Transcript Cultural Patterns and Processes

Cultural Patterns and Processes
MMMMM… the McArabia
• Three falafel balls, made from ground chickpeas and fava
beans, fried in canola oil and served on Iraqi pita bread
with tahini and chopped salad.
Or maybe…POUTINE!
• french fries, layered with cheese curds and smothered
beneath brown gravy. Cheese curds are the solid parts
of sour milk.
How about authentic Hawaiian food?
• Spam is so popular in Hawaii it has been dubbed "The
Hawaiian Steak," so it is no surprise that McDonald's put
the meat in their Deluxe Breakfast. Eggs, rice, hashbrowns,
spam and toast.
Ole! Gazpacho
Cultural geography
• The study of people’s lifestyles, their
creations, and their relationships to the earth
and the supernatural
Key questions
• How do geographers define culture?
• How do geographers look at spatial and place aspects of
culture in the form of language, religion, race, ethnicity,
and gender?
• How are cultural patterns represented at different scales,
from local to global?
• How do cultural traits move through space and time?
• What are key aspects to the geography of language and
religion?
• How does culture shape human-environment
relationships?
• How is culture expressed in landscapes, and how do
different landscapes reflect different cultural identities?
Basics of Culture
• Material components of Culture Vs.
Nonmaterial components of Culture
• Cultural geography
– Looks at how and why culture is expressed in
different ways in different places
• Cultural Landscape-CARL SAUER
– The built environment
– The physical implications of human culture
Sequent occupance
• The succession of cultures leaving their mark
in a shared space or territory
• Ex. Romans, Saxons, Vikings, and others who
conquered England over a 3000 year period
• CULTURAL ECOLOGY
– Human-environment interaction
Human-environment interactions
• Environmental determinism
– Environment determines all
• Possibilism
– Environment sets limits
• And CULTURAL DETERMINISM
– Environment does not set limits…WE set the
restrictions on ourselves
The Jigsaw of Culture
• Cultural traits
– A single attribute of a culture
• Ex. Bowing to show respect
• Cultural Complex
– The combination of all culture traits creates a
unique set of traits
– Like a recipe
– Ex. All the things Americans do makes us
American… no other culture has THAT unique
combination
Cont…
• Culture systems
– When complexes share traits the complexes can
merge
– Ex. People in N. Germany has a different accent
but they combine with the rest of Germany to
form the German cultural system
Cultural Regions and Realms
• Cultural regions
– Drawn around people with similarities in their cultural
systems
• Regional Identity
– Emotional attachment to the group of people and
places associated with a particular culture region
– Leads to…
• Perceptual Regions (vernacular regions)
– Defined by peoples emotions and feelings about an
area rather than objective regions
Cultural Realm
• Merging together of culture regions
Cultural Diffusion
• The spread of people’s culture across space
• Spatial diffusions
– The spread of any phenomenon across space
– Ex. Disease
– Two types… expansion and relocation
Expansion Diffusion
• The cultural component spreads outward to
new places while remaining strong in the
home hearth
– Ex. Islam spreading from Saudi Arabian hearth
Different types
• Stimulus diffusion
– Idea spreads but the original idea has changed
• Contagious diffusion
– Occurs when numerous places or people near the point of origin
become adopters (or INFECTED)
• Ex. Disease or a restaurant spreading out
• Hierarchical diffusion
– Spreads from a place or person of power or high susceptibility
to another in a leveled pattern
– Ex. Hip hop music starts at the cities first and spreads down to
the lower towns
– Ex. Knowledge of 9/11 plot… US gov. to media to general public
Relocation diffusion
• Involves the actual movement of the original
adopters from their hearth to a new place
• Ex. Movement of Russian capital from St.
Petersburg to Moscow
• Ex. HIV/AIDS spread by movement
• Migrant diffusion
– Innovation spreads but only lasts a brief time
– Ex. The flu
Mixie Mixie
• They can be combined
– Ex. The flu
– Ex. HIV/AIDS
Culture
• Cultural Convergence
– The process of two cultures blending and
becoming more alike
• Acculturation
– A weaker culture adopts a more dominant
culture’s traits
– May lead to…
• Assimilation
– Complete erase of the weaker culture
Transculturation
• Occurs when two cultures of just about equal
power or influence meet and exchange ideas
without domination
S-Curve of Diffusion
Cultural hearth
• Where innovations in a culture begin
• INDEPENDENT INNOVATION
– Originate without knowledge of similar
innovations
– Ex. Agricultural innovation in E. Asia and
Mesopotamia
Religion
Religion
• A set of beliefs and activities that are created
to help human celebrate and understand their
place in the world
– Can be MONOTHEISTIC or POLYTHEISTIC
• Universalizing Religions
– Universal appeal
• Ethnic Religions
– Attempt to appeal to only one group
Universalizing Religions
• Branches => Denominations => sects
Buddhism
• World’s 1st universalizing religion
• Founded in India near INDO-GANGETIC Hearth
(Indus/Ganges rivers)
• Founded by Prince Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha)
who was born in 644 BCE
• Diffusion: Spread throughout India then China,
Korea, Japan, Tibet, Mongolia, and SE Asia along
Silk Road
• 350 million worldwide
• Branches: Theraveda and Mahayana
Branches
• Theravada
– Monastic (monks and nuns)
– 55%
• Mahayana
– Find salvation through meditation and prayer
• Lamaism (in Tibet)
– Combines monatiscism with local dieties and demons
– The Dalai Lama is a proponent
– China has tried to suppress this branch including EXILE of
the Dalai Lama
• Zen
– In Japan
Cultural landscape of Buddhism
• Pagoda
– Derived from ancient burial mound shapes
• Bodhi tree
• Many pilgrimages
Christianity
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600 years after Buddhism
Offshoot of Judaism
Originated in Semitic Hearth (Israel)
Monotheistic
Holy book: the Bible
Cont… Diffusion
• Largest number of adherents (2 billion)
• Spread out especially through the Roman
Empire
• Nearly 90% in the W. Hemisphere are
Christian
Cont… Branches
• Roman Catholic
– Largest (830 million)
– Hierarchical
• Protestant
– Broken into denominations
– Baptist, Methodist, Pentecostal, and Lutheran
– 503 million
• Eastern Orthodox
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Formed during the Great Schism of 1054
14 separate churches
Largest is Russian Orthodox
192 million (roots in Constantinople
Cont… Cultural landscape
• Roman Catholic
• Protestant Church
• Eastern Orthodox
Islam
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600 CE
1.2 billion worldwide
Muhammad
Diffused Globally from Saudi Arabia
Mecca and Medina
Monotheistic
Holy Book: Koran/Quran
Two Branches: Sunni and Shiite
Cont… Branches
• Sunni
– 85%
• Shiite
– 15%
– Believe that only descendants Muhammad should
be head of Islam
– Iraq and Iran
Cultural Landscape
• The Mosque
Cont… Misc…
• 5 pillars
• Pilgrimage to Mecca (holiest site)
• Third holy site is Dome of the Rock in
Jerusalem
Sikkhism
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22 million
Syncretic religion
Blend of Hindu and Islam
Mainly in Punjab Region of India
Monotheistic
Holy book: Guru Granth Sahib
Ethnic Religion
• Hinduism
– Mainly in India
– 900 million adherents
• Predates Buddhism
• Cultural landscape features Caste System
• Judaism
– Jewish diaspora
– Holy book: Torah
• Shintoism
• Taoism
• Shaminism
– Any religion that follows a religious leader/healer/truth knower
• Animism-belief that objects like trees, mountains, rivers have spirits in them
Secularism and Theocracy
• Secularism
– Movement away from religion
• Theocracy
– Government run by religion
– Ex. Former Taliban run Afghanistan
– Ex. Iran
Religion and Conflict
• Interfaith boundaries
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China- Tibetan Buddhism and Atheism
Nigeria- Islam and Christianity
India- Hinduism and Sikkhism
India and Pakistan-Hinduism and Islam
Palestine- Judaism and Islam
• Intrafaith boundaries
– Iraq- Sunni and Shiite
– USA- Christianity
– N. Ireland- Protestants and Roman Catholics
Language
Language
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Language Divergence
Language replacement
Language extinction
Reverse reconstruction
Language Hearths
Theories on hearth of Proto Indo
European language
• Conquest theory
• Agricultural theory
Monolingual and Multilingual
• Can be centripetal or cetrifugal
• Ex. Belgium
– Dutch and French
– Canada
• French and English
Official and Standard Languages
• Official
• Standard
– Acceptable forms
Others…
• Lingua Franca
– Facilitates trade
• Pidgin
– Simplified version
• Becomes Creole/Creolized (once it is adopted)
• Ex. French domination in the Caribbean…first pidgin
French then became Creolized
Toponyms
• Are Place names
• Reflect cultural identity and impact the cultural
landscape
• May be controversial
– Ex. India wanted to change Bombay to Mumbai (“Mumbai”
relates to a Hindu god, this angered non-Hindus)
• Can give historical clues
– St. Petersburg (named by Peter the Great for his patron
saint)
– Can indicate the “dreams” of a place…
• Paradise, CA
• Hope, AK
– Can reflect religion
• “St.” in N. New York and Quebec
• Santa Barbara (reflects spanish/portugese language and catholic
influence)
Ethnicity
• Relates to sets of norms that people create to
define their group through actual or perceived
shared culture traits (language, religion,
nationality)
• Can be expressed in different ways
– Territory
• Albanians in Albania
Ethnic groups
• Jews are spatially divided
– Forced segregation in Nazi Germany
• GHETTO- region in which an ethnic minority is forced to
live by economic, legal, or gov pressures
• ENCLAVE- place of minority concentration surrounded
by unwelcoming groups
• BARRIO- Spanish speaking ethnic neighborhood in a
city
Race
• Refers to a classification system of humans
based on skin color and other genetic/physical
characteristics
• APARTHEID
– Africa… particularly S. Africa
– Separation of whites and blacks
– What separates ethnicity and race?
• More than just race
Examples…
• Puerto Ricans… include more than just a
“Hispanic race”
Social Distance
• How “distant” two ethnicities are apart from
each other but not in a spatial sense
• Ethnocentrism
– One group’s use of its cultural identity as the
superior standard by which to judge others, often
causes discriminatory behavior
Ethnic Conflict
• Ethnic Cleansing
– A process in which a racial or ethnic group attempt to
expel from a territory another racial or ethnic group
• Genocide
– When a racial or ethnic group tries to kill another
racial or ethnic group
• Slobadan Milosevic (Serbian leader of former Yugoslavia) led
genocide campaign against ethnic Albanians living in Kosovo
(a region in Serbia)
• Hitler
• Sudan trying to eliminate ethnic groups in Darfur
• Rwanda
Gender
• Men have more opportunities
• Masculine and feminine are cultural traits
• Men dominate economically, politically, and
socially
– Gender gap
Gender Problems
• High maternal mortality rates
– LDCs 100-600x more likely to die than women in
MDCs
• Female Infanticide
– China
– India and the DOWRY
• Dowry Death in India
– Failure to pay
• Enfrancisement… right to vote
• Longevity gap…women live longer
Folk and Pop culture
• Folk culture
– Limited in scope
– Ex. Amish
• Pop culture
– Mass culture
Maladaptive Diffusion
• Adoption of a diffusing trait that is impractical
for a region or culture
• Jeans in the summer
Cultural Imperialism
• The invasion of a culture into another with the
intent of dominating the invaded culture
politically, economically, and/or socially
• Ex. When McDonald’s arrived in one African
city protesters attacked the restaurant
• Ex. Middle eastern culture resent the influx of
western pop culture
Cultural Nationalism
• The rise of anti cultural imperialism forces
• The fight to resist cultural convergence and
imperialism and remain distinct
Cultural Homogeneity
• Cultural sameness
• Pop cultures threatens uniqueness
Pop culture and Consumption
• Many pop culture trends can lead to increase
consumption and tax the natural resources
and increase waste
• Ex. Buy cars instead of public transportation…
leads to more gas usage and more pollution
• Ex. Plastic water bottles