UNDERSTANDING CULTURE

SOCIETY AND POLITICS

THE CONCEPT OF SOCIETY

At the end of the lesson the student should be
able to;
1. explain the concept of society and culture in
anthropological and sociological perspective;
2. describe some major characteristics of
society and culture;
3. differentiate between the various meanings
of culture within society; and
4. appreciate the significance of culture in the
society
Activity 1 Picture Analysis
Write your impression/s about the
pictures/images below. Use separate sheet
for your answer
 Meaning and Nature of Society
According to sociologist, a society is
a group of people with common
territory, interaction, and culture.
Arcinas (2016) in his book,
Undertanding Culture, Society, and
Politics, defined society as group of
people who share a common
territory and culture.
 It is a group of people living together in a
definite territory, having a sense of
belongingness, mutually interdependent of
each other, and follow a certain way of life.
Society is derived from the Latin term
“societas”, from socius, which means
companion or associate. Thus, it refers to all
people, collectively regarded as constituting
a community of related, interdependent
individuals living in a definite place, following
a certain mode of life (Ariola, 2012).
 Definition of society has two types - the
functional definition and the structural
definition. From the functional point of
view, society is defined as a complex of
groups in reciprocal relationships,
interacting upon one another, enabling
human organisms to carry on their life-
activities and helping each person to fulfill
his wishes and accomplish his interests in
association with his fellows.
 From the structural point of view,
society is the total social heritage of
folkways mores and institutions; of
habits, sentiments and ideals. The
important aspect of society is the
system of relationships, the pattern
of the norms of interaction by which
the members of the society
maintain themselves.
 Thefollowing are reasons
people live together as a
society (Ariola, 2012)
 For survival
 Feeling of gregariousness
 Specialization
Characteristics of Society
It is a social system.
It is relatively large
It socializes its members and from those

from without
It endures, produces and sustains its

members for generation

It holds its members through a common

culture
It has clearly-defined geographical territory
What are the Major Functions of
Society?
 It provides a system of socialization.
 It provides the basic needs of its

members.
 It regulates and controls people’s

behavior.
 It provides the means of social

participation.
 It provides mutual support to the

members.
 TYPES OF SOCIETIES
 Societies exist in particular places and times,

and they change over time.

 Societies are organized in particular patterns,

patterns that are shaped by a range of

factors, including the way people procure
food, the availability of resources, contact
with other societies, and cultural beliefs.
 For example, people can change from herding to

farming only if they have the knowledge, skills,

and desire to do so and only in environments
that will support agriculture.
Itis important to note that not all
societies go through all stages.
Some are jolted into the future by
political events or changes in the
global system, and some resist
pressures to become modernized
and continue to live in simpler
social systems.
 Sociologists and anthropologists
(experts who study early and tribal
cultures) identified different types and
classification of societies. Below are the
different types of societies as
mentioned by Ariola (2012) in his book
Sociology and Anthropology with Family
Planning:
 Dissolution of a Society
There are several ways by which a society is dissolved:
 when the people kill each other through civil revolution;
 when an outside force exterminates the members of the

society;
 when the members become apathetic among

themselves or have no more sense of belongingness;

 when a small society is absorbed by a stronger and

larger society by means of conquest or territorial

absorption;
 when an existing society is submerged in water killing all

the people and other living things in it; or 60 when the

people living in such a society voluntarily attach
themselves to another existing society.
 The Concept of Culture
It was E.B. Taylor who conceptualized the
definition of culture in 1860s.
According to him, culture is a complex whole
which consist of knowledge, beliefs, ideas, habits,
attitudes, skills, abilities, values, norms, art, law,
morals, customs, traditions, feelings and other
capabilities of man which are acquired, learned
and socially transmitted by man from one
generation to another through language and
living together as members of the society
(Arcinas, 2016).
Below are other definitions of culture as
mentioned in the book of David and Macaraeg
(2010) entitled“ Sociology: Exploring Society and
Culture”:

 Culture is a historically transmitted

pattern of meanings embodied in symbols,
a system of inherited conceptions
expressed in symbolic form by means of
which men communicate, perpetuate, and
develop their knowledge about and
attitudes towards life. – Clifford Geertz
 Culture consists of learned systems of meaning,
communicated by means of natural language and
other symbol systems, having representational,
directive, and affective functions, and capable of
creating cultural entities and particular senses of
reality. – Roy D’Andrade
 Culture is an extrasomatic (nongenetic,nonbodily),
temporal continuum of things and events
dependent upon symbols. Culture consists of
tools, implements, utensils, clothing, ornaments,
customs, institutions, beliefs, rituals, games,
works of art, language, etc. – Leslie White
 In general, culture is a term used by social
scientists, like anthropologists and sociologists, to
encompass all the facets of human experience
that extend beyond our physical fact. It simply
refers to the way we understand ourselves both as
individuals and as members of society, and
includes stories, religion, media, rituals, and even
language itself. Irrespective of the various
definitions, conceptions and approaches to the
understanding of the concept of culture, it is
however agreed that culture is a way of life and
morality is a part of culture. Practically all modern
CHARACTERISTICS OF CULTURE
 Fromthe Perspective of
Sociologists
1. Dynamic, flexible and adaptive - Culture
necessarily changes, and is changed by, a variety of
interactions, with individuals, media, and
technology, just to name a few.
 Cultures interact and change - Most societies

interact with other societies, and as a consequence

their cultures interact that lead to exchanges of
material (ex: tools and furniture) and non-material
(ex: ideas and symbols) components of culture.
 All cultures change, or else, they would
have problems adjusting and adapting to
changing environments.
 Culture is adaptive and dynamic, once we
recognize problems, culture can adapt
again, in a more positive way, to find
solutions.
 We need our cultural skills to stay alive.
From the Perspective of
Sociologists
2. Shared and maybe challenging - (Given the
reality of social differentiation), as we share culture
with others, we are able to act in a appropriate ways
as well as predict
how others will act. Despite the shared nature of
culture, that doesn’t mean that culture is homogenous
(the
same). - It may be challenged by the presence of
other cultures and other social forces in society like
modernization, industrialization, and globalization
From the Perspective of
Sociologists
3. Learned through socialization or
enculturation - - Culture is not biological,
people do not inherit it but learned as interact
in society. Much of learning culture is
unconscious. People learn, absorb and
acquire culture from families, friends,
institutions, and the media. The process of
From the Perspective of
Sociologists
4. Patterned social interactions - Culture as a
normative system has the capacity to define and
control human behaviors.
- Norms (for example) are cultural expectations in

terms of how one will think, feel, or behave as set by

one’s culture. It sets the patterns in terms of what is
appropriate or inappropriate in a given setting.
- Human interactions are guided by some forms of
standards and expectations which in the end
regularize it
From the Perspective of
Sociologists
5. Transmitted through socialization or
enculturation - In the process of
socialization /enculturation, we were able to
teach them about many things in life and
equip them with the culturally acceptable
ways of surviving, competing, and making
meaningful interaction with others in society.
From the Perspective of
Sociologists
6. Requires language and other forms
of communication - - In the process of
learning and transmitting culture, symbols
and language are needed to communicate
with others in society (Arcinas, 2016)
From the Perspective of
Anthropologist
1. Learned- - Culture is learned, as each person
must learn how to “be” a member of that
culture
- Culture is acquired by being born into a
particular society in the process of
enculturation. Through language, the cultural
traits of society are passed on to younger
members in the process of growing up
From the Perspective of
Anthropologist
2. Symbolic - Culture is symbolic, as it based
on the manipulation of symbols. Culture
renders meaning to what people do. Beliefs,
religion, rituals, myths, dances, performances,
music, artworks, sense of taste, education,
innovations, identity, ethnicity, and so on are
meaningful human expressions of what people
do and how they act.
From the Perspective of
Anthropologist
4. Shared - Culture is shared, as it offers all
people ideas about behavior.
5. Encompassing - Culture covers every
feature of humanity.
IMPORTANCE/FUNCTIONS OF
CULTURE
In the book of (David and Macaraeg,
2010), the following functions of
culture were given emphasis;
(1) it serves as the “trademark” of the people in
the society;
(2) it gives meaning and direction to one’s
existence;
(3) it promotes meaning to individual’s
existence;
(4) it predicts social behavior;
(5) it unifies diverse behavior;
In the book of (David and Macaraeg,
2010), the following functions of culture
were given emphasis;
(6) it provides social solidarity;
(7) it establishes social personality;
(8) it provides systematic behavioral pattern;
(9) it provides social structure category;
(10) it maintains the biologic functioning of the
group;
(11) it offers ready-made solutions to man’s
material and immaterial problems; and
(12) it develops man’s attitude and values and gives
 Elements of Culture
Culture
Language
Technology
Values
Beliefs
Norms
 Types of Norms:
a. Proscriptive norm defines and
tells us things not to do
b. Prescriptive norm defines and
tells us things to do
 Forms of Norms:
a. Folkways
b. Mores
c. Laws
 Two Components of Culture:
a. Material Culture – consist of
tangible things
b. Non – material culture –
consist of intangible things
 Modesof Acquiring
Culture
• Imitation
• Indoctrination or suggestion
• Conditioning
 Adaptation of Different Culture
• Parallelism - means that the same culture may
take place in two or more different places.
Example: The domestication of dogs, cats, pigs
and other animals may have semblance
• Diffusion - refers to those behavioral patterns
that pass back and forth from one culture to
another. This is the transfer or spread of culture
traits from one another brought about by change
agents such as people or media Examples: food
and eating practices, marriage and wedding
ceremonies, burial rituals, feast celebrations
 Adaptation of Different Culture
• Convergence takes place when two
or more cultures are fused or
merged into one culture making it
different from the original culture.
• Fission takes place when people
break away from their original
culture and start developing a
different culture of their own.
 Adaptation of Different Culture
• Acculturation refers to the process wherein
individuals incorporate the behavioral patterns
of other cultures into their own either
voluntarily or by force. Voluntary acculturation
occurs through imitation, borrowing, or
personal contact with other people.
• Assimilation occurs when the culture of a
larger society is adopted by a smaller society,
that smaller society assumes some of the
culture of the larger society or cost society
 Adaptation of Different
Culture
• Accommodation occurs when the
larger society and smaller society
are able to respect and tolerate
each other’s culture even if there
is already a prolonged contact of
each other’s culture
 Causes of Cultural Change
• Discovery is the process of finding a new
place or an object, artefact or anything that
previously existed.
• Invention implies a creative mental process
of devising, creating and producing
something new, novel or original; and also
the utilization and combination of previously
known elements to produce that an original
or novel product.
 Causes of Cultural Change
• Diffusion
a. Acculturation – cultural borrowing and cultural
imitation Example: The Filipinos are said to be the best
English- speaking people of Asia.
b. Assimilation – the blending or fusion of two distinct
cultures through long periods of interaction Example:
Americanization of Filipino immigrants to the US
c. Amalgamation – the biological or hereditary fusion of
members of different societies Example: Marriage
between a Filipino and an American
d. Enculturation – the deliberate infusion of a new
culture to another Example: The teaching of American
history and culture to the Filipinos during the early
American Regime
• Colonization refers to the political, social, and
political policy of establishing a colony which
would be subject to the rule or governance of the
colonizing state. For example, the Hispanization
of Filipino culture when the Spaniards came and
conquered the Philippines.
• Rebellion and revolutionary movements aim to
change the whole social order and replace the
leadership. The challenge the existing folkways
and mores, and propose a new scheme of norms,
values
 Ethnocentrism, Xenocentrism and Cultural
Relativism as Orientations in Viewing
• Ethnocentrism is a perception that arises
from the fact that cultures differ and each
culture defines reality differently.
• Xenocentrism is the opposite of
ethnocentrism, the belief that one’s
culture is inferior compared to others.
• Cultural relativism is an attempt to judge
behavior according to its cultural context
(Baleña, et.al,2016)
 Other important terms related to culture
1. Cultural diversity refers the differentiation of culture all over
the world which means there is no right or wrong culture but
there is appropriate culture for the need of a specific group of
people.
2. Sub-culture refers to a smaller group within a larger culture.
3. Counterculture refers cultural patterns that strongly oppose
those widely accepted within a society (example in the 1960”s
counter culture among teenagers reflect long hair, blue jeans,
peace sign, rock and roll music and drug abuse).
4. Culture lag is experienced when some parts of the society do
not change as fast as with other parts and they are left behind
5. Culture shock is the inability to read meaning in one’s
surroundings, feeling of lost and isolation, unsure to act as a
consequence of being outside the symbolic web of culture that
 Other important terms related to culture
6. Ideal culture refers to the social patterns
mandated by cultural values and norms.
7. Real culture refers to the actual patterns that
only approximate cultural expectations.
8. High culture refers to the cultural patterns
that distinguish a society’s elite
9. Popular culture refers to the cultural patterns
that are widespread among a society’s
population.
10.Culture change is the manner by which
culture evolve
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Complete the graphic organizers below by providing what is asked in
each item. Write your answer in a separate sheet of paper
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Complete the graphic organizers below by providing what is asked in
each item. Write your answer in a separate sheet of paper
Enrichment Activity
Directions: List down characteristics of society and culture. Write your answer in
a separate sheet of paper
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Describe the food gathering activities or substinence in following
types of societies. Write your answer in a separate sheet of pa
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Answer the following questions briefly
but substantially. Write your answer in a separate
sheet of paper. Your answers will be scored based on
the rubrics below
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Answer the following questions briefly
but substantially. Write your answer in a separate
sheet of paper. Your answers will be scored based on
the rubrics below
1. How are society and culture interlinked
with one another?
2. Why is culture important in our society?
3. How does our culture play a role in our
functions in the society?
Enrichment Activity
Directions: Guided with the rubrics provided below,
draw and explain how you can show that you are
proud of your own culture and what you can do to
help preserve tangible and intangible Filipino
culture. Use a separate sheet of paper for your
output.
Assessment Directions: Read very carefully the
questions below and choose the letter that
corresponds to your answer. Write your answers in a
separate sheet of paper
1. Which of the following is characterized by
communal ownership of property and
division of labor?
A. Asiatic Society
B. Capitalists Society
C. Democratic Society
D. Pre-class Society
2. Which is considered to be the
hallmark of modern society?
A. Information and communication
technology
B. Irrigation systems
C. Machines and industries
D. All of the above
3. Which of the following types of
society is characterized as by
economy that is dependent on
tangible goods and the people must
pursue greater education?
A. Horticultural
B. Industrial
C. Pastoral
D. Post-industrial
4. Technological tools, architectural,
structures, fashion and accessories,
and food are all examples of what
component of culture?
A. Basic Culture
B. Commercial Culture
C. Material Culture
D. Non-material Culture
5. Which one is considered as
the perception of individuals to
accepted reality?
A. Beliefs
B. Folkways
C. Knowledge
D. Outlook
6. What type of norms tells us
thing to do?
A. Folkway
B. Law
C. Prescriptive
D. Proscriptive
7. What type of norms tells us thing
NOT to do?
A. Folkway C. Prescriptive
B. Law D. Proscriptive
8. What form of norm is codified ethics,
formally agreed, and written down and
enforced by authorities?
A. Folkways C. Mores
B. Laws D. Taboos
9. Which one is an act that violates a social norm?
A. Conflict C. Rebellion
B. Deviance D. Ritualism
10. Which of the following is NOT TRUE?
A. Prospective norms are those that define and
tell things us not to do.
B. Societal norms are of different types and
norms.
C. Prescriptive norms are those that define and
tell us things to do.
D. Society and culture are the same.
11. Which represent the standards we
used to evaluate the desirability of
things?
A. Beliefs C. Knowledge
B. Folkways D. Values
12. What human action by which one
tends to duplicate more or less, or
exactly, the behavior of others?
A. Adaptation C. Modification
B. Imitation D. Socialization
13. What do you call of Mang Tirzo’s family’s
customary patterns of everyday life
that specify what is socially correct and proper?
A. Folkways C. Mores
B. Laws D. Norms
14. What does it mean when we say culture is
holistic?
A. It is integrated.
B. It is a patterned social interaction.
C. It is shared and may be challenged.
D. It is adaptive, dynamic, and flexibl
15. Which is the least essential statement?
A. The material and non-material cultures are always interlink. B.
A society represents the beliefs, practices and artifacts of a group.
C. The existence of material culture is justified by the non-material
culture.
D. All cultures consist of key elements that are crucial to human’s
existence
16. Which statement is relevant?
A. Culture is an adaptive mechanism for humans.
B. Culture is necessary for survival in the complex industrialized
nations, but it
is not in small societies that live by hunting and gathering wild
foods. C. The first humans evolved in the cold temperate regions
of the world because of the need to develop culture for survival in
those areas.
D. all of the above
17. A tractor is introduced to Mang Jose, a traditional
farmer who doesn’t know to operate it. This is an
example of what concept of culture?
A. Culture lag C. Counterculture
B. Contra culture D. Culture shock
17. A tractor is introduced to Mang Jose, a traditional
farmer who doesn’t know to operate it. This is an
example of what concept of culture?
A. Culture lag
B. Contra culture
C. Counterculture
D. Culture shock
19. Which is NOT correct about culture?
A. It may be challenged.
B. It is something biological.
C. Much of learning culture is unconscious
D. None of the above
20. Which statement is irrelevant?
A. Socialization plays no part in personality formation in
individuals.
B. Successful socialization can result in uniformity within
a society.
C. Large-scale complex societies that are not culturally
homogenous usually have unanimous agreement about
what should be the shared norms.
D. none