Culture
The word
culture, from the
Latin colo, -ere, with its root meaning "to cultivate", generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. Different definitions of "culture" reflect different theoretical bases for understanding, or criteria for evaluating, human activity.
Anthropologists most commonly use the term "culture" to refer to the universal human capacity to classify, codify and communicate their experiences
symbolically. This capacity is long been taken as a defining feature of the genus
Homo. However,
primatologists such as
Jane Goodall have identified aspects of culture among our closest relatives in the animal kingdom.
[Goodall, J. 1986. The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior.] Culture has been called "the way of life for an entire society." As such, it includes codes of manners, dress, language,
religion,
rituals, norms of behaviour and systems of belief.
[Jary, D. and J. Jary. 1991. The HarperCollins Dictionary of Sociology, p. 101.] Various definitions of
culture reflect differing theories for understanding — or criteria for evaluating — human activity.
Sir Edward B. Tylor writing from the perspective of
social anthropology in the U.K. in 1871 described culture in the following way:
"Culture or
civilization, taken in its wide
ethnographic sense, is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society."
[Tylor, E.B. 1974. Primitive culture: researches into the development of mythology, philosophy, religion, art, and custom.]More recently, the United Nations Economic, Social and Cultural Organization
UNESCO (2002) described culture as follows:
"... culture should be regarded as the set of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features of society or a social group, and that it encompasses, in addition to art and literature, lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs".[UNESCO. 2002. Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity.]
While these two definitions cover a range of meaning, they do not exhaust the many uses of the term "culture." In 1952
Alfred Kroeber and
Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of more than 200 definitions of "culture" in
Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions[Kroeber, A. L. and C. Kluckhohn, 1952. Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions.] These definitions, and many others, provide a catalog of the elements of culture. The items catalogued (e.g., a law, a stone tool, a marriage) each have an existence and life-line of their own. They come into space-time at one set of coordinates and go out of it another. While here, they change, so that one may speak of the evolution of the law or the tool.
A culture, then, is by definition at least, a set of cultural objects. Anthropologist
Leslie White asked: What sort of objects are they? Are they physical objects? Mental objects? Both? Metaphors? Symbols? Reifications? In
Science of Culture, (1949), he concluded that they are objects "sui generis," i.e., of their own kind. In trying to define that kind, he hit upon a previously unrealized aspect of symbolization, which he called "the
symbolate," i.e., an object created by the act of symbolization. He thus defined culture as: "symbolates understood in an extra-
somatic context."
[White, L. 1949. The Science of Culture: A study of man and civilization.] The key to this definition is the discovery of the symbolate.
A common way of understanding culture sees it as consisting of four elements that are "passed on from generation to generation by learning alone":#
values#
norms#
institutions#
artifacts.
[Hoult, T. F, ed. 1969. Dictionary of Modern Sociology, p. 93.]Values comprise ideas about what in life seems important. They guide the rest of the culture. Norms consist of expectations of how people will behave in various situations. Each culture has methods, called
sanctions, of enforcing its norms. Sanctions vary with the importance of the norm; norms that a society enforces formally have the status of
laws. Institutions are the structures of a society within which values and norms are transmitted. Artifacts—things, or aspects of material culture—derive from a culture's values and norms.
Julian Huxley gives a slightly different division, into inter-related "mentifacts", "socifacts" and "artifacts", for ideological, sociological, and technological subsystems respectively. Socialization, in Huxley's view, depends on the belief subsystem. The sociological subsystem governs interaction between people. Material objects and their use make up the technological subsystem.
[Forsberg, A. Definitions of culture] As a rule,
archaeologists focus on material culture, whereas
cultural anthropologists focus on symbolic culture, although ultimately both groups maintain interests in the relationships between these two dimensions. Moreover, anthropologists understand "culture" to refer not only to
consumption goods, but to the general processes which produce such goods and give them meaning, and to the social relationships and practices in which such objects and processes become embedded.
Culture as civilization
Many people today have an idea of "culture" that developed in
Europe during the 18th and early 19th centuries. This notion of culture reflected inequalities within European societies, and between European powers and their colonies around the world. It identifies "culture" with "
civilization" and contrasts it with "
nature." According to this way of thinking, one can classify some countries as more civilized than others, and some people as more cultured than others. Some cultural theorists have thus tried to eliminate popular or mass culture from the definition of culture. Theorists such as
Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) or
the Leavises regard culture as simply the result of "the best that has been thought and said in the world"
[Arnold, Matthew. 1869. Culture and Anarchy.] Arnold contrasted culture with social chaos or anarchy. On this account, culture links closely with social cultivation: the progressive refinement of human behavior. Arnold consistently uses the word this way: "... culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has been thought and said in the world".
In practice,
culture referred to
élite goods and activities such as
haute cuisine, high fashion or
haute couture,
museum-caliber
art and
classical music, and the word
cultured described people who knew about, and took part in, these activities. For example, someone who used 'culture' in the sense of 'cultivation' might argue that
classical music is more refined than music produced by working-class people, such as
punk rock or the indigenous music traditions of aboriginal peoples of
Australia.
People who use the term "culture" in this way tend not to use it in the plural as "cultures". They do not believe that distinct cultures exist, each with their own internal
logic and
values; but rather that only a single standard of refinement suffices, against which one can measure all groups. Thus, according to this
worldview, people with different customs from those who regard themselves as cultured do not usually count as "having a different culture," but are classed as "uncultured." People lacking "culture" often seemed more "natural," and observers often defended (or criticized) elements of
high culture for repressing "
human nature".
From the 18th century onwards, some social critics have accepted this contrast between cultured and uncultured, but have stressed the interpretation of refinement and of sophistication as corrupting and unnatural developments that obscure and distort people's essential nature. On this account,
folk music (as produced by working-class people) honestly expresses a natural way of life, and classical music seems superficial and decadent. Equally, this view often portrays
Indigenous peoples as '
noble savages' living
authentic unblemished lives, uncomplicated and uncorrupted by the highly-stratified
capitalist systems of
the West.
Today most social scientists reject the
monadic conception of culture, and the opposition of culture to
nature. They recognize non-
élites as just as cultured as élites (and non-Westerners as just as civilized) -- simply regarding them as just cultured in a different way. Thus social observers contrast the
"high" culture of élites to
"popular" or pop culture, meaning goods and activities produced for, and consumed by the
masses. (Note that some classifications relegate both
high and
low cultures to the status of
subcultures.)
Culture as worldview
During the
Romantic era, scholars in
Germany, especially those concerned with
nationalist movements — such as the nationalist struggle to create a "Germany" out of diverse principalities, and the nationalist struggles by ethnic minorities against the
Austro-Hungarian Empire — developed a more inclusive notion of culture as "
worldview." In this mode of thought, a distinct and incommensurable world view characterizes each ethnic group. Although more inclusive than earlier views, this approach to culture still allowed for distinctions between "civilized" and "primitive" or "tribal" cultures.
By the late 19th century,
anthropologists had adopted and adapted the term
culture to a broader definition that they could apply to a wider variety of societies. Attentive to the theory of
evolution, they assumed that all human beings evolved equally, and that the fact that all humans have cultures must in some way result from human evolution. They also showed some reluctance to use biological evolution to explain differences between specific cultures — an approach that either exemplified a form of, or segment of society
vis a vis other segments and the society as a whole, they often reveal processes of
domination and
resistance.
In the 1950s,
subcultures — groups with distinctive characteristics within a larger culture — began to be the subject of study by sociologists. The 20th century also saw the popularization of the idea of
corporate culture — distinct and malleable within the context of an employing
organization or a
workplace.
Culture as symbols
The symbolic view of culture, the legacy of Clifford Geertz (1973) and Victor Turner (1967), holds symbols to be both the practices of social actors and the context that gives such practices meaning. Anthony P. Cohen (1985) writes of the "symbolic gloss" which allows social actors to use common symbols to communicate and understand each other while still imbuing these symbols with personal significance and meanings.
[Cohen, A. 1985. The Symbolic Construction of Community.] Symbols provide the limits of cultured thought. Members of a culture rely on these symbols to frame their thoughts and expressions in intelligible terms. In short, symbols make culture possible, reproducible and readable. They are the "webs of significance" in Weber's sense that, to quote Pierre Bourdieu (1977), "give regularity, unity and systematicity to the practices of a group."
[Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice.] Thus, for example:
"Stop, in the name of the law!"—Stock phrase uttered to the
antagonists by the
sheriff or
marshal in
20th century American Old Western
moviesLaw and order—stock phrase in the United States
Peace and order—
stock phrase in the Philippines
Culture as a stabilizing mechanism
Modern cultural theory also considers the possibility that (a) culture itself is a product of stabilization tendencies inherent in evolutionary pressures toward self-similarity and self-cognition of societies as wholes, or
tribalisms. See
Steven Wolfram's
A new kind of science on iterated simple algorithms from genetic unfolding, from which the concept of culture as an operating mechanism can be developed,
[* Wolfram, S., A New Kind of Science.] and
Richard Dawkins'
The Extended Phenotype for discussion of genetic and
memetic stability over time, through
negative feedback mechanisms,
[Dawkins, R. 1982. The Extended Phenotype] such as
Wikipedia itself.
Large societies often have
subcultures, or groups of people with distinct sets of
behavior and
beliefs that differentiate them from a larger culture of which they are a part. The subculture may be distinctive because of the
age of its members, or by their
race,
ethnicity,
class or
gender. The qualities that determine a subculture as distinct may be
aesthetic,
religious,
occupational,
political,
sexual or a combination of these factors.
In dealing with immigrant groups and their cultures, there are essentially four approaches:
*
Monoculturalism: In most
Old World nations, culture is very closely linked to
nationalism, thus government policy is to assimilate immigrants.
*
Leading Culture: A model developed in Germany
Bassam Tibi. The idea is that communities within a country can have an identity of their own, but they should at least support the core concepts of the culture on which the society is based.
*
Melting Pot: In the
United States, the traditional view has been one of a melting pot where all the immigrant cultures are mixed and amalgamated without state intervention.
*
Multiculturalism: A policy that immigrants and others should preserve their cultures with the different cultures interacting peacefully within one nation.
The way nation states treat immigrant cultures rarely falls neatly into one or another of the above approaches. The degree of difference with the host culture (i.e., "foreignness"), the number of immigrants, attitudes of the resident population, the type of government policies that are enacted and the effectiveness of those policies all make it difficult to generalize about the effects. Similarly with other subcultures within a society, attitudes of the mainstream population and communications between various cultural groups play a major role in determining outcomes. The study of cultures within a society is complex and research must take into account a myriad of variables.
Many regional cultures have been influenced by contact with others, such as by
colonization,
trade,
migration,
mass media and
religion.
;AfricaThough of many varied origins, African culture, especially Sub-Saharan African culture has been shaped by European colonialism, and is differentiated from North Africa from its lesser influence by
Arab and
Islamic culture.
|
Hopi man weaving on traditional loom in the USA. |
AmericasThe culture of the
Americas is strongly influenced by:
*
peoples that inhabitated the continents before Europeans arrived,
* Africa (The United States especially has a large African-American population, most of whom are descended from former slaves.), and
* European immigration, especially Spanish, English, French, Portuguese, and Dutch.
;AsiaDespite the great cultural diversity of
Asian nations, there are, nevertheless, several transnational cultural influences. Though
Korea,
Japan, and
Vietnam are not Chinese speaking countries, their languages have been heavily influenced by Chinese and Chinese writing. Thus, in
East Asia,
Chinese writing is generally agreed to exert a unifying influence. Religions, especially
Buddhism and
Taoism have had an impact on the cultural traditions of East Asian countries (
see section on
Eastern religion and philosophy, below). There is also a shared social and moral philosophy that derives from
Confucianism.
Hinduism and
Islam have for hundreds of years exerted cultural influence on various peoples of
South Asia. Similarly, Buddhism is pervasive in
Southeast Asia.
;AustraliaMuch of Australia's culture is derived from European and American roots, but distinctive Australian features have evolved from the environment and
Aboriginal culture.
;EuropeEuropean culture also has a broad influence beyond the continent of Europe due to the legacy of
colonialism. In this broader sense it is sometimes referred to as
Western culture. This is most easily seen in the spread of the
English language and to a lesser extent, a few other European languages. Dominant influences include
ancient Greece,
ancient Rome, and
Christianity, although religion has declined in Europe.
;Middle East and North AfricaPerhaps the defining characteristic of the
Middle East and
North Africa is
Islam and variations of the
Arab language, though this region is also home to
Israel and
Judaism, and significant
Christian minorities. Further, several groups which are adherents to Islam do not consider themselves
Arab.
|
Islamic tilework of the Shrine of Hadhrat Masoumah, first built in the late 8th century. Islamic art has been mainly abstract and decorative, portraying geometric, floral, Arabesque, and calligraphic designs. Islamic art does not include depictions of human beings, as Muslims believe this tempts followers of the Prophet to idolatry. |
Religion and other belief systems are often integral to a culture. Religion, from the Latin
religare, meaning "to bind fast", is a feature of cultures throughout human history. The
Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion defines religion in the following way:
... an institution with a recognized body of communicants who gather together regularly for worship, and accept a set of doctrines offering some means of relating the individual to what is taken to be the ultimate nature of reality.[Reese, W.L. 1980. Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion: Eastern and Western Thought, p. 488.]
Religion often codifies behavior, such as with the
10 Commandments of
Christianity or the
five precepts of
Buddhism. Sometimes it is involved with government, as in a
theocracy. It also influences arts.
Eurocentric custom to some extent divides the humanity into Western and non-Western cultures, although this has some flaws.
Western culture spread from Europe most strongly to Australia, Canada, and the United States. It is influenced by
ancient Greece,
ancient Rome and the
Christian church.
Western culture tends to be more individualistic than non-Western cultures. It also sees man, god, and nature or the universe more separately than non-Western cultures. It is marked by economic wealth, literacy, and technological advancement, although these traits are not exclusive to it.
Abrahamic religions
Judaism is one of, if not the first, recorded
monotheistic faiths and one of the oldest religious
traditions still practiced today. The values and history of the Jewish people are a major part of the foundation of other
Abrahamic religions such as
Christianity,
Islam, as well as
Samaritanism and the
Bahá'í Faith.
Christianity was the dominant feature in shaping European culture for at least the last 1700 years. Modern philosophical thought has very much been influenced by Christian philosophers such as St. Thomas Aquinas and Erasmus. European colonization and
missionaries have spread it.
The Bible
Both Christians and Jews regard the
Old Testament, and Christians also the New Testament, as the
revealed word of
God.
Because of Christian domination of Europe from the late
Roman era to the
Age of Enlightenment, the Bible has influenced not only religion but language, law and the
natural philosophy of mainstream
Western Civilization.
Both Hebrew Scripture and the Christian Bible have been translated more times and into more languages " more than 2,100 languages in all " than any other book. The
Gutenberg Bible marked the beginning of the
mass production of
books in the
West.
Eastern religion and philosophy
.
Philosophy and religion are often closely interwoven in Eastern thought. Many Asian religious and philosophical traditions originated in India and China and spread across Asia through
cultural diffusion and the migration of peoples.
Hinduism is the wellspring of
Buddhism, the
Mahāyāna branch of which spread north and eastwards from India into Tibet, China, Mongolia, Japan and Korea and south from China into Vietnam.
Theravāda Buddhism spread throughout
Southeast Asia, including Sri Lanka, parts of southwest China, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand.
Indian philosophy includes
Hindu philosophy. They contain elements of nonmaterial pursuits, whereas another school of thought from India,
Carvaka, preached the enjoyment of material world.
Confucianism and
Taoism, both of which originated in China have had pervasive influence on both religious and philosophical traditions, as well as
statecraft and the arts throughout Asia.
During the
20th century, in the two most populous countries of Asia, two dramatically different political philosophies took shape.
Gandhi gave a new meaning to
Ahimsa, a core belief of both Hinduism and
Jainism, and redefined the concepts of
nonviolence and
nonresistance. During the same period,
Mao Zedong's
communist philosophy became a powerful secular belief system in China.
Folk religions
Folk religions practiced by tribal groups are common in Asia, Africa and the Americas. Their influence can be considerable; may pervade the culture and even become the state religion, as with
Shintoism. Like the other major religions, folk religion answers human needs for reassurance in times of trouble, healing, averting misfortune and providing
rituals that address the major passages and transitions in human life.
The "American Dream"
The
American Dream is a faith, held by many in the United States, that, through hard work, courage, and self-determination, regardless of social class, a person can
gain a better life.
[Boritt, Gabor S. Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream, p. 1.] This notion is rooted in the belief that the country is a "
city upon a hill, a light unto the nations,"
[Ronald Reagan. "Final Radio Address to the Nation".] which were values held by many early European settlers and maintained by subsequent generations.
Marriage
Religion often influences
marriage and
sexual practices.
Most
Christian churches give some form of blessing to a marriage; the wedding ceremony typically includes some sort of pledge by the community to support the couple's relationship. In marriage, Christians see a picture of the relationship between Jesus Christ and His Church. The
Roman Catholic Church believes it is morally wrong to
divorce, and divorcées cannot remarry in a church marriage.
Cultural studies developed in the late 20th century, in part through the re-introduction of
Marxist thought into
sociology, and in part through the
articulation of
sociology and other academic disciplines such as
literary criticism. This movement aimed to focus on the analysis of subcultures in
capitalist societies. Following the non-anthropological tradition,
cultural studies generally focus on the study of consumption goods (such as
fashion,
art, and
literature). Because the 18th- and 19th-century distinction between "high" and "low" culture seems inappropriate to apply to the mass-produced and mass-marketed consumption goods which cultural studies analyses, these scholars refer instead to "popular culture".
Today, some
anthropologists have joined the project of cultural studies. Most, however, reject the identification of culture with consumption goods. Furthermore, many now reject the notion of culture as bounded, and consequently reject the notion of
subculture. Instead, they see culture as a complex web of shifting patterns that link people in different locales and that link social formations of different scales. According to this view, any group can construct its own
cultural identity.
Cultures, by predisposition, both embrace and resist
change, depending on culture traits. For example, men and women have complementary roles in many cultures. One gender might desire changes that affect the other, as happened in the second half of the 20th century in
western cultures. Thus there are both dynamic influences that encourage acceptance of new things, and conservative forces that resist change.
Three kinds of influence cause both change and resistance to it:#forces at work within a society#contact between societies#changes in the natural environment.
[O'Neil, D. 2006. "Processes of Change".]Cultural change can come about due to the environment, to inventions (and other internal influences), and to contact with other cultures. For example, the end of the last
ice age helped lead to the invention of
agriculture, which in its turn brought about many cultural innovations.
In
diffusion, the form of something (though not necessarily its meaning) moves from one culture to another. For example,
hamburgers, mundane in the United States, seemed exotic when introduced into China. "Stimulus diffusion" refers to an element of one culture leading to an invention in another.
Diffusions of innovations theory presents a research-based model of why and when individuals and cultures adopt new ideas, practices, and products.
"Acculturation" has different meanings, but in this context refers to replacement of the traits of one culture with those of another, such as happened to certain
Native American tribes and to many indigenous peoples across the globe during the process of
colonization. Related processes on an individual level include
assimilation (adoption of a different culture by an individual) and
transculturation.
Cultural invention has come to mean any innovation that is new and found to be useful to a group of people and expressed in their behaviour but which does not exist as a physical object. Humanity is in a global "accelerating culture change period", driven by the expansion of international commerce, the mass media, and above all, the
human population explosion, among other factors. The world's population now doubles in less than years.
[O'Neil, D. 2006. "Overview".] Culture change is complex and has far-ranging effects. Sociologists and anthropologists believe that a
holistic approach to the study of cultures and their environments is needed to understand all of the various aspects of change. Human existence may best be looked at as a "multifaceted whole." Only from this vantage can one grasp the realities of culture change.
* Arnold, Matthew. 1869.
Culture and Anarchy. New York: Macmillan. Third edition, 1882, available online. Retrieved: 2006-06-28.
* Boritt, Gabor S. 1994.
Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0252064453.
* Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977.
Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 052129164X
* Cohen, Anthony P. 1985.
The Symbolic Construction of Community. Routledge: New York,
* Dawkiins, R. 1982.
The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene. Paperback ed., 1999. Oxford Paperbacks. ISBN 0192880519
* Forsberg, A.
Definitions of culture CCSF Cultural Geography course notes. Retrieved: 2006-06-29.
* Geertz, Clifford. 1973.
The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. New York. ISBN 0465097197.:— 1957. "Ritual and Social Change: A Javanese Example,"
American Anthropologist, Vol. 59, No. 1.
* Goodall, J. 1986.
The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674116496
* Hoult, T. F., ed. 1969.
Dictionary of Modern Sociology. Totowa, New Jersey, United States: Littlefield, Adams & Co.
* Jary, D. and J. Jary. 1991.
The HarperCollins Dictionary of Sociology. New York: HarperCollins. ISBN 0604610865
* Keiser, R. Lincoln 1969.
The Vice Lords: Warriors of the Streets. Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. ISBN 0-03-080361-6.
* Kroeber, A. L. and C. Kluckhohn, 1952.
Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions. Cambridge, MA: Peabody Museum
* Middleton, R. 1990.
Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0335152759.
* Tylor, E.B. 1974.
Primitive culture: researches into the development of mythology, philosophy, religion, art, and custom. New York: Gordon Press. First published in 1871. ISBN 0879680911
* O'Neil, D. 2006.
Cultural Anthropology Tutorials, Behavioral Sciences Department, Palomar College, San Marco, California. Retrieved: 2006-07-10.
*
Ronald Reagan.
"Final Radio Address to the Nation", January 14, 1989. Retrieved June 3, 2006.
* Reese, W.L. 1980.
Dictionary of Philosophy and Religion: Eastern and Western Thought. New Jersey U.S., Sussex, U.K: Humanities Press.
* UNESCO. 2002.
Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity, issued on
International Mother Language Day, February 21, 2002. Retrieved: 2006-06-23
* White, L. 1949.
The Science of Culture: A study of man and civilization. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
* Wolfram, Stephen. 2002
A New Kind of Science. Wolfram Media, Inc. ISBN 1579550088
*
Cultural bias -
Cultural imperialism -
Ethnocentrism*
Cross-cultural communication -
Intercultural competence*
Cultural evolution*
Culture theory *
Culture war*
Organizational culture*
Detailed article on Defining Culture*
CICB Center of Intercultural Competence*
Dictionary of the History of Ideas: "Cultural Development" in Antiquity
*
Dictionary of the History of Ideas: "Culture" and "Civilization" in Modern Times
*
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