The Meaning of Culture

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The Meaning of Culture
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The Elements of Culture

• Everyone born into a culture
• Culture is learned from parents/grandparents
• Elements are divided into 7 categories-used by
  anthropologists

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Social Organizationsmaller structure-meet needs
of people

• Family Patterns-
• most important
• nuclear family
• extended family

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Social Classes

• Ranking of people in order of status
• Based on what that culture values highly
• Social mobility

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Customs and Traditions

• One of the most important elements of
  culture-rules of behavior
• Usually taught by parents/grandparents
• cultural rules vary in importance
• social pressure to fit in

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Language

• The cornerstone of culture
• reflects a cultures identity
• many societies include large numbers of people
  who speak different languages
• unify culture (or not)
• age

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Arts and Literature

• Products of human imagination such as art, music,
  literature that please and entertain us.
• Folk tales-traditions that help pass on a
  cultures basic beliefs and values.
• A and L help to strengthen a cultures identity

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Religion

• Arts often closely linked to peoples religious
  beliefs
• within a culture, people usually share religious
  beliefs
• monotheism
• polytheism

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Forms of Government

• Peoples governments provide for their common
  needs such as order and protection
• people organize governments
• types of governments
• democracy
• republic
• dictatorship

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Economic Systems

• Economics refers to how people use limited
  resources to satisfy their wants and needs.
• 3 basic questions
• what goods and services should we produce
• how should we produce them
• for whom should we produce them

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Economics cont.

• Traditional economy people produce most of what
  they need to survive
• Market economybuying and selling goods and
  services.
• Command economy government controls what goods
  are produced what they cost
• Mixed-most nations have mixed economies

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The American Dream
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Cultural diffusion

• spread of culture and the factors that account
  for it, such as migration, communications, trade,
  and commerce
• Generally, culture traits originate in a
  particular area and spread outward, ultimately to
  characterize a larger expanse of territory.
• cultural diffusion helps explain how they got
  there.
• What would encourage or discourage this
  diffusion-think natural barriers and cultural
  barriers

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Ethnocentrism

• The tendency to look at the world primarily from
  the perspective of one's own culture.
  Ethnocentrism often entails the belief that one's
  own race or ethnic group is the most important
  and/or that some or all aspects of its culture
  are superior to those of other groups.

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Questions to Ponder

• Describe three elements that help give YOUR
  culture its identity.
• How are family patterns related to YOUR culture?
• How do the arts in the United States help to
  unify the nation?
• Which element of culture is most relevant in your
  life?