Chapter 2 The Concept of Culture

What We Will Learn  What do anthropologists mean by the term culture?  How do we acquire our culture?  Despite the enormous variation in different cultures, are some common features found in all cultures of the world?

Culture Defined  Everything people have  material possessions  Everything people think  ideas, values, and attitudes  Everything people do  behavior patterns

Three Components of Culture

Culture and Civilization  All civilizations are cultures, not all cultures are civilizations.  Civilizations are cultures that have developed cities.  Civilizations are characterized by  monumental architecture  centralized (hierarchical) governments  fully efficient food production systems  writing

Symbols  The ability to symbolize is the most fundamental aspect of culture.  Symbols help people identify, sort,and classify things, ideas, and behaviors.  When people symbolize using language, they can express experiences that took place earlier or suggest events that may happen.

Culture Is Shared  For something to be cultural, it must have a meaning shared by most people in a society.  When people share a culture, they can predict how others will behave.  When we step outside our culture, misunderstandings can occur.

Culture Is Learned  A male child born in Kansas:  Watch television often.  Be educated in a school.  Learn to drive a car.  Grow up to marry one wife at a time.

Culture Is Learned  A male child born among the Jie of Uganda.  Will play with cows.  Learn from peers and elders.  Be initiated into adulthood with a ceremony that includes being anointed with undigested stomach contents of an ox.  Grow up to have 3 or 4 wives at one time.

Culture Is Taken for Granted  Culture is deeply embedded in our psyche.  How we act and what we think are often habitual.

Cultural Change: Two Processes 1. Internal changes (innovations) - can spread to other cultures and occur in societies with the greatest number of cultural elements. 2. External changes (cultural diffusion) - spreading of cultural elements from one culture to another. Responsible for the greatest amount of change in any society.

Cultural Universals  Societies share common features because they solve problems shared by all human societies:  Economic system  Systems of marriage and family  Educational system  Social control system  System of supernatural belief  Systems of communication

Murdock’s Cultural Universals Age gradingEtiquette Inheritance rules Penal sanctions Athletics Faith healing Joking Personal names Bodily adornment Family Kinship groups Population policy CalendarFeasting Kin terminology Postnatal care Cleanliness training Fire making Language Pregnancy usages

Murdock’s Cultural Universals Community organization FolkloreLawProperty rights Cooking Food taboos Luck Propitiation of Supernatural beings Cooperative labor Funeral rites MagicPuberty customs CosmologyGamesMarriageReligious ritual

Murdock’s Cultural Universals CosmologyGamesMarriage Religious ritual CourtshipGesturesMealtimes Residence rules DancingGift givingMedicine Sexual restrictions Decorative arts GovernmentModesty Soul concepts DivinationGreetingsMourning Status differentiation

Murdock’s Cultural Universals Division of labor Ethnobotany Incest taboos Penal sanctions Dream interpretation Hair stylesMusicSurgery EducationHospitalityMythology Tool making EschatologyHousingNumeralsTrade EthicsHygieneObstetricsWeaning Weather control

Culture: Adaptive And Maladaptive  Culture is the major way humans adapt to their environments so they can survive.  Due to the adaptive nature of culture, people are able to live in previously uninhabitable places, such as deserts, the polar region, under the sea, and outer space.  Some features of a culture may be maladaptive:  The use of automobiles coupled with industrial pollutants is destroying the air.

Interconnectedness of the Parts of Culture

Small-scale Societies  A small-scale society is a society:  with a small population  that is technologically simple  is usually preliterate  has little labor specialization  is not stratified.

Small-scale Societies  A distinction between small-scale and more complex societies does not imply that societies can be pigeonholed into one or the other category.  All societies can be viewed along a continuum from small-scale to complex.

Quick Quiz

1. For this text, culture is defined as a) a mental map which guides us in our relations to our surroundings and to other people. b) 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. c) everything that people have, think, and do as members of society. d) the finer things in life.

Answer: c  For this text, culture is defined as everything that people have, think, and do as members of society.

2. One of two basic processes of change, ________ refers to internal changes, the ultimate source of all cultural changes. a) diffusion b) biology c) enculturation d) innovation

Answer: d  One of two basic processes of change, innovation refers to internal changes, the ultimate source of all cultural changes.

3. A second source of cultural change is ________, or the spread of ideas from one culture to another. a) innovation b) enculturation c) diffusion d) biology

Answer: c  A second source of cultural change is diffusion or the spread of ideas from one culture to another.

4. Despite many differences, all cultures share a number of common features called ________, because they have all worked out a series of solutions to a whole range of problems facing all human societies. a) cultural universals b) polytypical features c) symbols d) innovations

Answer: a  Despite many differences, all cultures share a number of common features called cultural universals, because they have all worked out a series of solutions to a whole range of problems facing all human societies.

5. Small-scale societies refer to those societies that have small populations. a) True b) False

Answer: False  Small-scale societies do not refer to those societies that have small populations.