culture

• is defined as the set of learned, behaviors,

beliefs, attitudes, values, and ideals that are
characteristics of a particular society or
population (Ember, 1999)

• is that complex whole which includes

knowledge, beliefs, art, law, custom, and any
other capabilities and habits acquired by man
as a member of the society. (Edward Tylor)
 CHARACTERISTICS OF CULTURE
There are quite a number of characteristics
of culture. There are:

1. CULTURE IS LEARNED

 Culture is acquired through education,

training and experience.
 The first essential characteristics of culture
is that it is learned. A child born in the
Philippines but was brought to the United
States after birth may not develop traits
characteristics of Filipinos. He may learn
behavior pattern characteristics of American
children, including language.
2. CULTURE SHARED BY A
GROUP OF PEOPLE

 For a thought or action to be considered

cultural, it must be commonly shared by some
population or group of individuals. Even if
some behavior is not commonly appropriate,
it is cultural if most people think it is
appropriate.
3. CULTURE IS
COMMULATIVE

 Knowledge is stored and passed on from

one generation to the next, and new
knowledge is being added to what is existing.
Each culture has worked out solutions to the
basic problem of life, which it then passes on
to its children.
4. CULTURES CHANGE
 All cultural knowledge does not perpetually
accumulate. At the same time that new cultural traits
are added, some old ones are lost because they are
no longer useful. For example: Most city dwellers
today do not have or need the skills required for
survival in a wilderness. Most would likely starve to
death because they do not know how to acquired
wild foods and survive the extremes of weather
outdoors. What is more important in modern urban
life are such things as the ability to drive a car, use a
computer, and understand how to obtain food in a
super market or restaurant (O’neill, 2005)
5. CULTURE IS DYNAMIC
 A character of culture that stems from its
commutative quality. No culture is ever in a
permanent state. It is constantly changing because
new ideas and techniques are added and old ways
are constantly modified and discarded. This is
because of rapid changes that occur which maybe
introduced from within or without. It also grows by
the spread of traits from the individual and from one
group to another which is termed as diffusion. One
form of diffusion is the growth of language.
Vocabulary has grown because of borrowing words
from other languages like Spanish, Chinese and
English.
6. CULTURE IS IDEATIONAL

 Culture is an ideal pattern of behavior

which the members are expected to follow.
Man assigns meanings to his environment and
experiences by symbolizing them. There are
internalized by the individual and he sees or
approaches his world from the stand point of
this culture (Panopio 1994)
7. CULTURE IS DIVERSE

 The some total of human culture consist of

a great many separate cultures, each of them
different. Culture as a whole, is a system with
many mutually interdependent parts. For
example, the choice of a marriage partner
involves many different parts of culture as
religion, economic class, education, etc.
8. CULTURE GIVES US A RANGE OF
PERMISSIBLE BEHAVIOR PATTERNS
 Every culture allows a range of ways in which men can
be men and women can be women. Culture also tells us
how different activities should be conducted, such as how
one should act as a husband, wife, parent, child, etc.
These rules of permissible behavior are usually flexible to
a decree-there are some alternatives rather than hard
rules. For instance, culture tells us how we should dress
based on our gender, but it allows us to dress in different
ways in different situations in order to communicate
varied messages and statuses. The clothing patterns of
women in this society can be particularly rich and
complex. There clothing can be intentionally business –
like recreational, as well as sexually attractive ambiguous
neutral, or even repulsive.
Thank you!