Culture

-Culture was derived from Latin word “Culture” which means “care”, or “Cultus” which means “civilization.”
It also means state of finish or refinement.
-Culture – refers to complex whole which includes knowledge, beliefs, art, law, morals, customs, language
and any other capabilities acquired by man as a member of society.
-Culture is man’s social heritage which has transmitted from one generation to the next by means of
language. Culture tells man what to do, what not to do, and how to do things.
- Culture represents the designs or recipes for living; the interrelated network of norms and roles. It
encompasses modes of thinking, feeling and acting commonly found in society and includes everything
man has acquired as a member of society.
-Culture is anything created by man, material or non-material.

Types of Culture

1. Material –the likes are tools and technology, artefacts, architecture, clothing
2. Non-material –such as language, social norms, beliefs, values, knowledge etc.

Components of Culture

1. Social Norms – are guides or models of behaviour which tells us what is proper or improper,
appropriate or inappropriate, right or wrong. They set limits within which individuals may seek alternative
ways to achieve their goals. They are socially in the form of rules, standards, prescriptions followed by
people. The norms indicate the society’s standards of propriety, morality, ethics, and legality. Under social
norms are the following:
a. Folkways – are the customary ways, the repetitive or the typical habits and patterns of
expected behaviour followed within a group or community. They provide for the needs of man and
developed out of man’s experiences which are intended to adapt to certain situations and the environment
and constitute the right way to react to these situations. Folkways are interrelated and organized into
interdependent social acts and differ in their sanctions they receive from tradition, convention, and
etiquette.
Some folkways are rational, others are non-rational. Some are explicit, but more are implicit. They
are considered appropriate and the right way, but they are not strictly enforced by society. There are
sanctions like ridicule, disapproval, embarrassment exerted upon one who does not conform to the
folkways. The person who does not follow the folkways are called funny, ridiculous, an “odd ball” or
eccentric. Folkways include innumerable group expectations like rules or eating, mode of dressings, forms
of greetings, rules of conduct for institutional settings, and ceremonies and rituals for some occasions.
b. Mores – are the special folkways with moral and ethical values which are strongly held and
emphasized by society. They are social norms which are associated with strong feelings about right and
truth. Having strong moral sanctions, they are the “must” and “should” of a society. Mores are coercive in
nature as they are considered important to the societal welfare. The enforcement of mores takes the form
of taboos or negative sanctions such as the prohibition of some actions. Other sanctions are positive
expressed in terms of what one is obliged to do. Violators of mores are regarded as immoral, sinful, vicious,
or anti-social. Violation of more will endanger society but that of folkways would not.

c. Laws – are formalized social norms enacted by people who have been vested with political powers and
are enforced through the political machinery of the state. The laws supplement and reinforce the mores.
Violation of law would mean penalty or imprisonment. Examples are corporation laws, the constitution of
the State, Civil and Criminal Codes, Presidential Decrees etc.

d. Fashion, Fads and Craze – these are short-lived social norms which demand compliance at the time
they operate. They are powerful regulators of behaviour in urban areas and industrialized centres. The
status and the prestige of a person depend on his use of this new style. Styles of dressing, hair, shoes and
bags, and even houses are examples of fashion. A friendship band, and cell phone paraphernalia are
examples of fads while dances fall under crazes.

e. Social Institutions – are approved way of thinking, behaving and of doing things. Institutions are
made up of structures and functions. Structure is a system of relatively regular and stable relationship
among the parts, its observable uniformities and regularities. Functions refer to the results of social
action in association with a particular structure.

2. Ideas, Beliefs, Values and Knowledge

a. Ideas – are the non-material aspect of culture and embody man’s conceptions of his physical, social
and cultural world. Ideas perpetuate culture so that we may say that culture lives on through the ideas
which are transmitted from one generation to another.

b. Beliefs – embody man’s perceptions and convictions about reality and include the primitive man’s
concept, idea of the universe as well as the scientist’s empirical view of the world. They result from his
experiences about the physical, biological and social world in which he lives. Beliefs like superstitions,
riddles, philosophy, technology, art and science are usually incorporated into the whole vast body of
knowledge which has been accumulated through time. Examples, the barrio folks believe that seeing a
black butterfly portends death, and the Catholics held the belief that there are three persons in one God.

c. Values – are degrees of desirability in a given society. They are relative and bipolar in character.
Relative in the sense that what is valued by one society may not be valued by the other. For example,
some people put a high regard for material progress whereas some value happiness over material things.
Values are bi-polar because for every value, there is a counter value. Example, Thrift has a counter value
of extravagance, and truthfulness has lies.

d. Knowledge – body of facts and information accumulated by man through time.

3. Material Culture – refers to concrete and tangible things that man creates and uses. They range from
prehistoric stone tools to the more advanced and complex machinery of the modern man.

4. Language – refers to a system of symbols that have specific and arbitrary meaning in a given society.
It is this symbolic communication or language that sets human beings apart from other species. It enables
man to talk and think about the past and the future. Language makes it possible for man to learn from
other’s experiences and to accumulate knowledge from one generation to the next.

Two different but Related Ideas of Culture

1. Culture as a natural phenomenon – refer to things which are readily visible and have reality as other
phenomenon. Examples are tools and technology and activities like ploughing the fields, attending mass
and other religious rituals, tendering a party etc.

2. Culture as an abstraction – it is abstracted or implied from human behaviour and maybe observed
from the activities of the people, in what people do or say, what they avoid doing, and in the techniques,
they used in making artefacts. Examples are the kissing of the hands, the wearing of black dress, holding
family reunion, celebrating fiestas, giving symbolic gifts etc.

The Characteristics of Culture

1. Culture is universal – Culture is found in every country and in every society

2. Culture is diverse – Culture varies from place to place and from country to country.

3. Culture is learned – Culture is acquired during the course of one’s life and it is not transmitted
genetically. It is derived from many sources, the family, the social groups, imitation, formal as well as
informal instructions.

4. Culture is transmitted – man is able to convey his ideas and transmit his culture to the next generation
which may add to the accumulated behaviour patterns and knowledge.

5. Culture is social – Culture is a group product developed by many persons interacting in a group and a
result of the accumulation of knowledge and group expectations. Culture sis shared by the society and
groups and is kept relatively uniform.

6. Culture is dynamic – Culture does not stand still, it keeps on changing and developing as it is
continuously exposed to other influences and as the need arises.

7. Culture is gratifying – Culture has the provisions to satisfy the biological and socio-cultural needs of
man. It allows for the reasonable efficient and spontaneous interaction in the group for the satisfaction of
the needs of the members.

8. Culture is ideational – Culture prescribed ideal patterns of behaviour which the members are expected to
follow. Man assigns meaning to his environment and experiences by symbolizing them. These are
internalized by the individual and he sees or approaches his world from stand point of his culture. This is
what W. I. Thomas calls the “definition of a situation” – meaning the individual perceives a situation and
responds to it in accordance with his culture.

9. Culture is adaptive – the culture of any society represents an adaptation or adjustments to the various
conditions of life including their physical and social environment. The change may occur as a result of
discoveries, inventions and cultural borrowings. The acceptance of change depends on the exposure of its
members to new ideas and ways, different from their own.

10. Culture is integrative – One consequence of the adaptive process is for the various elements of a given
culture to form a consistent and unified whole. It offers no room for opposing ideas and inconsistencies and
contradictions. It integrates and connects different social parts and processes for the purpose of harmony
and order.

11. Culture is normative – Culture prescribes a standard for man’ behaviour. It tells us what to do and not
to do. It tells us to do what is proper or appropriate and not to do the opposite.
12. Culture is cumulative – Culture is piling up. It keeps on adding new elements to existing culture. Some
of these elements may phase out while some will continue to exist and observed by the people.

Levels of Cultural Participation

1. Culture universals – are the culture traits, complexes and patterns shared among all members of a given
population. Examples are social norms, biological and psychological needs, habits, ideas, etc.

2. Specialties – behaviour expectations confined to certain subgroups which often demand unusual skill or
training and reflect the division of labour and hierarchy of statuses in a culture. These are not shared by
the total population. Special training is required for professionals like doctors, engineers, lawyers, teachers
etc.

3. Alternatives – are the behaviour expectations which permit a certain range of choice in human
behaviour and specify the tolerable variations in behaviour. These are shared by some individuals but are
not common to all the members of society. For example, a “ho” and “oho”, can be substituted for “po” and
“opo”. A civil wedding has the same validity as a church wedding.

The Organization of Culture

1. Culture traits – refers to the smallest unit or element of culture. It cannot be broken down into smaller
units. This is related to a particular need or situation. Each trait, be it material or non-material, is a product
of social interaction and conveys some meaning. Materials traits are concrete objects like a basket, a
spear, a mobile phone or a pencil. Associated with the non-material trait is an idea, a social norm, or a
technique.

2. Cultural pattern – refers to the frequently recurring and regularly ordered trait complex of ideal and
actual words and actions which a number of persons conform to under similar situations. The cultural traits
do not operate singly but are related to other traits in some kind of meaningful relationship. They are
generally clustered, and each trait derives meaning only in terms of the dynamic relationship to other
traits. For example, in a basketball game, a number of traits like the ball, the basket, the scoring board, the
uniform, dribbling, shooting, passing the ball, cheering, coaching are functionally related.

The Concept of Cultural Relativism

Culture is relative and no cultural practice is good or bad by itself. It is good if it integrates smoothly with
the rest of the culture. This is the concept of cultural relativism which implies that a trait has no meaning
by itself but has meaning only within its cultural setting. Cultural traits and values cannot be properly
studied unless the meaning and function they stand for in the society they apply to are taken into account.
One should never judge a culture of other society based on the standard of his own culture but on the
standard of that society.

Modes of Acquiring Culture

1. Imitation – an individual acquires the culture of his group through the process of socialization.

2. Indoctrination – may take the form of formal and informal teachings or training which may takes place
anywhere the individual finds himself interacting with a group or his fellow humans.

3. Conditioning – the individual acquires the patterns of beliefs, values, behavior and action prescribed the
social norms prevailing in society. This process is further reinforced by a system of reward and punishment
found in the cultural system.

Other Cultural Processes

1. Amalgamation- A process that refers to the intermarriage of persons coming from different ethnic
groups resulting in some kind of biological fusion of culture.

2. Enculturation – the introduction of one individual to a new or another culture thereby absorbing it as a
new way of life. By adopting such new culture the individual identifies himself with and becomes a
member of the group

3. Acculturation – is the process by which societies of different culture are modified through fairly close
and long continued contact but do not blend with one another. One society borrows from the culture of the
other without losing its identity.

4. Assimilation-a process of interpenetration and fusion of two or more cultures resulting into a new and
distinct culture. It is also a process of social and cultural integration leading to a loss of societal identity as
a result of cultural borrowing.
Adaptations of Culture

One major characteristic of culture is being adaptive. It can be said that culture has existed
whenever human beings have lived in group life. Its origin as a whole is simultaneous with the origin of the
society.

1. Parallelism – refers to the independent development of a culture characteristic in two widely

separated cultures. There is no historical evidence that a particular culture was originated by one
people in only one place. Even in the modern world similar or the same mechanical inventions or
scientific discovery occurs in places that are far apart.
2. Diffusion – is the much more common process of patterns and traits passing back and forth from
one culture to another. Examples of these are behaviour patterns, food, customs, religious
practices, rituals and festivities.
3. Fission – is a process that can be traced historically when a long-established society breaks up into
two or more independent units. The break away group developed different internal cultural traits.
4. Convergence – is the fusion of two or more cultures into the new one which is somewhat different
from its predecessors.

Functions of Culture

As a construct or a functional entity, culture has two major uses: as a general category for the
classification of phenomena and as a tool in predicting social behaviour.

Culture as a category – By using the construct of culture, the social scientist classifies phenomena and
thereby defines the scope of his field. Through classification which uses categories, man is able to
segregate things that must occupy his priority.

Culture as a tool in prediction – Prediction of social behaviour depends upon understanding how the
human organism will react to its environment. Because culture is learned and internalized by all individuals
in a society, it is a part of their usual subjective way of responding to stimuli.

The following are some of the specific functions of culture:

1. Culture serves as a “trade mark” or special feature that distinguishes society from another.
It characterize a people more meaningfully and more scientifically than the colour of their skin or
any other physiological making. Culture makes the people of a particular society different from the
rest.
2. Culture brings together, contains, and interprets the values of a society in a more or less systematic
manner. Through culture people discover the meaning and purpose of both social and individual
living. Meaning and values become integrated in and through the culture of a given society.
3. Culture provides one of the most important bases for social solidarity. It inspires loyalty and
devotion to associates and to the society in general. Culture provides the people the knowledge of
the common objectives of their society, which all of them try to accomplish. In this way, common
feelings, common sentiments and common aspirations are developed thereby attaining a common
national pride.
4. Culture provides a blue print as well as the materials for social structure. It systematizes social
behaviour so that the person participates in a society without the necessity of constantly relearning
and inventing ways of doing things. Culture relates and coordinates all the various segments of the
behaviour of individual and groups.
5. The culture of any society is the dominant factor in establishing and moulding the social personality.
It is a fact that in every society a sort of cultural stamp is always observed despite the differences
in the individuals. One’s social personality is the product of his culture.
6. The culture of society provides behavioural patterns. Culture governs the behaviour of people in a
society. It provides them with some norms to follow. As a result, there is coherence, consistency,
and systematic pattern among the behaviours manifested by the members of society.
7. Culture provides the individual with the meanings and the directions of his existence. The objectives
and the goals of the group where the individual belongs, the community where he is a participant,
and the concepts and motives of society guide and shape the individual in his quest for meaning
and direction in life.

Terms related to Culture

1. Ethnocentrism – when an individual considers his culture superior than the culture of other society.
2. Xenocentrism – when a person considers the culture of others superior than his own.
3. Subculture – a culture develop by a smaller group of people different from that of a broader society or
general culture – it is a culture within a culture. The Ilocanos have a typical culture not possessed by the
rest of the Filipinos. The Homosexuals have their own culture different from other genders. Squatters have
a culture that can be typically call their own. A sub-culture gives the individual an identity and some arise
from certain individuals need to obtain assurance and security from others for their inability to cope with
the prevailing patterns of culture.

Subcultures often develop when society becomes more complex and highly urbanized. A subculture
may be based on age, social class, occupational groups, religion or ethnicity

4. Counter culture – a culture which is opposite of/to the general culture. When the subculture
emphasizes conflict between a group and a larger society, a contra or counter culture develops.

5. Culture shock – the feeling of fear and anxiety when a person is exposed to a new culture. It comes as
a result of frustration and disorganization when a person encounters another culture whose patterns of
behaviour and ideas are different from his own.

6. Culture lag – occurs when two groups of culture do not develop at the same rate. Computer technology
is highly used in developed countries but not in primitive societies.

7. Culture gap – the conflict between cultures of two generations. Old people have difficulty
understanding the young because their cultures are different.