What Is Culture?
Cultural is a broad term with many interpretations, but there is considerable agreement that it encompasses all of the aspects of life of a group of people — including art, beliefs, language, lifestyle, food, values and traditions. The concept of culture is a central part of the philosophy of anthropology and the fields of sociology, history, and religion, as well as many other social sciences.
For example, UNESCO defines culture as “the distinctive spiritual, material and intellectual characteristics of a society or a group, such as arts, lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs.” While it is often assumed that cultures are unique and fixed, the truth is that no culture is static; all cultures are constantly evolving.
The study of the evolution of a particular culture is called cultural history. It is a branch of the wider discipline of history that has emerged from dissatisfaction with the limitations of earlier approaches to understanding the past, such as structuralism and post-structuralist critiques. Cultural historians focus on everyday life and continuities rather than ruptures, and are concerned with how different spheres of human activity — such as politics, economics, kinship, gender and religion — intersect and interact.
This approach to history has been controversial, in large part because of a specific objection that it is essentialist. An essentialist account of a culture treats certain key practices and norms as defining it, and argues that all members of the culture share those traits in equal measure. Critics of this view argue that it is not only impossible to define what constitutes a culture in this way, but that it is also undesirable to treat some cultures as ‘essential’, since the differences between them can be profound.
Another major criticism of this view is that it places too much emphasis on the activities deemed to be ‘high culture’ and neglects other aspects of a culture, such as the everyday lives of its members, their beliefs and behaviours, and their communities. In addition, this form of historical analysis tends to exclude women, minorities and the poor, whose contributions to a culture are less visible but no less important.
Despite the wide-ranging opinions on what exactly culture is, there is broad agreement that it matters to people, and that its importance is one of the reasons it should be protected in legal and political spaces. The defenders of this view argue that, even though it is difficult to defend the notion of a ‘culture’ in its fullest form, it is still possible to protect the elements of a culture that are valuable to individuals, such as ensuring that forums for negotiating and sharing these values are sustained in robust and inclusive ways.
Cultural is a broad term with many interpretations, but there is considerable agreement that it encompasses all of the aspects of life of a group of people — including art, beliefs, language, lifestyle, food, values and traditions. The concept of culture is a central part of the philosophy of anthropology and the fields of sociology, history, and religion, as well as many other social sciences. For example, UNESCO defines culture as “the distinctive spiritual, material and intellectual characteristics of a society or a group, such as arts, lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs.” While it is often assumed that cultures are unique and fixed, the truth is that no culture is static; all cultures are constantly evolving. The study of the evolution of a particular culture is called cultural history. It is a branch of the wider discipline of history that has emerged from dissatisfaction with the limitations of earlier approaches to understanding the past, such as structuralism and post-structuralist critiques. Cultural historians focus on everyday life and continuities rather than ruptures, and are concerned with how different spheres of human activity — such as politics, economics, kinship, gender and religion — intersect and interact. This approach to history has been controversial, in large part because of a specific objection that it is essentialist. An essentialist account of a culture treats certain key practices and norms as defining it, and argues that all members of the culture share those traits in equal measure. Critics of this view argue that it is not only impossible to define what constitutes a culture in this way, but that it is also undesirable to treat some cultures as ‘essential’, since the differences between them can be profound. Another major criticism of this view is that it places too much emphasis on the activities deemed to be ‘high culture’ and neglects other aspects of a culture, such as the everyday lives of its members, their beliefs and behaviours, and their communities. In addition, this form of historical analysis tends to exclude women, minorities and the poor, whose contributions to a culture are less visible but no less important. Despite the wide-ranging opinions on what exactly culture is, there is broad agreement that it matters to people, and that its importance is one of the reasons it should be protected in legal and political spaces. The defenders of this view argue that, even though it is difficult to defend the notion of a ‘culture’ in its fullest form, it is still possible to protect the elements of a culture that are valuable to individuals, such as ensuring that forums for negotiating and sharing these values are sustained in robust and inclusive ways.