Man and His Culture (1954)

for [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] in accordance with our instructions we continued toward the planet which its inhabitants called the Earth in order to study their mode of Life the intelligent creatures on this planet call themselves human beings and they exist in an amazing variety of conditions some live in heat Laden jungles wearing very little clothing on their bodies with found others who cover their bodies with great godess even though the heat may be just as great some shovel food into their mouths with tiny silver utensils some use sticks of bamboo wood and some use the five tentacle like extensions which grow from the lower part of each hand some live in Huts made from branches and leaves which grow abundantly nearby and some laboriously build huge structures which they slowly fashion out of steel and [Music] stone and yet in spite of these great differences we found that all these human beings share many things in common each group has built up its own established mode of living together a network of Customs habits attitudes and ways of doing things which it has acquired Through the Ages this mode of life is called by the Earth's social scientists the culture of the group it provides an organized system of behavior for the members of the group giving them a framework within which to shape their lives and presenting them with common motives and goals toward which they direct their everyday activities whether persons belong to a primitive tribe or to a complex civilization they know fairly well what life has in in store for them because their culture has marked the way these cultures are vastly different from each other the kind of land in which the culture exists plays an important part in shaping its pattern biological characteristics May account for some of the differences between cultures but the main reason why there are so many different kinds of culture among the people of the Earth are the differences in their historical experiences despite these differences there are many Universal problems faced by all people which their different cultures solve in their own ways they all have ways of taking care of their material welfare such as getting food and ways of providing shelter for their bodies they have ways of getting tools and instruments and other things that they need to help them satisfy their wants they all have some kind of family organization in which the culture will be learned and perpetuated this is one of the most basic factors in every culture since without it the culture would die out all human cultures have language and there are thousands of different ones how much is this in addition they all have gestures which sometimes make mere vocal language seem quite inadequate as a means of communication every culture provides a means for those members who conform to maintain their self-respect and the respect of others all cultures through their various religions and mythologies provide some explanation of man's place in the universe and every culture has its way of expressing a love of what its own people people think is beautiful however their tastes May differ from that of other [Music] [Applause] [Music] cultures every culture has a strong code of what is right and wrong in conduct which often helps to keep things running smoothly this code is called by the Earth's social scientists the moris of the culture for example it is part of the moris of the culture in the country which its inhabitants call United States to respect private property and although the streets of this country are lined with four-wheeled vehicles all looking very much alike the individual will ignore every vehicle but one which he calls his own so powerful is the force of a culture that in a society where male members on certain occasions are expected to wear small horizontal decorations under their chins a member who instead wear a vertical decoration suffers great Agony and mental distress what is right in one culture may be wrong in another In some cultures it may be considered right and proper for a man to have more than one wife but in the culture of the United States should a male have on his clothing so much as a strand of hair from a female not his wife a serious crisis may result the mories may be different for different situations within the same culture on public beaches a person may be seen with very little clothing on his body and this is considered quite natural but should the same person appear on a street even though he may have more clothing on his body if he's wearing the wrong type of clothing this would be a violation of the moris of his culture Not only would he shock other members of his society and cause great disturbance but his Society might also take official action to stop him from this violation of its [Music] mores generation after generation this complex pattern of culture traits is handed down the group has two ways of transmitting its culture to ensure its continued existence one way is through the natural tendency of children to imitate their elders and to learn from them another way is through the direct teaching of the culture to the younger generation it's my turn no it's still my turn it's my turn children you must share your things you mustn't be selfish people should always share things oh well right here formal teaching in schools plays a large part in keeping a culture alive through the generations that was why he said Give me liberty or give me death to him individual liberty was more important than life itself this does not mean of course that every individual soaks up the culture of his group in exactly the same way the individual accepts or rejects specific culture traits depending on many things for example his own personality and the environment from which he comes are extremely important factors in determining what he accepts and rejects but there are only certain culture traits on which there can be a choice of acceptance or rejection for example the woman who works at a career has chosen to ignore the culture trait that considers the Woman's Place is in the home she can do this without serious repercussions but the same culture requires that women must be married to have children and this culture trait is too strong for her to attempt to violate she has no choice but to conform or be subject to Great criticism a culture which permits a certain amount of flexibility makes for a more individualistic people a culture which demands too rigid Conformity tends to stifle individual initiative thus the individual himself is shaped by his culture just as he helps to shape it because of this constant interplay between the individual and his culture every culture on the planet Earth is always changing sometimes rapidly and sometimes very slowly these changes occur in different ways one is through diffusion of culture traits from one culture to another the Primitive native quickly adopts many of the advanced cultures tools whose value is readily apparent to him on the other hand primitive crats like the Indian maze are quickly adopted by the advanced cultures who see value in them the Indians tobacco has been adopted by Advanced cultures all over the world the white man's foot is often clad in the Indian's moccasin just as the white man's shoes are seen on the Indian's foot the Indian has found Great Value in the white man's vehicles and the white man has found important values in the Indians vehicle too so cultures grow and change through their interaction on each other in the process called cultural diffusion another way in which cultures change is through invention and Discovery every technological development brings about a greater or lesser change in the culture pattern it can Well Be Imagined what an infinite number of culture traits are bound up with a primary invention such as the wheel and with a primary Discovery like the use of fire such primary inventions and discoveries have made possible the immensely complicated developments of a technological age an example is the vehicle called the automobile which runs on four wheels and whose engine is driven by fire its introduction brought vast culture changes especially in the country called the United States the whole pattern of living of that nation has been changed people are moving out of the city into Suburban are are farmers are in closer contact with the towns transportation of goods has been revolutionized these are only a few of the great number of new culture traits which have been formed around the invention of the [Music] automobile but the inhabitants of planet Earth do not always welcome culture changes there is often a resistance to anything different from the habits of the past Julie when I was a girl we wouldn't been caught dead with no more clothes on than that my stars what are our young people coming to these days oh granny everybody dresses like this well I don't approve of it material culture traits like clothing change faster than non-material culture traits the youth still feels he should walk on the street side of his companion even though the material reasons such as muddy streets no longer exist the military man's salute originally to lift the visor of the knight's helmet continues in spite of the fact that Knights have been gone for hundreds of years but even though material culture traits change more easily than non-material change of any kind is often opposed by vested interests we just can't do it Jim we've got too much tied up in present equipment I've seen it work it turns out those stamping twice as fast I'm telling you if they install those machines it'll put half of us out of work within the year in view of my 20 years of work in this area I am convinced that this proposal would be uh um extremely expensive and very uncertain of success it can contribute nothing but confusion in an area already very much Disturbed in spite of such opposition cultures are always changing new ways of doing and of thinking gradually take hold but the basic moris on which each culture is built change very slowly thus they provide a set of Fairly stable long range goals which all the people of a given culture seek together in their effort to live in a way which they consider satisfying as already pointed out there are innumerable different cultures on the planet Earth many Encompass a very small group involving only a tribe or a series of villages such tiny culture groups dot the continent which the Earth people call Africa on the other hand the continent called Europe is largely covered by a huge civilized culture which has spread over many parts of the Earth but whether a culture is of life or a great C it's people in the same way by setting up goals for a way of life through which they can achieve personal happiness if they can form thus knowing the culture of any group charts the way to a fuller understanding of the people [Music] themselves