Elements of Culture

1. Elements of Culture Institutions Within Culture Cultural Activities Inner Core

2. Social Institutions • Social institutions provide basic structure within which we live our lives • Emerge around a fundamental human need which must be met for individual survival and prosperous society Replace members Socialize new members Produce and distribute goods and services Preserve order Provide a sense of purpose

3. Economic Institutions • Produce and distribute goods and services • Some form of compensation for time or work • Groups: • Banks • Credit card companies • Manufacturing companies

4. Economic Institutions • Economies differ in amount of governmental interference • Communism, Socialism, Capitalism • Function: Allows individuals to specialize in skills and still meet needs • Barter system or ‘swap out’ work • Money

5. Political Institutions • Some form of government • Provide peace and order within society • Protection from enemies outside society • Use of force concentrated within government • Legal system • Military establishment

6. Function: Social Control • Groups must ensure that members obey at least the rules vital to survival of the group • Physical force • Economic pressure • Occupational pressures • Sanctions • Positive • Negative

7. Family as an Institution • Laws and institutions surrounding family and kinship systems • Nuclear family units • Mom, Dad, siblings • Extended family units • Includes nuclear family and aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents • Authority and inheritance • Matrilineal • Patrilineal

8. Educational Institutions • Formal agencies in which students learn • Important history • Skills • Socialization • Cultural differences in education

9. Religious Institutions • Formal systems involving • Belief • Rituals • Places of worship • Linguistic concepts

10. Health Institutions • Meaningful health can differ by culture • Physical and mental health evaluated differently according to culture • Modern medicine vs. traditional healing

11. Social Structure • Informal Structure • Authority and status attained through interpersonal relationships or other non-structured means • Formal Institutions • Deliberately brought into existence to enable people who do not know each other to carry on relationships for the purpose of attaining specific goals

12. Bureaucracy: Weber’s ideal Specialization Hierarchy of offices Rules & regulations Technical competence Impersonality Formal, written communications

13. Bureaucracy: In reality Bureaucratic alienation Inefficiency and ritualism Bureaucratic inertia

14. Theories of Cultural Change • Cultural borrowing and innovation acceptance • Contact with a new culture produces change in one or both cultures • Diffusion: Cultural traits spread from one group to another • Innovation: New elements or combinations of old elements are absorbed

15. Theories of Cultural Change • Cultural Crisis • Changes are the result of uncontrollable forces • Ecological Change • Changes as response to long-term environmental changes

16. Theories of Cultural Change • Cyclical theories • Cultures fluctuate; some rise to dominance over other cultures, some decay and fall to ruin