through contrastive situations (or by receiving instruction) they gradually learn to make the kind of responses to these events which elicit appropriate reactions by other members of the community. For a more detailed development of the technical implications of this distinction, as well as of other problems discussed in these lectures, see my Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior.

[edit] References

• Goodenough, Ward (1970) “Describing a Culture” in Description and Comparison in Cultural Anthropology Cambridge: Cambridge University Press pp 104-119. ISBN-10 0-202-30861-8 ISBN-13 978-0-202-30861-6
• Harris, Marvin (1980) “Chapter Two: The Epistemology of Cultural Materialism,” in Cultural Materialism: The Struggle for a Science of Culture. New York: Random House. pp. 29-45 ISBN-10 0-759-10134-5; ISBN-13: 978-0759101340
• Nattiez, Jean-Jacques (1987). Music and Discourse: Toward a Semiology of Music (Musicologie générale et sémiologue, 1987). Translated by Carolyn Abbate (1990). ISBN 0-691-02714-5.
• Pike, Kenneth Lee (1967). Language in relation to a unified theory of structure of human behavior 2nd ed. The Hague: Mouton