Anthropology for IAS




Anthropology study plan.

"Anthropology demands open-mindedness with which one must look and listen, record in astonishment and wonder that which one would not have been able to guess" - Maragaret Mead.


Anthropology Paper I
1. Physical Anthropology - prehistory-evolution of man,biological concepts of man, genetics and diseases, race (Attempt physical anthro based and theory based questions as much as possible.from what i know, socio based questions fetch lesser marks comparitively)
2. Social Anthropology- family,marriage,religion,kinsh ip etc
3. Theories
4. Misc - demography,research methodology etc

Anthropology Paper II
1. Prehistory of India
2. Indian Social System
3. Tribal India

Time required: maximum of 3 months. with 3 hrs per day

Game Changers - Physical Anthropology( digrams or charts compulsory), Tribal India( recent reports), diagrams[anatomical -prehistoric man(skull,vertebra,bones,teeth diagrams) vis a vis modern man , prehistoric stages (tools used,artefacts ) easier to draw diagrams and then explain.. its more catchy and provides more information,saves examiner's time also,flow chart- that way we have an edge over others.

1.Physical Anthropology .nath + wikipedia for diagrams( very very imp)+ previous yrs qns.
2.Social anthropology; majumdar/madan( dont read d book page to page but acc to syllabus)+ newspapers
3.Theories and misc: any coaching centre material( braintree Karthicks notes are very good but not sufficient.. Adv- covers all topics , Disadv- Individual topics need value addition / muniratnam reddy/sosin notes).

4.Tribal India: r.n. sharma+ yojana tribal issue+ ministry of tribal affairs+ Reports of tribals like NC Saxena etc etc
5.Anthropology of India :nadeem hasnan
6. Previous yrs papers: important bcos 90% qns are repeated

remember u r not reading these books cover to cover, but by topics as mentioned in syllabus... so though it looks like a lot of work , its actually very little... if all d required contents from all d books were to b made into a single book, it would b 250 pages small book... so dont worry start from today..

strategy: atleast 3 qns in paper 1 must be attempted from physical anthro since they are least subjective.
max qns in paper 2 must be attempted from tribal india since its very scoring.
make short notes to revise again and again.
regarding note making -note making is req fr few topics like pre history, evolution, genetics ,phy part etc which r objective and direct qns are asked..mug up ,reproduce and score..of course ur notes must have quality and can b in d form of ur convinience( summary,point form etc with req diagrams). If u dont have time, u need not make it for socio part since analysis kind of questions are asked frm them and thorough reading of text books r required.. its wise if u dont attempt more of these qns..

eventually u r selling urself to d examiner. u have to show that u r different and better than others... so ur paper must catch his eye and attention...