Defining "culture"
Culture has been called "the way of life for an entire society." As such, it includes codes of manners, dress, language, religion, rituals, norms of behavior such as law and morality, and systems of belief.
Various definitions of culture reflect differing theories for understanding, or criteria for evaluating, human activity. Edward Burnett Tylor writing from the perspective of social anthropology in the UK in 1871 described culture in the following way: "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."
More recently, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) (2002) described culture as follows: "... culture should be regarded as 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, lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs".
While these two definitions cover a range of meaning, they do not exhaust the many uses of the term "culture." In 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions.
These definitions, and many others, provide a catalog of the elements of culture. The items cataloged (e.g., a law, a stone tool, a marriage) each have an existence and life-line of their own. They come into space-time at one set of coordinates and go out of it another. While here, they change, so that one may speak of the evolution of the law or the tool.
A culture, then, is by definition at least, a set of cultural objects. Anthropologist Leslie White asked: "What sort of objects are they? Are they physical objects? Mental objects? Both? Metaphors? Symbols? Reifications?" In Science of Culture (1949), he concluded that they are objects "sui generis"; that is, of their own kind. In trying to define that kind, he hit upon a previously unrealized aspect of symbolization, which he called "the symbolate"—an object created by the act of symbolization. He thus defined culture as "symbolates understood in an extra-somatic context."The key to this definition is the discovery of the symbolate.
Seeking to provide a practical definition, social theorist, Peter Walters, describes culture simply as "shared schematic experience", including, but not limited to, any of the various qualifiers (linguistic, artistic, religious, etc.) included in previous definitions.
How does culture happen?
Culture is not something you are born with. It is learned from family, school, religious teachings, television and media and the government of a country. Advertisements, magazines and movies are also powerful guides. For example American music videos promote a certain style of dress, values, expression and attitude for young people. South African youth culture has absorbed this in a big way. Many young people like the cool speak of American pop music rather than talking in their home language. Schools and religious organisations also play a big role. Religion has many rituals that symbolise belonging to a particular culture.
South Africa has been called the rainbow nation because we have so many diverse cultural practices in one country and because we are trying to appreciate each other after being divided by apartheid. Cultural practices are how we talk and behave, the ways in which we pray, the special things we do when we have festivals, births and deaths. We have groups with different languages, religions, race, customs and traditions eg. Zulu, Ndebele, Khoisan, Hindu, Muslim and Afrikaner people. All of these people are united by being South African and all of their cultural ways form part of our country’s identity and culture. It is important to promote a South African culture and identity. This helps South Africans to understand and respect each other and to learn from each other’s cultural practices. This is important so we do not have the separation of people as was done in the past. For this reason the government has a project called “Proudly South African” that encourages South Africans to value each other and the country.
Society
A society is a grouping of individuals, which is characterized by common interest and may have distinctive culture and institutions. In a society members can be from a different ethnic group. A "Society" may refer to a particular people, such as the Nuer, to a nation state, such as Switzerland, or to a broader cultural group, such as Western society. Society can also be explained as an organized group of people associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.
Heritage
Heritage refers to something which is inherited from one's ancestors. It has several different senses, including:
- Cultural heritage, a nation's historic monuments, museum collections, etc.
- Natural heritage, a nation's fauna and flora, natural resources, and landscape
- Tradition, customs and practices inherited from ancestors
- Inheritance of physical goods after the death of an individual
- Biological inheritance of physical characteristics
- Birthright, something inherited due to the place, time, or circumstances of someone's birth
- Industrial Heritage, the monuments from the industrial culture
Our site focuses on the first three definitions of Heritage.
Cultural heritage ("national heritage" or just "heritage") is the legacy of physical artifacts and intangible attributes of a group or society that are inherited from past generations, maintained in the present and bestowed for the benefit of future generations. Often though, what is considered cultural heritage by one generation may be rejected by the next generation, only to be revived by a succeeding generation.
Physical or "tangible cultural heritage" includes buildings and historic places, monuments, artifacts, etc., that are considered worthy of preservation for the future. These include objects significant to the archaeology, architecture, science or technology of a specific culture. "Natural heritage" is also an important part of a culture, encompassing the countryside and natural environment, including flora and fauna. These kind of heritage sites often serve as an important component in a country's tourist industry, attracting many visitors from abroad as well as locally.
A broader definition includes intangible aspects of a particular culture, often maintained by social customs during a specific period in history. The ways and means of behavior in a society, and the often formal rules for operating in a particular cultural climate. These include social values and traditions, customs and practices, aesthetic and spiritual beliefs, artistic expession, language and other aspects of human activity. The significance of physical artifacts can be interpreted against the backdrop of socioeconomic, political, ethnic, religious and philosophical values of a particular group of people. Naturally, intangible cultural heritage is more difficult to preserve than physical objects.
Traditions and customs
A tradition is a story or a custom that is memorized and passed down from generation to generation, originally without the need for a writing system. Tools to aid this process include poetic devices such as rhyme and alliteration. The stories thus preserved are also referred to as tradition, or as part of an oral tradition. For example, it is now a tradition to have a Christmas tree to celebrate Christmas.
Although traditions are often presumed to be ancient, unalterable, and deeply important, they are often much less "natural" than is often presumed. Many traditions have been deliberately invented for one reason or another, often to highlight or enhance the importance of a certain institution. Traditions are also frequently changed to suit the needs of the day, and the changes quickly become accepted as a part of the ancient tradition. A famous book on the subject is The Invention of Tradition, edited by Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger.
Some examples include "the invention of tradition" in Africa and other colonial holdings by the occupying forces. Requiring legitimacy, the colonial power would often invent a "tradition" which they could use to legitimize their own position. For example, a certain succession to a chiefdom might be recognized by a colonial power as traditional in order to favour their own favourite candidates for the job. Often these inventions were based in some form of tradition, but were grossly exaggerated, distorted, or biased toward a particular interpretation.
Other traditions that have been altered through the years include various religious festivals such as Christmas. The actual date of Jesus' birth does not coincide with December 25 as in the Western Church. This was a "convenient" day for it to be held on so as to capitalize on the popularity of traditional solstice celebrations.
Identity
Identity is an umbrella term used throughout the social sciences for an individual's comprehension of him or herself as a discrete, separate entity. This term, though generic, can be specified by the disciplines of psychology and sociology, as well as the two forms of social psychology.
Identity may be contrasted with the notion of self. In cognitive psychology, the term "identity" refers to the capacity for self-reflection and the awareness of self. The psychological idea of identity in humans is related to self image, namely a person's view or mental model of him or herself.
Sociology places some explanatory weight on the concept of role-behavior. The notion of identity negotiation may arise from the learning of roles from personal experience. Identity negotiation is a process where a person "negotiates" with society as the meaning of their social identities.
Psychologists usually use the term "identity" to describe personal identity, or the idiosyncratic things that make a person unique. Meanwhile, sociologists often use the term to describe social identity to describe group membership. However, the uses are not proprietary, and each discipline may use either concept.
On our site we are using the term to describe a social identity.
Identity is both static and ever changing and also depends on who is doing the identifying. For example a woman can be a teacher, mother, wife and driver to her children. She can also be a famous politician fighting for justice or a farmer growing crops for food. She may also be involved in looking after her community or supporting the extended family. To herself she may be all of these and much more. At the same time her being a girl of a particular race and economic class gives her a very clear identity.
The arts is a broad subdivision of culture, composed of many expressive disciplines. In modern usage, it is a term broader than "art", which usually means the visual arts (comprising both fine art, decorative art, and crafts). The arts encompasses visual arts, performing arts, language arts, and culinary arts. Many artistic disciplines involve aspects of the various arts, so the definitions of these terms overlap to some degree.
The current usage of visual arts includes fine arts as well as crafts, but this was not always the case. In Britain and elsewhere, a visual artist referred to a person working in the fine arts (such as painting, sculpture, or printmaking) and not the handicraft, craft, or applied art disciplines. This distinction was emphasized by artists of the Arts and Crafts movement who valued vernacular artforms as much as high forms. The movement contrasted with modernists who sought to withhold the high arts from the masses by keeping them esoteric. Art schools made a distinction between the fine arts and the crafts in such a way that a craftsperson could not be considered a practitioner of art.
The practice of the visual arts in the present day is known as contemporary art.
