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The word '''''culture''''', from the [[Latin]] ''colo, -ere'', with its root meaning "to cultivate", generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. Different definitions of "culture" reflect different theoretical bases for understanding, or criteria for evaluating, human activity. Anthropologists most commonly use the term "culture" to refer to the universal human capacity to classify, codify and communicate their experiences [[symbol|symbolically]]. This capacity is taken as a defining feature of the genus ''[[homo (genus)|Homo]]'', though [[Jane Goodall]] (''The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior'', 1986) identified aspects of culture among our closest relatives.

==Defining culture==
Different definitions of ''culture'' reflect different theories for understanding - or criteria for evaluating - human activity.

[[Edward Burnett Tylor |Sir Edward B. Tylor]] wrote in 1871 that "culture or [[civilization]], taken in its wide ethnographic sense, is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society", while a 2002 document from the United Nations agency [[UNESCO]] states that culture is the "set of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features of society or a social group, and that it encompasses, in addition to art and literature, [[lifestyle]]s, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs". [http://www.unesco.org/education/imld_2002/unversal_decla.shtml UNESCO, 2002] While these two definitions range widely, they do not exhaust the many uses of this concept - in 1952 [[Alfred L. Kroeber|Alfred Kroeber]] and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of more than 200 different definitions of ''culture'' in their book, ''Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions'' [Kroeber and Kluckhohn, 1952].
===Culture as values, norms, and artifacts===
A common way of understanding culture sees it as consisting of three elements:
# [[Value (personal and cultural)|''values'']]
# [[Norm (sociology)|''norms'']]
# [[Artifact (archaeology)|''artifacts'']].
(See ''Dictionary of Modern Sociology'', 1969, 93, cited at [http://www.info.gov.hk/coy/eng/report/doc/Youth_Statistical/2002/app/Chp6_Cultural_Capital.pdf])
Values comprise ideas about what in life seems important. They guide the rest of the culture. Norms consist of expectations of how people will behave in different situations. Each culture has different methods, called ''sanctions'', of enforcing its norms. Sanctions vary with the importance of the norm; norms that a society enforces formally have the status of ''[[law]]s''. Artifacts — things, or material culture — derive from the culture's values and norms.

[[Julian Huxley]] gives a slightly different division, into inter-related "mentifacts", "socifacts" and "artifacts", for ideological, sociological, and technological subsystems respectively. Socialization, in Huxley's view, depends on the belief subsystem. The sociological subsystem governs interaction between people. Material objects and their use make up the technological subsystem. [http://fog.ccsf.cc.ca.us/~aforsber/ccsf/culture_defined.html]

As a rule, [[archaeology|archeologists]] focus on material culture whereas [[cultural anthropology|cultural anthropologists]] focus on symbolic culture, although ultimately both groups maintain interests in the relationships between these two dimensions. Moreover, anthropologists understand "culture" to refer not only to [[consumption goods]], but to the general processes which produce such goods and give them meaning, and to the social relationships and practices in which such objects and processes become embedded.
===Culture as civilization===
Many people today use a conception of "culture" that developed in [[Europe]] during the 18th and early 19th centuries. This idea of culture then reflected inequalities within European societies, and between European powers and their colonies around the world. It identifies "culture" with "[[civilization]]" and contrasts the combined concept with "[[nature]]". According to this thinking, one can classify some countries as more civilized than others, and some people as more cultured than others. Thus some cultural theorists have actually tried to eliminate popular or mass culture from the definition of culture. Theorists like [[Matthew Arnold]] (1822-1888) or [[F. R. Leavis | the Leavises]] regard culture as simply the result of "the best that has been thought and said in the world” (Arnold, 1960: 6); Arnold contrasted culture with social chaos or anarchy. On this account, culture links closely with social cultivation: the progressive refinement of human behavior. Arnold consistently uses the word this way: "...culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has been thought and said in the world". [http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/nonfiction_u/arnoldm_ca/ca_all.html Arnold, 1882]
''Italic text''
In practice, ''culture'' referred to [[elite | Ã©lite]] goods and activities such as ''[[haute cuisine]]'', high fashion or ''[[haute couture]]'', [[museum]]-caliber [[art]] and [[European classical music|classical music]], and the word ''cultured'' described people who knew about, and took part in, these activities. For example, someone who used 'culture' in the sense of 'cultivation' might argue that [[European classical music|classical music]] "is" more refined than music produced by working-class people such as [[punk rock]] or than the indigenous music traditions of aboriginal peoples of [[Australia]].

People who use "culture" in this way tend not to use it in the plural as "cultures". They do not believe that distinct cultures exist, each with their own internal [[logic]] and [[Value (personal and cultural)|value]]s; but rather that only a single standard of refinement suffices, against which one can measure all groups. Thus, according to this [[worldview]], people with different customs from those who regard themselves as cultured do not usually count as "having a different culture"; but class as "uncultured". People lacking "culture" often seemed more "natural", and observers often defended (or criticized) elements of [[high culture]] for repressing "[[human nature]]".

From the 18th century onwards, some social critics have accepted this contrast between cultured and uncultured, but have stressed the interpretation of refinement and of sophistication as corrupting and unnatural developments which obscure and distort people's essential nature. On this account, [[folk music]] (as produced by working-class people) honestly expresses a natural way of life, and classical music seems superficial and decadent. Equally, this view often portrays non-[[Western culture|Western]] people as '[[noble savage]]s' living [[authenticity (philosophy)|authentic]] unblemished lives, uncomplicated and uncorrupted by the highly-stratified [[capitalism | capitalist]] systems of [[western culture | the West]].

Today most social scientists reject the [[monadic]] conception of culture, and the opposition of culture to [[nature (innate) | nature]]. They recognize non-[[Ã©lite]]s as just as cultured as Ã©lites (and non-Westerners as just as civilized) - simply regarding them as just cultured in a different way. Thus social observers contrast the '''"high" culture''' of Ã©lites to [[Popular culture|'''"popular" or pop culture''']], meaning goods and activities produced for, and consumed by, non-Ã©lite people or the [[proletariat|masses]]. (Note that some classifications relegate both [[high culture|high]] and [[low culture|low cultures]] to the status of [[subculture]]s.)

===Culture as worldview===
During the [[Romantic era]], scholars in [[Germany]], especially those concerned with [[nationalism|nationalist]] movements - such as the nationalist struggle to create a "Germany" out of diverse principalities, and the nationalist struggles by ethnic minorities against the [[Austro-Hungarian Empire]] - developed a more inclusive notion of culture as "[[worldview]]". In this mode of thought, a distinct and incommensurable world view characterizes each ethnic group. Although more inclusive than earlier views, this approach to culture still allowed for distinctions between "civilized" and "primitive" or "tribal" cultures.

By the late 19th century, [[anthropology|anthropologists]] had adopted and adapted the term ''culture'' to a broader definition that they could apply to a wider variety of societies. Attentive to the theory of [[evolution]], they assumed that all human beings evolved equally, and that the fact that all humans have cultures must in some way result from human evolution. They also showed some reluctance to use biological evolution to explain differences between specific cultures - an approach that either exemplified a form of, or legitimized forms of, [[racism]]. They believed that biological evolution would produce a most inclusive notion of culture, a concept that anthropologists could apply equally to non-literate and to literate societies, or to nomadic and to sedentary societies. They argued that through the course of their evolution, human beings evolved a universal human capacity to classify experiences, and to encode and communicate them [[symbol|symbolically]]. Since human individuals learned and taught these symbolic systems, the systems began to develop independently of biological evolution (in other words, one human being can learn a belief, value, or way of doing something from another, even if the two humans do not share a biological relationship). That this capacity for symbolic thinking and social learning stems from human evolution confounds older arguments about [[nature versus nurture]]. Thus [[Clifford Geertz]] (1973: 33 ff.) has argued that human physiology and neurology developed in conjunction with the first cultural activities, and Middleton (1990: 17 n.27) concluded that human "'instincts' were culturally formed".

People living apart from one another develop unique cultures, but elements of different cultures can easily spread from one group of people to another. Culture changes dynamically and people can (must?) teach and learn culture, making it a potentially rapid form of [[adaptation (biology)|adaptation]] to change in physical conditions. Anthropologists view culture as not only as a product of biological evolution but as a supplement to it, as the main means of human adaptation to the world.

This view of culture as a symbolic system with adaptive functions, and one which varies from place to place, led anthropologists to conceive of different cultures as defined by distinct patterns (or structures) of enduring, arbitrary, conventional sets of [[meaning]], which took concrete form in a variety of artifacts such as [[myth]]s and [[ritual]]s, [[tool]]s, the design of housing, and the planning of villages. Anthropologists thus distinguish between '''material culture''' and '''symbolic culture''', not only because each reflects different kinds of human activity, but also because they constitute different kinds of data that require different methodologies. Since at lest the 1980s, many archaeologists ([[Ian Hodder]], for example) have argued that these two types of culture cannot be separated but that much of a societiy's symbolic culture is communicated and expressed through its material culture.

This view of culture, which came to dominate between [[World War I]] and [[World War II]], implied that each culture had bounds and demanded interpretation as a whole, on its own terms. There resulted a belief in [[cultural relativism]]; the belief that one had to understand an individual's actions in terms of his or her culture; that one had to understand a specific [[cultural artifact]] (a [[ritual]], for example) in terms of the larger [[symbolic]] system of which it forms a part.

Nevertheless, the belief that culture comprises symbolical codes and can thus pass via teaching from one person to another meant that cultures, although bounded, would change. Cultural change could result from [[invention]] and [[innovation]], but it could also result from contact between two cultures. Under peaceful conditions, contact between two cultures can lead to people "borrowing" (really, learning) from one another ([[diffusion (anthropology)|diffusion]] or [[transculturation]]). Under conditions of violence or political inequality, however, people of one society can "steal" cultural artifacts from another, or impose cultural artifacts on another ([[acculturation]]). [[Diffusion of innovations]] theory presents a research-based model for how, when and why people adopt new ideas.

All human societies have participated in these processes of diffusion, [[transculturation]], and [[acculturation]], and few anthropologists today see cultures as bounded. Modern anthropologists argue that instead of understanding a cultural artifact in terms of its own culture, one needs to understand it in terms of a broader history involving contact and relations with other cultures.

In addition to the aforementioned processes, migration on a major scale has characterized the world, particularly since the days of [[Christopher Columbus|Columbus]]. Phenomena such as [[colonialism|colonial expansion]] and forced migration through [[slavery]] became prominent. As a result, many societies have become culturally heterogeneous. Some anthropologists have argued nevertheless that some unifying cultural system bound heterogeneous societies, and that it offers advantages to understand heterogenous elements as [[subcultures]]. Others have argued that no unifying or coordinating cultural system exists, and that one must understand heterogeneous elements together as forming a [[multicultural]] society. The spread of the doctrine of [[multiculturalism]] has coincided with a resurgence of [[identity politics]], which involve demands for the recognition of social subgroups' cultural uniqueness.

[[Sociobiological theory|Sociobiologists]] argue that observers can best understand many aspects of culture in the light of the concept of the ''[[meme]]'', first introduced by [[Richard Dawkins]] in his 1976 book ''[[The Selfish Gene]]''. Dawkins suggests the existence of units of culture - ''memes'' - roughly analogous to ''genes'' in [[evolutionary biology]]. Although this view has gained some popular currency, anthropologists generally reject it.

===Culture as patterns of products and activities===
In the early 20th century, [[cultural anthropology|anthropologists]] understood culture to refer not to a set of discrete products or activities (whether material or symbolic) but rather to underlying [[pattern]]s of products and activities. Moreover, they assumed that such patterns had clear bounds (thus, some people confuse "culture" with the society that has a particular culture).

Geertz distinguishes between ''culture'' and ''social system'': "…the former is an ordered system of meanings and symbols in terms of which social interaction takes place; …the latter… [is] the pattern of social interaction itself." (Keiser, 1969:viii)

In the case of smaller societies, in which people merely fell into categories of [[ageing|age]], [[gender]], household and descent group, anthropologists believed that people more-or-less shared the same set of values and conventions. In the case of larger societies, in which people undergo further categorization by region, [[race]], [[ethnicity]], and [[social class|class]], anthropologists came to believe that members of the same society often had highly contrasting values and conventions. They thus used the term [[subculture]] to identify the cultures of parts of larger societies. Since subcultures reflect the position of a segment of society ''vis a vis'' other segments and the society as a whole, they often reveal processes of [[domination]] and [[resistance movement|resistance]].

The 20th century also saw the popularization of the idea of [[corporate culture]] - distinct and malleable within the context of an employing [[organization]] or of a [[workplace]].

===Culture as symbols===
The symbolic view of culture, the legacy of Clifford Geertz (1973) and Victor Turner (1967), holds symbols to be both the practices of social actors and the context that gives such practices meaning. Anthony P. Cohen (1985) writes of the "symbolic gloss" which allows social actors to use common symbols to communicate and understand each other while still imbuing these symbols with personal significance and meanings. Symbols provide the limits of cultured thought. Members of a culture rely on these symbols to frame their thoughts and expressions in intelligible terms. In short, symbols make culture possible, reproducible and readable. They are the "webs of significance" in Weber's sense that, to quote Pierre Bourdieu (1977), "give regularity, unity and systematicity to the practices of a group...".

===Culture as stabilizing mechanism===
Modern cultural theory also considers the possibility that (a)
culture itself is a product of stabilization tendencies inherent
in evolutionary pressures toward self-similarity and self-cognition of societies as wholes, or [[tribalism]]s. See
[[Steven Wolfram]] "[[A new kind of science]]" on iterated simple algorithms from genetic unfolding, from which the concept of culture as an operating mechanism can be developed, and [[Richard Dawkins]] "[[The extended phenotype]]" for discussion of genetic and [[memetic]] stability over time, through [[negative feedback]] mechanisms, such as [[WikipÃ¦dia]].

==Cultural change==
Cultures, by predisposition, both embrace and resist [[change]] dependence of culture traits. For example, men and women have complementary roles in many cultures. One sex might desire changes that affect the other, as happened in the second half of the 20th century in [[western culture]]s.

Cultural change can come about due to the environment, to inventions (and other internal influences), and to contact with other cultures. For example, the end of the last [[ice age]] helped lead to the invention of [[agriculture]], which in its turn brought about many cultural innovations.

In [[diffusion (anthropology)|diffusion]], the form of something moves from one culture to another, but not its meaning. For example, [[hamburger]]s, mundane in the United States, seemed exotic when introduced into China. "Stimulus diffusion" refers to an element of one culture leading to an invention in another. [[Diffusions of innovations]] theory presents a research-based model for why and when individuals and cultures adopt new ideas, practices, and products.

"Acculturation" has different meanings, but in this context refers to replacement of the traits of one culture with those of another, such as happened to certain [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native American]] tribes and to many indigenous peoples across the globe during the process of [[colonization]].

Related processes on an individual level include [[cultural assimilation|assimilation]] (adoption of a different culture by an individual) and [[transculturation]].

==Cultural studies==
[[Cultural studies]] developed in the late 20th century, in part through the re-introduction of [[Marxist]] thought into [[sociology]], and in part through the [[articulation (sociology)|articulation]] of [[sociology]] and other academic disciplines such as [[literary criticism]]. This movement aimed to focus on the analysis of subcultures in [[capitalist]] societies. Following the non-anthropological tradition, [[cultural studies]] generally focus on the study of consumption goods (such as [[fashion]], [[art]], and [[literature]]). Because the 18th- and 19th-century distinction between "high" and "low" culture seems inappropriate to apply to the mass-produced and mass-marketed consumption goods which cultural studies analyses, these scholars refer instead to "popular culture".

Today, some [[anthropology|anthropologists]] have joined the project of cultural studies. Most, however, reject the identification of culture with consumption goods. Furthermore, many now reject the notion of culture as bounded, and consequently reject the notion of [[subculture]]. Instead, they see culture as a complex web of shifting patterns that link people in different locales and that link social formations of different scales. According to this view, any group can construct its own [[cultural identity]].

==Sample list of cultures==
===Cultures of contemporary countries and regions===
''Main article: [[List of national culture articles]].''

<div style="float: left; width: 33%">
*[[Culture of Anga|Anga]]
*[[Culture of Albania|Albania]]
*[[Culture of Angola|Angola]]
*[[Culture of Australia|Australia]]
*[[Culture of Belgium|Belgium]]
*[[Culture of Bhutan|Bhutan]]
*[[Culture of Brazil|Brazil]]
*[[Culture of Bosnia and Herzegovina|Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
*[[Culture of Bulgaria|Bulgaria]]
*[[Culture of Canada|Canada]]
**[[Culture of Quebec|Quebec]]
**[[Political culture of Canada]]
*[[Culture of Chile|Chile]]
*[[Culture of China|China]]
**[[Culture of Hong Kong|Hong Kong]]
*[[Culture of Denmark|Denmark]]
*[[Culture of Egypt|Egypt]]
*[[Culture of Finland|Finland]]
</div>

<div style="float: left; width: 33%">
*[[Culture of France|France]]
*[[Culture of Georgia|Georgia]]
*[[Culture of Gibraltar|Gibraltar]]
*[[Culture of Greece|Greece]]
*[[Culture of Hungary|Hungary]]
*[[Culture of India|India]]
*[[Culture of Indonesia|Indonesia]]
*[[Culture of Iran|Iran]]
*[[Culture of Ireland|Ireland]]
*[[Culture of Israel|Israel]]
*[[Culture of Italy|Italy]]
*[[Culture of Japan|Japan]]
*[[Culture of Jersey|Jersey]]
*[[Culture of Korea|Korea]]
**[[Contemporary culture of North Korea|North Korea]]
**[[Contemporary culture of South Korea|South Korea]]
*[[Culture of Kuwait|Kuwait]]
*[[Culture of Lithuania|Lithuania]]
*[[Macedonian Culture (Slavic)|Macedonia]]
*[[Culture of Mexico|Mexico]]
</div>

<div style="float: left; width: 33%">
*[[Culture of the Netherlands|Netherlands]]
*[[Culture of New Zealand|New Zealand]]
**[[MÄori culture]]
*[[Culture of Pakistan | Pakistan]]
*[[Culture of Peru|Peru]]
*[[Culture of Portugal|Portugal]]
*[[Culture of Russia|Russia]]
*[[Culture of South Africa|South Africa]]
*[[Culture of Serbia|Serbia]]
*[[Culture of Spain|Spain]]
*[[Culture of Sweden|Sweden]]
*[[Culture of Switzerland|Switzerland]]
*[[Culture of Turkey|Turkey]]
*[[Culture of the United Kingdom|United Kingdom]]
**[[Culture of England|England]]
**[[Culture of Northern Ireland| Northern Ireland]]
**[[Culture of Scotland|Scotland]]
**[[Culture of Wales|Wales]]
*[[Culture of the United States|United States]]
</div>

<br clear="both" />

=== Contemporary local cultures ===
*[[Culture of New York City]]
*[[Culture of Stockholm]]
*[[Culture of Sydney]]

=== Other contemporary cultures ===
*[[Autistic culture]]
*[[Cassette culture]] 
*[[Deaf culture]]
*[[Drug culture]]
*[[Esperanto culture]]
*[[Hacker culture]]
*[[Queer culture]]
*[[Underground culture]]
*[[Working class culture|Working-class culture]]
*[[Youth culture]]

=== Historic cultures ===
*[[Assyro-Babylonian culture]]
*[[Clovis culture]] — pre-historic in [[North America]] and [[Central America]] from about 13,500 years ago
*[[Indus Valley Culture]]
**[[Cemetery H culture]]
*[[La Tene culture]] — from the [[Iron Age]] in parts of Europe
*[[Natufian culture]] — in the [[Mediterranean]] more than 10,000 years ago
*[[Paideia]] — Classical Greek culture
*[[Romanitas]] — Roman Imperial culture
*[[Weimar culture]]

==References==
* Arnold, Matthew, ''Culture and Anarchy'', 1882. Macmillan and Co., New York. Online at [http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/nonfiction_u/arnoldm_ca/ca_titlepage.html].
* Bourdieu, Pierre. ''Outline of a Theory of Practice.'' 1977.
* Cohen, Anthony P. ''The Symbolic Construction of Community.'' Routledge: New York, 1995 (1985).
* Geertz, Clifford. (1973). ''The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays''. New York. ISBN 0465097197.
* Hoult, Thomas Ford, ed. (1969). ''Dictionary of Modern Sociology''. Totowa, New Jersey, United States: Littlefield, Adams & Co.
* Keiser, R. Lincoln (1969). ''The Vice Lords: Warriors of the Streets''. Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. ISBN 0-03-080361-6. Keiser's quotation from Geertz (p. viii) is cited from Geertz, C., 1957, "Ritual and Social Change: A Javanese Example," ''American Anthropologist'', Vol. 59, No. 1. p. 33-34.
* Kroeber, A. L. and C. Kluckhohn, 1952. ''Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions''. Peabody Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States.
* Middleton, Richard (1990/2002). ''Studying Popular Music''. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0335152759.
* [http://anthro.palomar.edu/tutorials/cultural.htm Cultural Anthropology Tutorials], Behavioral Sciences Department, Palomar College, San Marco, California, United States, as of December 12, 2004.
* UNESCO, "[http://www.unesco.org/education/imld_2002/unversal_decla.shtml UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity]", issued on [[International Mother Language Day]], [[February 21]], 2002.

==See also==

{{portal}}
{{wikiquote}}
{{wiktionary}}
{{wikinewspar|Culture and entertainment}}
{{commonscat}}
*[[Acculturation]]
*[[Cross-cultural communication]]
*[[Cultural bias]] - [[cultural diversity]] - [[cultural evolution]] - [[cultural imperialism]]
*[[Culture theory]] - [[Culture war]] - [[Culture jamming]] 
*[[Dominator culture]]
*[[European Capital of Culture]] — city chosen by the [[European Union]] for a year at a time to showcase its cultural life
*[[Kulturkampf]] — a specific cultural fight in 1870s Germany
*[[Organizational culture]]
*[[Culture and Society]] - a literary study of the idea in Britain
*[[World Values Survey]]
*[[Free Culture Movement]]

==External links==
*[http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv1-72 ''Dictionary of the History of Ideas'':] "Cultural Development" in Antiquity
*[http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv1-73 ''Dictionary of the History of Ideas'':] "Culture" and "Civilization" in Modern Times
* [http://samvak.tripod.com/class.html Classificatory system for cultures and civilizations], by Dr. Sam Vaknin
*[http://www.latinoarts.org/ Association of Hispanic Arts (AHA)]

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