The department of ethnography reading answers – Cambridge 3 Reading Test 3 Reading Passage 1

Take a look at the department of ethnography reading answers given below in the table format.

Solution for the department of ethnography

Q1. False
Q5. True
Q9. FA

Q2. False
Q6. True
Q10. AT

Q3. False
Q7. TS
Q.11 FA

Q4. Not Given
Q8. AT
Q12. SE

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The Department Of Ethnography Reading Answers – AC Reading module

The department of ethnography reading answers given in this blog is for the IELTS practicing candidates. The AC reading module is one of the toughest modules to score. So, practice well on the given academic reading passage and the different question types given here. The solution to the Department of ethnography reading passage provided here is inspired by Cambridge 3 Reading test 3 Reading passage 1. 

Strategies and steps to solve the department of ethnography

The IELTS reading passage – Cambridge 3 Reading test 3 Reading passage 1 is considered to be more important by the IELTS experts. So, you need some strategies to solve this passage easily.

  • Quickly read the passage to come to an idea about the passage,
  • Read the question carefully and choose the best keyword to locate the text in the reading passage
  • Search for the keyword or their synonyms or paraphrases in the passage. This will help you to spot the answers easily.
  • Once you find the appropriate portion of the text, read it carefully to confirm the answer.
  • Then, write the answer properly on your answer sheet without changing the word form.

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The department of ethnography reading passage – Cambridge 3 Reading Test 3 Reading passage 1

Answer all the IELTS reading question types by reading the complete passage carefully. Then, verify your solutions using the department of ethnography reading answers with explanation. 

The Department of Ethnography 

The Department of Ethnography was created as a separate department within the British Museum in 1946, offering 140 years of gradual development from the original Department of Antiquities. It is concerned with the people of Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Pacific, and parts of Europe. While this includes complex kingdoms, as in Africa, and ancient empires, such as those of the Americas, the primary focus of attention in the twentieth century has been on small-scale societies. Through its collections, the Department’s specific interest is to document how objects are created and used and to understand their importance and significance to those who produce them. Such objects can include both the extraordinary and the mundane, the beautiful and the banal.

The collections of the Department of Ethnography include approximately 300,000 artefacts, of which about half are the product of the present century. The Department has a vital role to play in providing information on non-Western cultures to visitors and scholars. To this end, the collecting emphasis has often been less on individual objects than on groups of material which allow the display of a broad range of a society’s cultural expressions.

Much of the more recent collecting was carried out in the field, sometimes by Museum staff working on general anthropological projects in collaboration with a wide variety of national governments and other institutions. The material collected includes great technical series – for instance, textiles from Bolivia, Guatemala, Indonesia, and areas of West Africa – or artefact types such as boats. The latter includes working examples of coracles from India, reed boars from Lake Titicaca in the Andes, kayaks from the Arctic, and dug-out canoes from several countries. The field assemblages, such as those from Sudan, Madagascar, and Yemen, include a whole range of material cultures representative of one person. This might cover the necessities of life of an African herdsman or an Arabian farmer, ritual objects, or even on occasion airport art. Again, a series of acquisitions might represent a decade’s fieldwork documenting the social experience as expressed in the varieties of clothing and jewellery styles, tents, and camel trappings from various Middle Eastern countries, or in the developing preferences in personal adornment and dress from Papua New Guinea. Particularly interesting is a series of collections that continue to document the evolution of ceremony and of material forms for which the Department already possesses early (if not the earliest) collections formed after the first contact with Europeans.

The importance of these acquisitions extends beyond the objects themselves. They come to the Museum with documentation of the social context, ideally including photographic records. Such acquisitions have multiple purposes. Most significantly they document for future change. Most people think of the cultures represented in the collection in terms of the absence of advanced technology. In fact, traditional practices draw on a continuing wealth of technological ingenuity. Limited resources and ecological constraints are often overcome by personal skills that would be regarded as exceptional in the West. Of growing interest is the way in which much of what we might see as disposable is, elsewhere, recycled and reused.

With the Independence of much of Asia and Africa after 1945, it was assumed that economic progress would rapidly lead to the disappearance or assimilation of many small-scale societies. Therefore, it was felt that the Museum should acquire materials representing people whose art or material culture, ritual, or political structures were on the point of irrevocable change. This attitude altered with the realization that marginal communities can survive and adapt In spire of partial integration into a notoriously fickle world economy. Since the seventeenth century, with the advent of trading companies exporting manufactured textiles to North America and Asia, the importation of cheap goods has often contributed to the destruction of local skills and indigenous markets. On the one hand, modern imported goods may be used in an everyday setting, while on the other hand other traditional objects may still be required for ritually significant events. Within this context trade and exchange, attitudes are inverted. What are utilitarian objects to a Westerner may be prized objects in other cultures – when transformed by local ingenuity – principally for aesthetic value. In some way, the West imports goods from other peoples and in certain circumstances categorizes them as ‘art’.

Collections act as an ever-expanding database, nor merely for scholars and anthropologists, but for people involved in a whole range of educational and artistic purposes. These include schools and universities as well as colleges of art and design. The provision of information about non-Western aesthetics and techniques, not just for designers and artists but for all visitors, is a growing responsibility for a Department whose own context is an increasingly multicultural European society.

The department of ethnography reading questions

Questions (1-6)

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?

Write answers for questions (1-6) on your answer sheet

TRUE if the statement is true according to the passage

FALSE if the statement is false according to the passage

NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage

1. The twentieth-century collections come mainly from mainstream societies such as the US and Europe.

2. The Department of Ethnography focuses mainly on modern societies.

3. The Department concentrates on collecting single unrelated objects of great value.

4. The textile collection of the Department of Ethnography is the largest in the world.

5. Traditional societies are highly inventive in terms of technology.

6. Many small-scale societies have survived and adapted in spite of predictions to the contrary.

Read IELTS reading true false not given to enhance your skills of the question type

Questions (7-12)

Some of the exhibits at the Department of Ethnography are listed below (Questions 7-12). The writer gives these exhibits as examples of different collection types.

Match each exhibit with the collection type with which it is associated in Reading Passage 1. Write the appropriate letters for questions (7-12) on your answer sheet.

NB You may use any collection type more than once.

 7. Bolivian textiles

8. Indian coracles

9. airport art

10. Arctic kayaks

11. necessities of life of an Arabian farmer

12. tents from the Middle East

Collection Types

AT Artefact Types

EC Evolution of Ceremony

FA Field Assemblages

SE Social Experience

TS Technical Series

Check out IELTS reading matching features

The department of ethnography reading answers with explanations

Verify your answers with the department of ethnography reading answers key clearly given below.

(Note: The text in italics is from the department of ethnography reading passage and shows the location from where the answer is taken or inferred. The text in the regular font explains the answer in detail.)

Questions (1 – 6) (IELTS Reading True/False/Not given)

  • Question no 1 – The twentieth-century collections come mainly from mainstream societies such as the US and Europe
Solution for question no 1: False 

Explanations – The Department of Ethnography was created as a separate department within the British Museum in 1946, offering 140 years of gradual development from the original Department of Antiquities. It is concerned with the people of Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Pacific, and parts of Europe.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 1, line 1

  • Question no 2 – The Department of Ethnography focuses mainly on modern societies.
Solution for question no 2: False 

Explanations –   While this includes complex kingdoms, as in Africa, and ancient empires, such as those of the Americas, the primary focus of attention in the twentieth century has been on small-scale societies.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 1, line 4

Question no 3 – The Department concentrates on collecting single unrelated objects of great value.

Solution for question no 3: False

Explanations – Through its collections, the Department’s specific interest is to document how objects are created and used and to understand their importance and significance to those who produce them. Such objects can include both the extraordinary and the mundane, the beautiful and the banal.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 1, last four lines

  • Question no 4 – The textile collection of the Department of Ethnography is the largest in the world.
Solution for question no 4: Not given

Explanations – The particular information is not found in the department of ethnography reading passage.

Keywords – textile collection, largest in the world

  • Question no 5 – Traditional societies are highly inventive in terms of technology.
Solution for question no 5: True

Explanations –  In fact, traditional practices draw on a continuing wealth of technological ingenuity. Limited resources and ecological constraints are often overcome by personal skills that would be regarded as exceptional in the West. 

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 4, line 5

  • Question no 6 – Many small-scale societies have survived and adapted in spite of predictions to the contrary.
Solution for question no 6: True

Explanations – Nomadic Bedouin are well known for the traditions of hospitality in the desert. According to Middle Eastern tradition, guests are served both tea and coffee from pots kept ready on the fires of guest tents where men of the family and male visitors gather. 

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 6, line 1

Questions (7 – 12) (IELTS Reading Matching features) 

  • Question no 7 – Bolivian textiles
Solution for question no 7: TS 

Explanations –  The material collected includes great technical series – for instance, textiles from Bolivia, Guatemala, Indonesia, and areas of West Africa – or artefact types such as boats.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3, line 3

  • Question no 8 – Indian coracles
Solution for question no 8: AT

Explanations –  or artefact types such as boats. The latter includes working examples of coracles from India, reed boars from Lake Titicaca in the Andes, kayaks from the Arctic,…  

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3 & line 4

  • Question no 9 – airport art
Solution for question no 9: FA

Explanations – The field assemblages, such as those from the Sudan, Madagascar, and Yemen, including a whole range of material cultures representative of one person. This might cover the necessities of life of an African herdsman or an Arabian farmer, ritual objects, or even on occasion airport art.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3, line 7

  • Question no 10 – Arctic kayaks
Solution for question no 10 – AT

Explanations – … – or artefact types such as boats. The latter includes working examples of coracles from India, reed boars from Lake Titicaca in the Andes, kayaks from the Arctic, and dug-out canoes from several countries. 

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3, line 4

  • Question no 11 – necessities of life of an Arabian farmer
Solution for question no 11 – FA

Explanations – The field assemblages, such as those from the Sudan, Madagascar, and Yemen, including a whole range of material cultures representative of one person. This might cover the necessities of life of an African herdsman or an Arabian farmer, ritual objects, or even on occasion airport art.

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3, line 7

  • Question no 12 – B –  tents from the Middle East
Solution for question no 12 – SE

Explanations –  Again, a series of acquisitions might represent a decade’s fieldwork documenting the social experience as expressed in the varieties of clothing and jewellery styles, tents, and camel trappings from various Middle Eastern countries,…

Keyword location in the passage – Paragraph 3, line 10

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Summary

We hope that “the department of ethnography reading answers” of the Cambridge 3 Reading test 3 Reading passage 1 given here would have helped you to achieve a good band score. Also, check out the often asked passages links mentioned above.