Ch. 2: What Is Culture? Flashcards
In his book Primitive Culture, Sir Edward Tylor proposed what?
Cultures obey natural laws and therefore can be studied scientifically.
What is Enculturation?
The process by which a child learns their culture through growing up.
What are symbols?
Signs that have no necessary or natural connection to the things they signify or for which they stand.
Who described cultures as sets of “control mechanisms” and likens them to computer programs that govern human behavior?
Anthropologist Clifford Geertz (1973).
What are the ways culture is learned?
Taught directly
Observation
Absorbed unconsciously
No other animal besides human has developed anything as complex as____
Language
What are the abilities on which culture rests?
Learn, think symbolically, language, use tools and products
What links people who grow up in the same culture?
Shared beliefs, values, memories, and expectations
We are most likely to agree with and feel comfortable with people who are_____
Socially, economically, and culturally similar to ourselves.
Our culture and cultural changes affect the ways in which we perceive_____
Nature
Human nature
The Natural
Cultures are integrated______
Patterned systems
What are core values?
Key, basic, or central values that integrate a culture
What is the main reason for human adaptability and success?
Culture
We use technology and tools to______
Cope with environmental stresses
Culture is used instrumentally which means____
To fulfill basic needs for food, drink, shelter, comfort, and reproduction
Examples of maladaptive aspects of culture include:
Policies that encourage overpopulation
Poor food distribution systems
Overconsumption
Environmental degradation
What is Hominidae/hominid?
The zoological family that includes fossils and living humans, chimps, and gorillas
What are Hominins?
All the human species that ever existed
Which human traits reflect that our ancestors lived in trees?
Grasping ability and manual dexterity
Depth and color vision
Learning ability
Parental investment
Sociality and cooperation
Difference between primates and most mammals?
Ratio of brain to body size
What is society?
Organized life in groups
Similarities between primates
Ability to learn from experience and change behavior to adapt to environment, use tools, aim and throw
Differences between humans and primates
Elders are respected and cared for, greater amount of stored information, marriage included in mating, exogamy and kinship.
What are universal features?
Found in every culture
What are generalities?
Common to several but not all human groups
What are particularities?
Unique to certain cultural traditions
What are some universal cultural features?
Long period of infant dependency
Year round sexuality
Complex brain patterns for symbols, language, and tools
What are some generalities?
The nuclear family structure
A common language
A cultural particularity is a trait that is____
Confined to a single place, culture, or society
When cultural traits are borrowed, they are____
Modified to fit the culture that has adopted them
Which universal life cycle events can vary between cultures?
Birth
Puberty
Marriage
Parenthood
Death
System can refer to_____
Various Concepts, including culture, society, social relations, or social structure that are made up of individuals.
Cultures are constantly changing because____
People learn, interpret, and manipulate the same rule in different ways to suit their interests.
What is ideal culture?
What people say they do and should do
What is real culture?
The actual behavior of a person as observed by an Anthropologist.
How are individuals and culture linked?
Through internalizing the meaning of public messages and then converting their understandings to public expression.
What is Agency?
The actions that individuals take, both alone and in groups, in forming and transforming cultural identities.
What is practice theory?
An approach to culture that individuals within a society or culture have diverse motives, intentions, and different degrees of power and influence.
What contrasts are associated with practice theory?
Gender, age, ethnicity, class, and social variables
Practice theory recognizes a _____ relation between culture and the individual.
Reciprocal
Practice theory recognizes constraints on ______ and flexibility and changeability of _______
Individual
Cultures and social systems
Beliefs, learned behavior patterns, values, and institutions shared by citizens of the same nation.
National culture
Cultural traditions that extend beyond and across natural boundaries.
International culture
Cultural traits can spread through____
Borrowing, or diffusion from one group to another.
What are different symbol based patterns and traditions associated with particular groups within the same society?
Subcultures
Where do subcultures originate?
Region
Ethnicity
Language
Class
Religion
What is ethnocentrism?
The tendency to view one’s own culture as superior to others and to use own standards to judge outsiders.
One goal of anthropology is____
To show the value in the lives of others
What is cultural relativism?
Behavior should not be evaluated by outside standards but in the context of the culture it occurs in.
A particular practice may be supported by some people more than others when___
There are power differentials
Cultural relativism is not a moral belief but a _____
Methodological position
What are human rights?
Rights based on Justice and morality beyond and superior to particular countries, cultures, and religions.
What is inalienable?
Nations cannot abridge or terminate them
What are the four UN documents that describe most human rights?
UN Charter
Universal Declaration of Human rights
The Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural rights
The Covenant on Civil and Political rights
What are cultural rights?
Rights vested in religious and ethnic minorities and indigenous societies
Examples of cultural rights include___
Ability to choose how to raise children
Continue language
Not be deprived of economic base
Self determination
Home rule
Right to practice religion, culture, lang.
What are indigenous intellectual property rights? (IPR)
An indigenous group’s collective knowledge and its applications
Enthnomedicine, cosmetics, cultivated plants, foods, folklore, arts, crafts, songs, dances, costumes, and rituals are all examples of what?
Cultural commercial value
What does the 1954 Hague Convention for the protection of Cultural property in the event of armed conflict state?
Targeting of cultural sites is a war crime
What is UNESCO?
United Nations Cultural Agency
What is a heritage?
Something that has been passed on from previous generations
What is Cultural Heritage?
The culture, values, and traditions of a particular group - material and intangible - that gets passed on
What are sites with items that are recognized as important to the shared history of humanity?
World Heritage Sites
What is NAGPRA?
Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
What is cultural diffusion?
The borrowing of traits between cultures
Diffusion is direct when ___
Two cultures trade, intermarry, or wage war
Diffusion is forced when ____
One culture subjugates another and imposes it’s customs on the dominated group
Diffusion is indirect when ____
Items move from A to C by means of B without any contact
Much transnational diffusion is due to the spread of _____
Mass media and advanced information technology
What is acculturation?
The exchange of cultural features that results when two groups have continuous contact
What is pidgin?
A mixed language that develops to ease communication in situations of trade or colonialism
What is independent invention?
The process by which humans innovate to find solutions to problems
What is globalization?
The accelerating interdependence of nations in the world system today
What are 3 examples of economic globalization?
World Trade Organization
International Monetary Fund
The European Union
What is the primary meaning of globalization?
Worldwide connectedness
The political meaning of globalization refers to ____
Efforts by international finance powers to create a global free market for goods and services
What plays a key role in creating globalizations?
Easy access to rapid communication
