Download Cultural Geography

Cultural Evolution vs. Cultural Diffusion
Behavioral Geography
Culture Realms
Global Diffusion of Western Culture
CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
WHAT IS CULTURE? (IN SOCIOLOGY)
Knowledge
 Language
 Values
 Customs
 Material objects

*Also called Cultural
Traits or Elements
NOTES ON CULTURAL



Learned. The process of
learning one’s culture is
called
“enculturation.” Culture is
not merely passively
absorbed, but rather taught
and learned by agentive
individuals with differing
levels of power.
Shared. Members of a
particular society have their
culture in common.
Patterned. People in a
given society live and think
in distinctive and describable
ways.




Mutually constructed. By
means of constant and ongoing
social interaction, individuals
create, recreate, and change
the nature of a particular
culture.
Symbolic. Those within a
particular culture possess a
shared understanding of
meaning.
Arbitrary. Culture is not
based on natural laws but
rather is created by human
beings.
Internalized. Culture is
habitual, taken for granted,
and perceived as natural.
KEEP IT GOING
Each is passed person to
person in the society
 Also from one generation
to the next

CREATING CULTURAL LANDSCAPES
The earth’s surface as modified by human
action
CULTURES CHANGE IN TWO WAYS:
Evolutionism
Cultures change
internally
 Technology plays an
important role

Diffusionism
Cultures change externally
by borrowing of cultural
elements from one society
by members of another
 Cultural diffusion –
process of spreading
 Acculturation – process of
adopting

THEORIES OF CULTURAL
EVOLUTION
How might cultures change through internal
measures?
VARRO’S THEORY OF HUMAN STAGES

Stages of Development

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



Stage 1 – Hunters & Gatherers
Stage 2 – Pastoral Nomadism (domestication)
Stage 3 – Settled agriculture (Subsistence
agriculture)
Stage 4 – Commercial Agriculture
Stage 5 – Urbanization & Industry
Challenges
Not every culture passes through the same stages
 Not true of all societies
 “Some ahead and some behind”
 Used to dominate other cultures

MARX’S HISTORICAL MATERIALISM
Looks for the causes of developments
and changes in human societies
 Technology is the key to change!
 Technology determines economic
systems which determines politics
and society
 Cornucopian
 Goods would be distributed based on
need since technology would help
produce surplus.

* Malthusians believe that there is no
guarantee that technology will
continue to provide rising standards of
living as population increases.
ENVIRONMENTAL DETERMINISM
View that the physical environment, rather than
social conditions, determines culture.
 Societies adapt to natural landscape
 Climate (major control)
 Challenge-Response Theory

People need the challenge of a difficult environment
 Weather of the middle latitudes led to more determined
and driven work ethics


Possibilism

Theory that the environment sets certain constraints or
limitations, but culture is otherwise determined by man's
actions
Environmental
Determinism
Debate
Colonial
experience legacy
Cultures of the
tropic retard
growth
Environments'
fault
Climate
handicaps
societies
Colonial
Powers Fault
Poverty
in the
Tropical
Regions
People &
Government’s
of the Region’s
Fault
CULTURAL DIFFUSION
How might cultures change through external
measures?
CULTURAL DIFFUSION
Overwhelms Cultural Evolution
 Does not explain all distribution
 Diffusion is affected by a number of important
variables:

duration and intensity of contact
 degree of cultural integration
 similarities between the donor and recipient cultures
 built in cultural resistance

Cultural Hearth – place of origin of culture elements
 Problem: Same phenomenon occurs spontaneously at
two or more places

ACCULTURATION
Exchange of cultural
features that results when
groups come into continuous
firsthand contact
 Immigrants adapt to
cultural change resulting
from contact with the
dominant group by using one
of four strategies:

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


Assimilation (adopting)
Integration (multicultural)
Separation (separate)
Marginalization (alienation)
CULTURAL RESISTANCE

France bids Adieu to “E-mail”
PARIS, July 18, 2003-- Goodbye "e-mail," the
French government says, and hello "courriel" — the
term that linguistically sensitive France is now using
to refer to electronic mail in official documents. The
Culture Ministry has announced a ban on the use of
"e-mail" in all government ministries, documents,
publications or websites, the latest step to stem an
incursion of English words into the French lexicon.
FOLK CULTURE
 Made
up of people who maintain the
traditional
 Describes people who live in an oldfashioned way-simpler life-style
 Rural, cohesive, conservative, largely selfsufficient group, homogeneous in custom
 Strong family or clan structure and highly
developed rituals
 Tradition is paramount — change comes
infrequently and slowly
FOLK CULTURE
Amish
Appalachia
POPULAR CULTURE
Consists of large masses of people who conform to
and prescribe to ever-changing norms
 Large heterogeneous groups
 Often highly individualistic and groups are
constantly changing
 Pronounced division of labor leading to
establishment of specialized professions
 Police and army take the place of religion and
family in maintaining order
 Money based economy prevails
 Replacing folk culture in industrialized countries
and many developing nations

GROUPING HUMANS IN CULTURE
How are humans groups defined?
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RACE AND
ETHNICITY


Race: attitudes formed
in consequence of
being a minority or
majority member (via
privilege). – Not
assumed to be
biological
Ethnicity: attitudes
formed associating
with the traditions
and values of
particular ethnic
group.


Sociologist Max Weber
once remarked that:
"The whole conception of
ethnic groups is so
complex and so vague
that it might be good to
abandon it altogether.“
Examples: Polish, Arab,
Chinese, Japanese,
Mexican, & French
GROUPS
Culture Groups

Defined by a variety of
characteristics or just
one:
Language/Literature
 Religion/Values/Tradition
s
 Politics/Beliefs
 Food/Manners

Subjective
 Subculture – smaller
bundle of attributes
shared by a smaller
group

Ethnic Groups
“Ethno” – Gr. for people
 Ambiguous term
 May depend on:

Biology
 Culture
 Allegiance
 Historic background


Ethnocentrism - judge
other cultures by own
standards
ARE YOU TABOO?
Do you eat pork?
 Have you ever kissed in public?
 Should you have more than one wife or
husband?
 Do you eat with your left hand?
 Do you compliment physical features?
 Do you eat fertilized duck eggs?
 Do you wear shoes in the house?
 Have you ever talked back to an adult?

BEHAVIORAL GEOGRAPHY
Approach to Human Geography that examines
human behavior
 Studies perceptions of the world and how
perceptions influence behavior.
 “Pictures in our heads” – Mental Maps
 People make decisions on their mental maps
 Cultural differences in perceptions
 Proxemics (cross-cultural study of the use of
space)
 Territoriality

CULTURE REGIONS/ CULTURE
REALMS
WHAT CRITERIA IS USED TO DEFINE THE
1. Is it consistent?
CULTURE REGION?
2. Is it meaningful?
WHAT ARE THE MOST OBVIOUS FACTORS OF
CULTURAL DIVERSITY?
Language
 Religion
 Ethnicity
 Architecture
 Statues & Monuments
 Clothing/Style

SETTLEMENT PATTERNS

Cluster Housing
Live together, work together
 Family or Religious bonds
 Common security
 Europe, Latin America, Asia,
Africa, & Middle East


Isolated Housing
Peace & security
 Agricultural colonization
 Anglo-America, Australia, New
Zealand, South Africa

FORCES THAT STABILIZE CULTURE
REALMS
Despite diffusion, cultures remain fixed
 Inertia – term for the force that keeps things stable
 Historical Geography

Studies the past and how geographic distributions have
changed
 How people have interacted with their environment, and
created the cultural landscape.

Fixed Assets (Infrastructure)
 Historical Consciousness (self reflection on history)
 Values - Preserve key aspects of culture
 Passed down from generation to generation

TRADE & CULTURAL DIFFUSION
Diminishes isolation
 Triggers change - Important
force of diffusion
 Trade, economy, and culture
intertwined
 Part of Economic Geography



Study of how various people make
a living, how economies develop,
and trade
Export surplus, Import Luxuries
TRENDS IN TRADE
More Trade, More Diffusion
 Nearly all parts of the world are affected
 Friction of Distance is less (costs down)
 Felt needs are created (think you need)
 Activities relocate freely – footloose
 Communication advances trades/ideas

Electronic highway
 Cyberspace


Possible clash of “Civilizations”
GLOBAL DIFFUSION OF
EUROPEAN CULTURE
NOTES ON EUROPEAN CULTURE
Widespread (through
conquest)
 Massive Impact
 Progress or unwanted
acculturation???
 Illustrates all types, paths,
and processes of diffusion

Prince Henry “the Navigator”
Political
Conquest
Agricultural
Revolution
Increased Food
Production
Commercial
Revolution
Expansion of
Europe
Tremendous
expansion of
trade
Industrial
Revolution
Protect overseas
investments
Increased wealth
Restrain Rivalry
Creation of stock
markets
Divided up rest
of the world
Multiplied energy
for production
European
Culture
dominated
traditional
cultures
New cities,
factories, and
town sprang up
New technologies
(railroads, steam
engine, and
manufacturing)
Large-scale
Farming
Social cohesion
dissolved
Private land
ownership
Increase
demand for
CULTURAL IMPERIALISM
European ways are
superior
 Christianity a major
catalyst (conversion)
 Economic & military
superiority
 Methods

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Force
Training/schooling
Reference Group Behavior
(desire to belong)
Rewarding
Degrading
WESTERNIZATION TODAY

Diffusion continues
Wealthy buy Western
products
 Young adopt western
styles
 Media & TV increase
rate of diffusion

Tourism
 Non-Western
Professionals (Europe
& U.S.)
 Transforming
traditional
cultures/folk cultures


U.S. Influence
Very strong
 9/11 Ripple Effect
 Negative views of
American policies

“Drugs”
 “Peace-Keeping”

Spread of U.S. Culture
 Economic Power

UGLY AMERICAN
Used to describe boorish people from the U.S.
insensitive to those in other countries
 Bothers fans of the 1958 novel The Ugly
American, whose title character was actually
sensitive and thoughtful—he just looked ugly

Are Americans truly ugly?
“The Great Satan” – 1979 Ayatollah
Khomeini
47 nations surveyed
PEW GLOBAL ATTITUDES PROJECT
(6/2006)

America's Image Slips

Spain, India, Russia,
Indonesia, & Turkey
U.S.-led war on terror
draws majority
support in just two
countries - India and
Russia
 United States as the
worst culprit in
“hurting the world’s
environment.”

In Japan, barely a quarter
of respondents (26%) now
favor the U.S.-led war on
terror
 War in Iraq has made the
world a more dangerous
place
 33 of the 47 countries polled
expressed a dislike of
American ideas about
democracy, with the
hostility highest in three
allies: Turkey, France and
Pakistan.

WHAT ARE AMERICAN VALUES?
Equal Opportunity
 Achievement &
Success (competition)
 Material Comfort
 Activity and Work
(action)
 Practicality and
efficiency

Progress (move forward)
 Science
 Democracy and Free
enterprise (individual
rights have significant
value)
 Freedom (individual
over the group)
 Racism and group
superiority
