BaMbuti

The British American anthropologist Colin Turnbull came to the public’s attention by means of the research of the BaMbuti tribes from Congo. They subsist in the deep forests of Africa in modern day Republic of Congo, a place which is mostly surrounded by large trees. The distance the pygmies could observe is awfully limited. Since the tribe people haven’t seen anything from a long distance do to their environment, their perception of size and distance is to some extent different than ours. The pygmies have not learned that when a figure normally recedes into the distance, it gets smaller. The pygmies assume the size they visualize is the size they really are. Common people have learned throughout their life’s the correlation of size-constancy and distance; this is due to the information we have obtain by our experiences. The observations of Colin Turnbull were extremely important for modern day psychology. Turnbull had the opportunity to record another important observation regarding the BaMbuti, they refer to white, black and red by color names, the rest of the colors they make comparisons, for example they refer to green as “like the leafs”. The young pygmy Kenge was a great help for Collin Turnbull and his psychological discovery. Kenge not having knowledge of long distant correlation made it possible for us infer that we are not born with perception, we gain it over experience. By him asking all the inquiring questions, we can analyze the difference between perception and how perception is gained, not born with.

Turnbull, Collin M. "Some Observations Regarding the Experiences and Behavior of the BaMbuti Pygmies." Primary Sources. Web. 02 Sept. 2010. .
"Colin Turnbull." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 04 Sept. 2010. .
Grineker, Roy Richard. In the Arms of Africa by Roy Richard Grinker. Web. 04 Sept. 2010. .