UCSP Last Exam

culture is good :)

Culture is social

Culture does not exist in isolation. It is a product of society. It develops through social interaction. No man can acquire culture without association with others.

Culture varies from society to society

Every society has a culture of it’s own that differs from other societies. The culture of every society is unique to itself. Cultures are not uniform. Cultural elements like customs, traditions, morals, values, and beliefs are not uniform.

Culture is shared.

Culture is not something that an individual alone can possess. Culture, in a ideological sense, is shared. For example, customs, traditions, beliefs, ideas, values, morals, etc. are all shared by people of a group or society.

Culture is learned

Culture is not inborn. It is learned. Culture is often called “learned ways of behavior.” Unlearned behavior is not culture. But shaking hands, saying thanks, etc. are cultural behavior.

Culture is transmitted

The cultural ways are learned by persons from persons. Many of them are “handed down” by elders, parents, teachers, and others, while other cultural behavior are “handed up” to elders.

Culture is continuous and cumulative

Culture exists as a continuous process. In it’s historical growth, it tends to become cumulative.

Culture is gratifying and idealistic

Culture provides proper opportunities for the satisfaction of our needs and desires. Our needs both biological and social and fulfilled in cultural ways. Culture determines and guides various activities man.

Culture defines situations

Each culture has many subtle cues which define each situation. It reveals whether one should prepare to fight, run, laugh, or make love.

Culture defines attitudes, values, and goals.

Each person learns from his/her culture what is good, true, and beautiful. Attitudes, values, and goals are define by the culture, and the individual normally learns them as unconsciously as he or she learns the language.

Culture defines myths, legends, and the supernatural

Myths and legends are important parts of every culture. They may inspire or reinforce effort and sacrifice and bring comfort in bereavement.

Culture provides behavior patterns

The individual need not to go through painful trial and error to know what food can be eaten or how to live among people without fear. People find a ready-made set of patterns awaiting them which they need only to learn and follow.

Omniscience

It’s library creates, collects, stores, retrieves, and manipulates human memories.

Omnipotence

It’s agents occupy and control all the influential positions in it’s domain.

Omnipresent

It’s spies are present in the four corners of it’s territory.

Ethnocentrism

refers to the tendency of each society to place it’s own cultural patterns at the center of things. It is the practices of comparing other cultural practices with those of one’s own and automatically finding those other other cultural practices to be inferior.

Ethno-

Greek for “race,” “people,” or “culture”

-centric

Latin that means the “center”

Functions of Ethnocentrism

Encourages solidarity of a group.

Hinders the understanding or the cooperation between groups.

Conflict often leads to social change. In that sense, ethnocentrism becomes a vehicle for the social change. It does so, however, through encouragement of it’s peaceful evolution.

Cultural Relativism

Is the idea that all norms, beliefs, and values are dependent on their cultural context and should be treated as such.

Xenos

Greek for “Foreigner” or “Stranger”

Phobia

Greek for “Fear”

Xenocentrism

refers to a preference for the foreign. It is characterized by a strong belief that one’s own products, styles, or ideas are inferior to those which originated elsewhere.

Xenophobia

It is the fear of what is perceived as foreign or strange. It may include fear of losing identity, suspicion of the other group’s activities, aggression, and the desire to eliminate the presence of the other group to secure a presumed purity.

Tangible Culture

They are the ones produced and created based on specific and practical purposes and aesthetic values.

Intangible Culture

maybe associated with events, values, and knowledge

Norm

Is a rule that guides the behavior of members of a society or group.

Normal

It is the act of abiding by these rules.

Normative

Refers to what we perceive as normal, or what we think should be normal, regardless of whether it is actually is.

Hunting and Gathering Societies

The oldest and most basic way of economic subsistence is hunting gathering. Hunting and gathering societies produce simple forms of tools used to hunt for animals and gather plants and vegetation for food.

Horticultural Societies

developed around 10,000 years ago and they are described as seminomadic societies because they do not frequently move as opposed to hunter-gatherer societies. These societies subsist through small-scale farming. They produce and use simple forms of hand tools to plant crops.

Pastoral Societies

developed around 10,000 years ago. The principal means of subsistence of pastoralists is animal domestication.

Agricultural Societies

began 5,000 years ago during the Neolithic Period (8,000-4,000 BCE). During this time, the Neolithic Revolution occurred.

Neolithic Revolution

A era where human societies started to switch to an agricultural form of society.

Industrial Societies

it began when the Industrial Revolution swept through Europe during the late eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century.

Industrial Revolution

New sources of energy were harnessed, advanced forms of technology were applied, and machineries were invented.

Post-Industrial Societies

A term coined by Daniel Bell, post-industrial societies are focused on the use and application of new information technology than factories.

Biological Evolution

Refers to the changes, modifications, and variations in the genetics and inherited traits of biological populations from one generation to another.

Cultural Evolution/Sociocultural Evolution

Refers to the changes or development in cultures from a simple form to a more complex form of human culture.

Charles Darwin

introduced his theory, the Theory of Evolution, he also the introduced the concept of evolution to explain the origins of modern humans.

Sociology

It focuses on the ubiquity(or the “everywhere-ness”) of social forces in unlikely forms: sex, gender, religion, class, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and the like.

Social Forces

Can be interpreted as any human-created way of doing things that influence, pressure, or force people to behave, interact with others, and think in certain ways.

Social Map

refers to a person’s specific economic and political location.

Sociological Imagination

Allows social actors to discern opportunities where there is none by converting their personal troubles into public issues.

Anthropology

as a science seeking to “uncover principles of behavior that apply to all human communities.”

Political Science

is the systematic study of government and politics.

Proscriptive Norm

States what we should not do

Prescriptive Norm

States what we should do

Mores

refers to norms that are widely observed and have great moral significance

Folkways

refers to norms for routine and casual interaction

Laws

written norms enforced by authorities

Natural Selection

“[It is the] outcome of processes that affect the frequencies of traits in a particular environment. Traits that enhance survival and reproductive success increase in frequency over time”

Hominids

Is the general term used by scientists to categorize the group of early humans and other humanlike creatures that can walk erect during the prehistoric times.

Ardipithecus

Their name means “ape on the ground”

Australopithecus

They lived in the African jungle from 5 million to 1 million years ago. And were divided into two subgroups

Robust

They were larger, more muscular, and had larger teeth among the two australopithecus groups

Gracile

They had smaller teeth and jaws than the other australopithecus group.

Homo Erectus

“upright man”

Homo Habilis

“handy man”

Homo Sapiens

“wise man”

Peking Man

One of the famous fossils of homo erectus discovered in Zhoukoudian, China.

Java Mana

He was excavated in Trinil, Java, Indonesia and was considered a fossil of homo erectus

Cro-Magnon

He is the earliest fossil of homo sapiens ever discovered

Eugene Dubois

He excavated the fossil of the Java Man