DEFINING CULTURE

& SOCIETY FROM THE PERSPECTIVES OF

ANTHROPOLOGY AND SOCIOLOGYDIEGO C. POMARCA JR.SHS Teacher – Pangpang Integrated NHS

www.diegopomarca.wix.com/undercover

ACTIVITY 1:

ANALYSIS

ANTHROPOLOGIST believe that culture is a product of human evolution.

Culture from different places develop distinct culture.

Culture is regarded as the means of human adaptation to the world.

EXPLICIT CULTURE – are those that people aware of and consciously recognize e.g. shaking of hands when introduced.

IMPLICIT CULTURE – it is not always recognize by people but it influence behaviour and people simply take them for granted and rarely think about it.

CULTURE: AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL

PERSPECTIVEBY GARY FERRARO AND SUSAN

ANDREATTATheories – are perspectives that are essential in shaping an analysis about a particular issue.The following are the 7 theoretical orientations in anthropology and the ideas on culture:

1. Cultural Evolutionism2. Diffusionism3. Historicism4. Psychological Anthropology5. Functionalism6. Neo-evolutionism7. Materialism

A. CULTURAL EVOLUTIONISMPerspective on Culture: All cultures undergo the same development stages in the same order. The main classifications include savagery, barbarism and civilization.

“Cultural evolution” is the idea that human culture changes in socially transmitted beliefs, knowledge, customs, skills, attitudes, languages, etc.

Can be described as a Darwinian evolutionary process that is similar in key respects (but not identical) to biological/genetic evolution.

(www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo.../obo-9780199766567-0038.xml)

CULTURAL EVOLUTIONISMPerspective on Culture: Explains the genesis and growth of cultural phenomena.

It tried to establish a universal pattern of human cultural evolution.

By studying and analysing cultural evolution, anthropologists during the 19th century hoped to develop a science of culture that could incorporate universal laws of human nature.

Evolutionism in the 19th century was initiated by the works of Charles Darwin. A couple of years prior to Darwin, Herbert Spencer a philosopher visualized evolution to be a cosmic process.

http://www.sociologyguide.com/anthropology/main-approaches-to-the-study-of-society-and-culture/cultural-evolutionism.php

THE BASIC ASSUMPTIONS OF 19TH CENTURY CULTURAL EVOLUTIONISM WERE:All cultures throughout the world developed progressively over time.

Cultural progress took place from simple to complex forms.

Cultural evolution led the growth of civilization.

It was the belief in Social Darwinism that led to the belief that some societies were better equipped than others to dominate and rule.

Natural selection operated to eliminate those which did not have the requisite capacities and capabilities while encouraging the survival of the fittest.

Edward Tylor, Lewis Henry Morgan and James George Frazer were the classical evolutionists.

EDWARD TYLOR the Father of Anthropology In his book entitled Primitive Culture published in 1871, he defined culture as a complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom and other capacities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.

He was convinced that all cultures were capable of progress because he believed in psychic unity of mankind.

He also explained 'The Comparative Method' and defined the concept of survival as processes, customs, and opinions that has been carried on by force of habit into a new state of society in which they had their original home and they remain as proofs and examples of an older condition of culture that a newer one has evolved.

LEWIS HENRY MORGAN the Father of Kinship Studies He wrote extensively about evolution of specific social institutions like Marriage, family and Kinship but also constructed a general sequence of human history.

He was the first to typify the kinship terminologies of the world into descriptive in which lineal kin are differentiated from collateral kin.

He published his works on kinship in the Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity.

FIVE KINSHIP TERMS ACCORDING TO MORGAN Consanguine is based on group marriage within the same

generation. The Punaluan based on a form of group marriage in which

brothers were forbidden to marry sisters. The Syndyasmian or pairing family, a transitional form

between group marriage and monogamy in which husband or wife could end the marriage at will as often as he or she wished.

The Patriarchical a supreme authority was vested in the male head.

The Monogamian based on monogamy and female equality and progressively resembling the modern nuclear unit.

JAMES GEORGE FRAZER famous for his work The Golden Bough published in 1914.He developed his theories based on other people's ethnographic researches.

According to him, all primitive people were mentally irrational and hence superstition pervaded primitive thought.

Frazer came up with three stage evolutionary development:Magic------> Religion ------> Science

According to Frazer in the first stage of human society magic played very important role. But then man must have realized that there could be some superior power above him that controls him and his activities. He must have submitted himself to this superior power. It is here when magic was replaced by religion. Later on science which is based on factual correlations between cause and effect would have evolved as man also evolved mentally. 

B. DIFFUSIONISMPerspective on Culture: All societies change as a result of cultural borrowing from one another.

Diffusionism refers to the diffusion or transmission of cultural characteristics or traits from the common society to all other societies. They criticized the Psychic unity of mankind of evolutionists.

They believed that most inventions happened just once and men being capable of imitation, these inventions were then diffused to other places.  

DIFFUSIONISMPerspective on Culture: All cultures originated at one point and then spread throughout the world.

Opposed the notion of progress from simple to complex forms held by the evolutionists.

Held that primitive or modern is also a relative matter and hence comparative method is not applicable.

Looked specifically for variations that gradually occurred while diffusion took place.

THE MAIN PROPONENTS OF BRITISH SCHOOL OF DIFFUSIONISM WERE:

1. G.Elliot Smith;2. William J Perry; and 3. W.H.R Rivers.

ACCORDING TO ADVOCATES OF THE BRITISH SCHOOL OF DIFFUSIONISM…

Egypt was the culture center of the world and the cradle of civilization. Hence human culture originated in Egypt and then spread throughout the world.

They pointed to the Pyramid like large stone structures and sun worship in several parts of the world.

PROPONENTS OF THE GERMAN SCHOOL OF DIFFUSIONISM1. Friedrich Ratzel;2. Leo Frobenius;3. Fritz Graebner; and 4. William Schmidt. 

C. HISTORICISMPerspective on Culture: Each culture is unique and must be studied in its own

contextRegarded historical development as the most basic aspect

of human existence. Social and cultural phenomena are determined by history.Historicism is an approach to the study of anthropology

and culture that dates back to the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It encompasses two distinct forms of historicism: diffusionism and historical particularism.

Historicism developed out of dissatisfaction with the theories of unilineal socio-cultural evolution.

LEADING FIGURES OF HISTORICISM:1.Grafton Elliot Smith (1871-1937) is credited with founding and leading the British school of diffusionism.

Through a comparative study of different peoples from around the world that have practiced mummification, Smith formulated a theory that all of the people he studied originally derived their mummification practices from Egypt. He concluded that civilization was created only once in Egypt and spread throughout the world, just as mummification had, through colonization, migration, and diffusion.

LEADING FIGURES OF HISTORICISM:2. R. Fritz Graebner (1877-1934) – Graebner is remembered for being the founder of the German

School of diffusionism. Graebner borrowed the idea of culture area and the psychic unity of mankind as developed by Adolf Bastian and used it to develop his theory of Kulturekreistehere (culture circles), which was primarily concerned with the description of patterns of culture distribution (Winthrop 1991:222).

His theory of culture circles posits that culture traits are invented once and combine with other culture traits to create culture patterns, both of which radiate outwards in concentric circles.

The most complete exposition of his views is contained in his major work, Die Methode der Ethnologie (Putzstuck 1991:247-8).

LEADING FIGURES OF HISTORICISM:3. Franz Boas (1858-1942) Boas was born in Minden, Westphalia (now part of Germany) and grew up in Germany.

At the age of twenty he enrolled in college at Heidelberg. He studied physics and geography both in Heidelberg and in Bonn.

In 1899, he became the first Professor of Anthropology at Colombia University, a position that allowed him to instruct a number of important anthropologists who collectively influenced anthropological thought in many ways.

FRANZ BOAS BELIEVED THATAll societies are part of one single human culture evolving towards a cultural pinnacle is flawed, especially when proposing a western model of civilization as the cultural pinnacle.

He argued that many cultures developed independently, each based on its own particular set of circumstances such as geography, climate, resources and particular cultural borrowing.

The distribution of culture traits must be plotted. Once the distribution of many sets of culture traits is plotted for a general geographic area, patterns of cultural borrowing may be determined.

This allows the reconstruction of individual histories of specific cultures by informing the investigator which of the cultural elements were borrowed and which were developed individually 

OTHER PROPONENTS OF HISTORICISM (PROBABLY BOAS’S STUDENTS)1. Alfred Louis Kroeber2. Ruth Benedict3. Robert H. Lowie 4. Edward Sapir5. Paul Radin6. Clark Wissler7. Arjun Appadurai

D. PSYCHOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY

Perspective on Culture: Personality is largely seen to be the result of learning culture. Psychological anthropology is the study

of psychological topics using anthropological concepts and methods. Among the areas of interest are personal identity, selfhood, subjectivity, memory, consciousness, emotion, motivation, cognition, madness, and mental health.

Psychological anthropology is the study of psychological topics using anthropological concepts and methods. Among the areas of interest are personal identity, selfhood, subjectivity, memory, consciousness, emotion, motivation, cognition, madness, and mental health.

PSYCHOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGYPerspective on Culture: Investigates the psychological conditions that encourage

endurance and change in social systems, with the goal of better understanding the relationship between culture and the individual. It approaches anthropological investigations through the use of psychological concepts and methods.

It logically follows that without human behavior, the field of anthropology would not exist. 

Leslie A. White viewed culture as a material system of objects and symbols that determined human behavior so completely that differences among individuals could be ignored.

THE HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY

School Approach and Dates Leading Figures

Psychoanalytic Anthropology

Orthodox, 1910 - Freud, Roheim, Flugel, Ferenczi

Later Freudian, 1930 - Fromm, Erikson, Bettleheim, LeBarre, Devereux

Culture and Personality

Configuralist, 1920-1940 Benedict, Sapir, M. Mead, Barnouw, Hallowell

Basic and Modal Personality, 1935-1955

Kardiner, Linton, DuBois, Wallace, Gladwin

National Character, 1940 - Kluckhohn, Bateson, Gorer, Hsu, Caudhill, Inkeles

Cross-Cultural, 1950 - Whiting, Spiro, LeVine, Spindler, Edgerton, Munroe, D’Andrade

Social Structure and Personality

Materialist, 1848 - Marx, Engels, Bukharin, Godelier

Positionalist, 1890 - Veblen, Weber, MertonInteractionist, 1930 - G. H. Mead, Goffman, Garfinkle

Cognitive Anthropology

Primitive Mentality, 1870 - Tylor, Levy-Bruhl, Boas, Levi-Strauss

Developmental, 1920 - Piaget, Cole, Price-Williams, WitkinEthnosematic, 1960 - Conklin. Frake, Kay, Berlin, Hunn

Behavioral Human Ethology, 1970 - Erkman, McGrewSociobiology, 1975 - Wilson, Barash

Self and Emotion, 1947 - Murphy, Shweder, LeVine, Lutz

E. FUNCTIONALISMPerspective on Culture: Society is thought to be like a biological organism with all

of the parts interconnected. Existing institutional structures of any society are thought to perform indispensable functions, without which the society could not continue.

Functionalists seek to describe the different parts of a society and their relationship through the organic analogy. The organic analogy compared the different parts of a society to the organs of a living organism.

Bronislaw Malinowski and A.R. Radcliffe-Brown had the greatest influence on the development of functionalism from their posts in Great Britain.

FUNCTIONALISMPerspective on Culture: Functionalism was a reaction to the excesses of the

evolutionary and diffusionist theories of the nineteenth century and the historicism of the early twentieth century.

Malinowski suggested that individuals have physiological needs (reproduction, food, shelter) and that social institutions exist to meet these needs.

There are also culturally derived needs and four basic "instrumental needs" (economics, social control, education, and political organization), that require institutional devices.

Each institution has personnel, a charter, a set of norms or rules, activities, material apparatus (technology), and a function.

He argued that satisfaction of these needs transformed the cultural instrumental activity into an acquired drive through psychological reinforcement.

FUNCTIONALISMPerspective on Culture: Radcliffe-Brown focused on social structure rather than biological needs.

He suggested that a society is a system of relationships maintaining itself through cybernetic feedback, while institutions are orderly sets of relationships whose function is to maintain the society as a system.

Radcliffe-Brown, inspired by Augustus Comte, stated that the social constituted a separate "level" of reality distinct from those of biological forms and inorganic matter.

He argued that explanations of social phenomena had to be constructed within the social level. Thus, individuals were replaceable, transient occupants of social roles.

Unlike Malinowski's emphasis on individuals, Radcliffe-Brown considered individuals irrelevant.

PROPONENTS OF FUNCTIONALISM1. E.E. Evans-Pritchard2. Sir Raymond Firth 3. Meyer Fortes4. Sir Edmund Leach5. Lucy Mair6. Robert K. Merton 7. Talcott Parsons 8. Audrey Richards 

F. NEO-EVOLUTIONISMPerspective on Culture: Culture is said to be shaped by environmental and

technological conditions. Cultures evolve when people are able to increase the amount of energy under their control.

Neo-evolutionism is a social theory that tries to explain the evolution of societies by drawing on Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and discarding some dogmas of the previous social evolutionism.

Leslie White, Julian Steward, Marshall Sahlins and Elman Service as main propounders.

LESLIE WHITE EMPHASIZED THAT the evolutionary stages are abstractions applicable to the

growth of human culture. culture grows out of culture with new combinations,

syntheses continually formed. technology is the basic determinant of cultural

evolutionism. He also refers to it as Cultural Materialism. the other factors remaining constant, culture evolves as

energy harnessed per capita, per year is increased, the system not only increase in size but become more highly evolved , they become more differentiated and more specialized functionally.

JULIAN STEWARD SAYS THAT Cultural Evolution may be defined as quest for regularities

or laws. There are three ways in which evolutionary data can be analyzed.

Multilinear evolution is a methodology based on the assumption that regularities in culture change occur. This is concerned with historical reconstruction with any set laws.

1. Unilineal evolution: the classical 19th century formulation which dealt with particular cultures, placing them in stages of universal sequence.

2. Universal evolution: This designates the modern revamping of unilineal evolution which is concerned with culture than with cultures.

3. Multilinear evolution: It is distinctive in searching parallels of limited occurrence instead of universals.

MARSHALL SAHLINS AND ELMAN SERVICE HAVE COMBINED THE WHITE AND STEWARD'S VIEWS BY RECOGNIZING TWO

KINDS OF EVOLUTION.1. Specific Evolution refers to the

particular sequence of change and adaptation of a particular society in a given environment.

2. General Evolution refers to general progress of human society in which higher forms arise and surpass lower forms. 

G. MATERIALISM(CULTURAL MATERIALISM)

Perspective on Culture: Culture is the product of the “material conditions” in

which a given community of people finds itself. Cultural Materialism is a scientific research strategy

that prioritizes material, behavioral and etic processes in the explanation of the evolution of human socio-cultural systems. It was first introduced by Marvin Harris in The Rise of Anthropological Theory (1968).

Cultural materialism embraces three anthropological schools of thought, cultural materialism, cultural evolution and cultural ecology.

MATERIALISMPerspective on Culture: Cultural similarities and differences as well as models for

cultural change within a societal framework consisting of three distinct levels:  infrastructure, structure and superstructure.  

Infrastructure - consisting of “material realities” such as technological, economic and reproductive (demographic) factors mold and influence the other two aspects of culture (structure and superstructure).

The “structure” sector of culture consists of organizational aspects of culture such as domestic and kinship systems and political economy.

The “superstructure” sector consists of ideological and symbolic aspects of society such as religion.

MATERIALISMPerspective on Culture: Cultural materialists believe that technological and

economic aspects play the primary role in shaping a society.  Aims to understand the effects of technological, economic

and demographic factors on molding societal structure and superstructure through strictly scientific methods.  

Cultural materialism views both productive (economic) and reproductive (demographic) forces as the primary factors which shape society. 

Systems such as government, religion, law, and kinship are considered to be constructs that only exist for the sole purpose of promoting production and reproduction. 

PROPONENTS OF CULTURAL MATERIALISM

1. Marvin Harris 2. Julian Steward3. Leslie White4. R. Brian Ferguson5. Martin F. Murphy6. Maxine L. Margolis7. Allen Johnson

REFERENCES: anthropology.ua.edu/Faculty/murphy/histor.htm http://

www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199766567/obo-9780199766567-0124.xml

http://www.indiana.edu/~wanthro/theory_pages/Psychological.htm

http://www.sociologyguide.com/anthropology/main-approaches-to-the-study-of-society-and-culture/neo-evolutionism.php