Day 6: Aim: What are cultures and how do we study them



#12

CULTURE

I. What is Culture?

Culture describes a whole way of life including arts, beliefs and institutions that is often passed down from generation to generation. It is always changing. Culture can include shared language, food, beliefs, religion, rituals, norms of behavior such as law and morality, clothing, music, art, literature, and entertainment. People usually belong to more than one culture. For example, you may belong to hip-hop culture, Latino culture, the culture of the South Bronx, the culture of Mott Haven Village Preparatory School, and general American popular culture. In America, there are many different cultures including:

1. High culture (writings of a society’s thinkers and the work of its artists)

2. Popular culture (current trends and fashions – TV shows, movies, music, food).

3. Sub-Cultures (cultures that are not shared by the entire population and often go against traditional cultural values and beliefs). Some examples of sub-cultures include; hip-hop culture, hipster culture, Gay/lesbian culture, ethnic/religious cultures.

II. How do we study Culture?

Past cultures have left us many clues about how they lived. Historians use many different kinds of materials to learn about the cultures of the past. Some of these materials include: primary and secondary sources, oral histories, non-material items such as language, and material items such as artifacts.

1. Primary and Secondary Sources:

a) Primary sources provide first-hand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic under investigation. For example, The Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglas (which you read last year in English class) was a primary source on slavery because it was written first hand by someone who lived through slavery.

b) Secondary Sources are documents or recordings that discuss information originally presented elsewhere. For example, a current article on slavery would be a secondary source because the person writing it would have gotten their information from someplace else, and not from actually living through slavery.

2. Oral Histories: Oral histories are stories that are passed down through generations. Some cultures of the past did not have writing, so they told their stories, religions, and myths through oral histories that have been passed down. Even cultures that did have a written language told some of the important stories of their culture orally, rather than writing it down.

3. Non-Material Items: We also learn about cultures by studying their non-material items (meaning items that you cannot actually touch). Some of the most important non-material items that help us learn about a culture include; language, tradition, religion, rituals, and value structures.

4. Material items/ Artifacts: We also learn about cultures by looking at what things they left behind. Historians, called archaeologists, dig and search for items that past cultures have left behind. When we find something from a past culture, we call that item an artifact. Artifacts are anything that was used by a past culture and artifacts give us big clues about how past cultures lived. Some important artifacts include; Old maps, which may have been created either by people living in certain places or by people exploring those places, clothing, pictures, and tools.

III. How is culture spread?

Early humans formed small groups that developed a simple culture that enabled them to survive. When people started joining together in groups, or when smaller groups started traveling/trading with other groups, they started sharing their traditions and cultures. The sharing of culture that happened when cultures came together or interacted with each other is called cultural diffusion. Cultural Diffusion is when one group adopts useful parts of another’s culture. Diffusion is when something is passed from one group to another. Can anyone think of something passed on from our culture to another?

o Michael Jordan’s long shorts – now people all over the world wears them

o Food – Chinese, Indian, Thai

o Music – Regetton, Rap (around the world)

o Coke – all over

o McDonalds

o TV shows

o Movies

In much the same ways, there were interactions between cultures in ancient times and culture was spread or diffused. Ancient cultures took from other cultures what was useful. For example:

1) Ways to grow food – agriculture

2) Ways to bury the dead

When culture is diffused or shared, we can assume that there was some sort of communication, contact, or trade between these two cultures. Cultures are consistently looking at what others are doing and taking what seemed good or useful for themselves. Archaeologists can tell when cultures interacted with each other because they will find a tool from one culture in another groups area and know that they shared.

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