Biocultural Evolution - View of Culture

View of Culture

People have defined the word "culture" to describe a large set of different phenomena. A definition that sums up what is meant by "culture" in DIT is:

Culture is information stored in individuals' brains that is capable of affecting behavior and that got there through social learning.

This view of culture emphasizes population thinking by focusing on the process by which culture is generated and maintained. It also views culture as a dynamic property of individuals, as opposed to a view of culture as a superorganic entity to which individuals must conform. This view's main advantage is that it connects individual-level processes to population-level outcomes.

Read more about this topic:  Biocultural Evolution

Famous quotes containing the words view of, view and/or culture:

    In relation to God, we are like a thief who has burgled the house of a kindly householder and been allowed to keep some of the gold. From the point of view of the lawful owner this gold is a gift; From the point of view of the burglar it is a theft. He must go and give it back. It is the same with our existence. We have stolen a little of God’s being to make it ours. God has made us a gift of it. But we have stolen it. We must return it.
    Simone Weil (1909–1943)

    Children’s view of the world and their capacity to understand keep expanding as they mature, and they need to ask the same questions over and over, fitting the information into their new level of understanding.
    Joanna Cole (20th century)

    Let a man attain the highest and broadest culture that any American has possessed, then let him die by sea-storm, railroad collision, or other accident, and all America will acquiesce that the best thing has happened to him; that, after the education has gone far, such is the expensiveness of America, that the best use to put a fine person to is to drown him to save his board.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)