CULTURE AND CULTURAL STUDIES

What is culture?

There is a general agreement that culture is learnt, that it allows man to adapt himself to natural and social setting, that it is greatly variable, that it is manifested in institutions, thought patterns and material objects. One of the best early definition was given by E.B. Tylor who described culture as ‘that complex whole which includes knowledge, beliefs, art, morale, law, custom and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society’.

Culture is universal in man’s experience, yet each local or regional manifestation of it is unique. Culture is stable, yet it is also dynamic. Culture fills and determines the course of our lives, yet rarely intrudes into conscious thought.

Some of the main features of culture are as follows:

• Culture is learnt behavior as opposed to the natural one. It is acquired behavior which one learns by virtue of being a member of society.
• Culture is social, not an individual heritage of man. Culture refers to the ways common to all the members of a group.
• Culture differs from society to society and thus it is unique.
• Culture provides members of a group an identity, it creates a sense of belongingness. It gives one a sense of pride.
• Culture is a social heritage of man. This implies that culture is inevitably linked with the past.
• Human beings are continuously refining and polishing their behavior of action and thought. Culture is therefore the embodiment of refinement.
• Culture tends to be patterned as it involves similar approved behavior. E.g. religious practices and customs of a particular group.
• Culture is integrated as it has values and goals which give a sense of unity.
• Culture can be institutionalized and can exist and represent itself in a set of institutions. E.g. the institution of marriage or family.
• Culture is super-organic. People and societies may cease to exist but culture continues to survive.
• Culture is symbolic. It has a range of symbols which are both material and non-material. E.g. Indian woment wear a ‘mangalsutra’ and ‘sindoor’ which indicates that they are married.
• Culture has the ability to innovate, and this is seen through evolution of different forms of music, dance, etc.

Culture is not innate. Traits learnt through civilization, habits and thoughts are what is called culture. Culture is communicated from one generation to the next. Every individual takes part in the transmission and communication of culture but culture is social rather than individual. Man cannot create or generate while existing apart from the group. Culture fulfils those ethical and social needs which are ends in themselves.

Culture emphasise the human component of accumulated resources, immaterial as well as material which the people inherit, employ, transmute, add to structure and cultural pattern cannot exist independently of one another in human society. Society and culture are mutually dependant and social relations are carried or exemplified only in cultural behavior.

Radcliff Brown talked of culture as ‘the process by which a person acquires from contact with other persons or from such things as books or works of art, knowledge, skill, ideas, beliefs, tastes, sentiments’.

CHARACTERISTICS OF CULTURE

According to George Peter Murdock, culture has the following characteristics:

• The Learned Quality – Man is not born with culture hence it is a learned process and man moulds himself according to his environment
• The transmitted quality – Culture is transmitted from person to person. The individual is moulded according to his family and society of which he is a member.
• The social quality – Each society has culture. Each member of the society is depended on the other and each expects from the other, this expectation binds the society.
• The quality of Idealism – Culture is based on some ideals and each generation acquires it from its predecessors and each member has to follow it.
• Gratifying quality – Man as a member of the society has various needs and these needs are satisfied by the culture.
• The adapted and integrated quality – Each culture tries to adopt the qualities from outside its own environment. The contact of two or more cultures takes place and this interaction lends the adaptive quality to the culture. The different aspects of culture join hands to form a whole integrated culture.
• Culture is always idealized – Human beings are continuously refining and polishing their behavior, action and thought, culture stands for ideals and norms of human behavior.
• Culture meets the recurring demands of mankind – Culture meets the various recurring demands of mankind e.g. Demand of reproduction, nursing an infant to maturity, marriage and finally disposal of the dead, all these demands are met by culture from generation to generation. Culture points out the smooth way to meet the perpetual demands of individuals.

CULTURAL STUDIES

Man in order to live must eat – Karl Marx

Diversity is the unique feature of the human community. E.g. In the case of transportation Arabs use camels as it is easy to cross the sandy desert. In the case of Eskimos they use sledges pulled by huskies. Infrastructure may be different, but the purpose is the same i.e. transportation.

Culture is the way you adapt yourself in a society / natural environment. Anthropology is the study of human adaptation in their natural environment.

Culture studies focuses on particular aspects of culture not only on the whole range of culture i.e. pop culture or folk culture reflected in the lives and interests and behavior patterns of the masses of people like entertainment, folk arts, folk theatre, folklore which means a distinction is drawn between high culture and popular culture. Culture studies emphasizes that culture should be seen, examined and analyzed in relation to social structure and when we speak of social structure we also speak of relation of power. Culture becomes a field where the dominance of one group over the other is reflected. The dominant groups try to impose their ideology on the small group and this dominance of the major group takes place in keeping with the political, economic and ideological interests over the minority. So culture becomes associated with area of contests and consensus.