How culture begins and spreads Diffusion: movement of people, ideas and goods Culture trait (language, religion, housing style) spread location to location Culture hearth: where innovations and new ideas originate and diffuse outward to other regions

How culture begins and spreads Cultural barriers: hinders diffusion Taboo: cultural barrier that prevent habits or new ideas from establishing in a society EX: prohibitions, customs, laws, rules Food taboos: Hinduism prohibits consumption of beef, Muslim and Judaism prohibit consumption of pork. Most Somali clans restrict consumption of fish.

Acculturation & Assimilation acculturation: a change that occurs within a culture when it adopts a practice from another culture. EX: Mongols under Genghis Khan swept down for the Central Asian steppes to conquer China in 13 th century. The Mongolian occupiers adopted Chinese culture within a generation. Acculturation: process of adopting some of the values, customs and behaviors of host culture. EX: immigrants may adopt the language and a few other customs of the host group but retain many distinct traditions.

Assimilation assimilation: process of immigrants becoming totally integrated into host culture Some countries many demand immigrants totally assimilate or ban the use of their language or religion

Cultural Differences Environmental Determinism : theory that human behavior is controlled by physical environment Theory is no longer accepted Cultures constantly change. Biggest differences are in language, religion and ethnicity Possibilism: theory that the physical environment merely establishes limits of what is possible on the human population Theory still raises questions Human race pushed beyond limits imposed on it by its physical environment thanks to advanced technology and communication

Language Indo European language family: largest family; spoken by roughly half the world’s population Includes most European lang. and many in Asia Language family: Group of languages that are related and derived from a single, earlier language