Lec ii Culture: An Introduction - Imran Ahmad Sajid

Culture
IMRAN AHMAD SAJID
Lecturer
Department of Social Work,
University of Peshawar
imranahmad131@upesh.edu.pk
Lecture for MA Final
Social Work
Subject: Social Institutions and Social System
of Pakistani Society

• There are different standards of beauty among people around the world.
• There are different preferences around the world of how a wife should look like.

Bielgee, Mongolian DanceBhangra, Punjabi Dance
HipHop, US Street Dance Attanr, Pakhtun Dance
Raqs, Turkish Sufi Dance

• The ways of life found around the world differ
in so many ways.
• not only in language and forms of dress but
also in
– Preferred foods,
– Musical tastes,
– Family patterns, and
– Beliefs about right and wrong.

In Tana Toroja, Indonesia, death rituals is a large social
event that includes music, dance, and feasts to large
number of guests.

In Tibet, Sky Burial is performed where the body
is chopped, mixed with flour and left to be eaten
up by scavenging bird

Yanomomi of Brazil mix the ashes of the corps
with fermented Banana. The mixture is
consumed by all the tribes people.

The Malagasy of Madagascar take out the dead from the graves
and live with them. The celebration is often held once every
seven years and is a time of joyous family reunions.

• The ways of life found around the world differ in
so many ways.
• Some of the world’s people have many children,
while others have few;
– some honors elderly, while others seem to glorify
youth.
– Some societies are peaceful, while others are warlike;
– and societies around the world embrace a thousand
different religious beliefs as well as particular ideas
about what is
• polite and rude,
• beautiful and ugly,
• pleasant and repulsive.
• This amazing human capacity for so many
different ways of life is a matter of human
culture.

WHAT IS CULTURE?????
• Culture is the way of life of a group of people
who share similar beliefs and customs.

Edward B. Tylor
• Culture … is that complex whole which
includes knowledge, belief, arts, morals, laws,
customs, and any other capabilities and habits
acquired by man as a member of society.
(1871:1)

Edgar Schein
• Culture consists of the shared beliefs, values,
and assumptions of a group of people who
learn from one another and teach to others
that their behaviors, attitudes, and
perspectives are the correct ways to think, act,
and feel.
http://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/cultural-intelligence-for-leaders/s04-02-what-is-culture.html

John J. Macionis
• Culture is the ways of thinking, the ways of
acting, and the material objects that together
form a people’s way of life (Macionis,
2012.p.54).

John Cuber
• Culture is the continuously changing patterns
of learned behaviour and the products of that
learned behaviour are shared and transmitted
among members of society.

Encarta Encyclopedia
• Cultures is the pattern of behaviour and
thinking that people living in a social group
learn, create and share.

HOW MANY CULTURES ARE THERE IN
PAKISTAN?
• Indicator of Culture: Language
• 74 languages spoken in Pakistan.
• Major Languages:
– Provincial: Urdu, Pashto, Sindhi, Punjabi, Balochi
– Regional: Kashmiri, Brahui, Hindko, Shina, Saraiki,
http://www.ethnologue.com/country/pk

1
‫رانگڑی‬
(Haryanvi) 16 Dari 31 Jandavra 46 Loarki
2 Aer 17 Dameli 32 Kabutra 47 Marwari
3 Badeshi 18 Dogri 33 Kachchi/Kutchi 48 Memoni
4 Bagri 19 Dehawri 34 Kalami 49 Od/Odki
5 Balti 20 Dhatki/Thari 35 Kalasha-mun 50 Ormuri
6 Bateri 21 Domaaki 36 Kalkoti 51 Palula
7 Bhadrawahi 22 Gawar-Bati 37 Kamviri 52 Sansi
8 Bhaya 23 Ghera 38 Kati 53 Savi
9 Brokskat 24 Goaria 39 Khetrani 54 Swati
10 Burig/Purik 25 Gowro 40 Khowar 55 Shina-Kohistani
11 Burushaski 26 Gujarati 41 Kohistani Indus 56 Sindhi-Bhil
12 Chambeali 27 Gojri (Gujari) 42 Koli-Kachi 57 Torwali
13 Changthang 28 Gurgula 43 Koli-Parkari 58 Uyghur
14 Chilisso 29 Hazaragi 44 Koli-Wadiyara 59 Ushojo/Ushoji
15 Chitrali 30 Jadgali 45 Lasi 60 Bagri/Vagri
61 Wakhi 62 Waneci 63 Yidgha 64 Zangskari
Other Languages of Pakistan

Characteristics of Culture
Culture
1. Learned
2. Shared
3. Dynamic
4.
Systematic
5. Symbolic
From these definitions, it can be
inferred that …..

1. Culture is Learned
• We do not inherit our
culture through our genes
in the way we inherit our
physical characteristics.
• Instead, we obtain our
culture through the process
of enculturation.
• Enculturation is the
process of social interaction
through which people learn
and acquire their culture.

2. Culture is Shared
• Culture consists of the shared practices and
understandings within a society.
• These publicly shared meanings provide
designs or recipes for surviving and
contributing to the society.
Shared stories, shared values, shared beliefs, shared purpose, shared rituals.

• Pakistanis in the UK.
• feel that this group of people understands
them better and shares their values and ideas.

3. Culture is Dynamic
• Culture is dynamic and thus complex.
• Culture is fluid rather than static, which means
that culture changes all the time, every day, in
subtle and tangible ways.
Change in material objects.
Change in ideas.

4. Culture is Systemic
• Systems are interrelated, interconnected parts
that create a whole.
• Behaviours of people in a culture are
interconnected .

Lec ii Culture: An Introduction - Imran Ahmad Sajid

5. Culture is Symbolic
• Symbols are both verbal and nonverbal in
form within cultural systems, and they have a
unique way of linking human beings to each
other.
• Humans create meaning between symbols
and what they represent;
• as a result, different interpretations of a
symbol can occur in different cultural
contexts.

Meaning of Smile in Hull University
and Peshawar University differ

• Ants and Zebras all around the world behaves
very much the same because behaviour is
guided by instincts, biological programming
over which the species has no control.
• Humans behave differently the world over.
• Only humans rely on culture rather than
instincts to create a way of life and ensure our
survival.

• Culture shapes not only what we do but also
what we think and how we feel—elements of
what we commonly, but wrongly, describe as
“human nature.”
People living in similar
environment may develop
very different kind of human
nature. For example

Yanomomi Tribe of Brazil thinks
Aggression is Natural
• Living in Forests of Brazil and heavily nature dependent

Semai of Malaysia live quite peacefully.
• Living in Forests of Malaysia and heavily nature dependent
• Culture shapes human nature.

CULTURAL SHOCK
• Personal disorientation when experiencing an
unfamiliar way of life.
• Cultural shock is very strong when visiting
abroad.
Culture is the ways of thinking, the ways of acting, and the material objects that together form
a people’s way of life (Macionis, 2012.p.54).

What does a mouse mean to you?

Roasted Mouse in Hai Duong, Vietnam
• To the people of
Hai Duong in
Vietnam, Field
Mouse means Rich
Food Diet
• The field mouse
meat is white and
sweet-smelling
just like chicken.
http://hoanganhship.com.vn/index.php?language=en&nv=news&op=print/NEWS/The-roasted-field-mouse-the-feature-of-special-culinary-culture-31
Cultural Shock

Feeding Dog, Philippine
Cultural Shock

Raosted Dogs, Hanoi, Vietnam, and
parts of ChinaCultural Shock
Cultural Shock is Personal
disorientation when experiencing
an unfamiliar way of life.

CULTURE, NATION, SOCIETY
• Culture: shared way of life.
• Nation: a political entity, a territory with
designated borders.
• Society: the organized interaction of people
who typically live in a nation or some other
specific territory.
• Pakistan is both a society and a nation but it is
multicultural: the people follow various ways
of life that blend and sometimes clash.

• To understand that all culture is, we must
consider both thoughts and things.
– Nonmaterial culture is the ideas created by members
of a society.
– Material culture, is the physical things created by
members of a society.
MATERIAL VS NON-MATERIAL
CULTURE

1. Material Culture
• Material culture refers to the physical objects,
resources, and spaces that people use to define
their culture.
• These include homes, neighborhoods, cities,
schools, churches, synagogues, temples,
mosques, offices, factories and plants, tools,
means of production, goods and products, stores,
and so forth.
• All of these physical aspects of a culture help to
define its members' behaviors and perceptions.

Wall chalking  Part of Material
Culture in Pakistan

Material Culture of Tana Torajo of
Indonesia

Material Culture of Turkey Material Culture of Afghanistan

Chitrali Cap,
Material Culture from Chitral
That diffused to the whole of
KP

2. Non-Material Culture
• Non‐material culture refers to the nonphysical
ideas that people have about their culture,
including beliefs, values, rules, norms, morals,
language, organizations, and institutions.
• e.g. What and when family members should
eat?

Beliefs Non-material culture

Why we can’t build Qilla Balahisar or
Blue Masque?
Blue Masque, Turkey, 1604
Balahisar Fort, Peshawar, Pakistan, 1100

• Girls should wear Pardah
• Men shouldn’t disrespect women

ELEMENTS OF CULTURE
• Culture uses Four important process to shape
its members' thoughts, feelings, and
behaviors (the non-material culture).
1. Symbols
2. Language
3. Values and Beliefs
4. Norms

1. Symbols
• We experience the
surrounding world
and we try to add
meaning to it.
• A Symbol is anything
that carries a
particular meaning
recognized by people
who share a culture.

Symbols Faisal Masjid and Azan

1. To the human mind, symbols are cultural
representations of reality.
– Gun in the hands of policeman  Protection
– Gun in the hands of civilian  crime
2. Every culture has its own set of symbols
associated with different experiences and
perceptions.
3. Thus, as a representation, a symbol's
meaning is neither instinctive nor automatic.
• The culture's members must interpret and
over time reinterpret the symbol.
A Source of disgust or food?

1. Symbols occur in different forms:
verbal or nonverbal, written or
unwritten.
– They can be anything that conveys a
meaning, such as words on the page,
drawings, pictures, and gestures.
2. Clothing, homes, cars, and other
consumer items are symbols that
imply a certain level of social status.

• A word, a whistle, a wall covered with graffiti,
a flashing red light, a raised fist– all serve as
symbols.
• Humans have the capacity to create and
manipulate meanings.
• e.g. Winking  interest, understanding, or
insult.
A Cow means different things to
A Hindu and a Muslim

• We are so dependent on our culture’s symbols
that we take them for granted.
• We become keenly aware of their importance
When someone uses it in an unconventional
way, as when someone burns
– Pakistan’s Flag
– The Quran
– The Bible
– Or slaughters a cow.

• Truly, Cultural shock is the inability to read
meanings of symbols in strange surroundings.
• Not understanding the symbols of a culture
leaves a person feeling lost and isolated,
unsure of how to act, and sometimes
frightened.
Hugging is common symbol of Greetings in Pakistan but it will be a Cultural Shock
for a US Citizen as they consider it a gay habit.

2. Language
• Language is a system of symbols that allows
people to communicate with one another.
• Language is the key to the world of culture.

• Language not only allows communication but
is also the key to cultural transmission.
– Cultural transmission is the process by which one
generation passes culture to the next.
• Just as our bodies contain the genes of our
ancestors, our culture contains countless
symbols of those who came before us.
• Language is the key that unlocks centuries of
accumulated wisdom.

‫دلبرہ‬ ‫غنتہ‬ ‫تا‬ ‫ھسی‬ ‫وی‬ ‫نہ‬ ‫بہ‬ ‫مخ‬ ‫پہ‬ ‫جہان‬ ‫د‬
‫برہ‬ ‫سمن‬ ،‫مویہ‬ ‫سمبل‬ ،‫بویہ‬ ‫عنبر‬ ،‫رویہ‬ ‫پری‬
• Language links us to the past.
• It also sparks human imagination to connect
symbols in new ways, creating an almost
limitless range of future possibilities.
‫ھمدم‬‫درینہ‬!‫و‬ُ‫ب‬ ‫و‬ ‫رنگ‬ ‫جہان‬ ‫ہے‬ ‫کیسا‬
‫آرزو‬ ‫و‬ ‫جستجو‬ ‫و‬ ‫داغ‬ ‫و‬ ‫درد‬ ‫و‬ ‫ساز‬ ‫و‬ ‫سوز‬‫پسر‬ ‫اے‬ ‫نشانی‬ ‫شش‬ ‫را‬ ‫عشقاں‬
‫تر‬ ‫چشم‬ ‫و‬ ‫سرد‬ ‫آہ‬ ،‫زرد‬ ‫رنگ‬
‫بدر‬ ‫درد‬ ،‫بےقراری‬ ،‫زاری‬ ‫و‬ ‫آہ‬

Does language shapes reality?
• Does someone who thinks and speaks using
English Language experience the world
differently from other Pakistanis who think in,
say Urdu or Pashto?
• Edward Sapir and Benjamin Whorf claimed
that the answer is YES.

• A hungry Hindu man will let himself starve
rather than slaughtering and eating a cow,
despite the fact that there are old cows
roaming all over his village, blocking the
streets for cars to pass.

• To the average adult Pakistani man, who
regularly eats beef each year, this seems
illogical. If you have been hungry for months,
then you should eat the cow! There are old
cows roaming all over India, no one else owns
the cows, and you know how to slaughter a
cow! What's stopping the Hindu man from
killing the cow?

• The answer to that question is simple, if you
understand his cultural values.

• The group's values aren't always obvious right
away - they run deep!
• Cultural values are the core principles and
ideals upon which the entire community
exists.

3. Values and Beliefs
• Values are fundamental to understanding how
culture expresses itself.
• Values, culturally defined standards that
people use to decide what is desirable, good,
and beautiful and that serve as broad
guidelines for social living.

• Values are broad principles that support
beliefs.
• Beliefs are specific thoughts or ideas that
people hold to be true.
• Values are abstract standards of goodness,
and beliefs are particular matters that
individual consider true or false.

Values vary from culture to culture.
• Values that are important in higher income
countries differ somewhat from those
common in lower-income countries.

Lower Income Countries
Survival and Traditional Values
• LICs develop cultures that value survival.
• importance of physical safety and economic security.
• They Worry about having enough food to eat and a
safe place to sleep at night.
• They are traditional with values that celebrate the past
and emphasize the importance of family and religious
beliefs.
• Men have most of the power, discourage and forbid
practices such as divorce.

Higher Income Countries
Self-Expression and Secular Values
• HICs develop cultures that value individualism and self-
expression.
• They are Rich, survival is taken for granted.
• focus their attention on which “lifestyle” they prefer
and how to achieve the greatest personal happiness.
• HICs tend to be secular-rational, placing less emphasis
on family ties and religious beliefs and more on people
thinking for themselves‫۔‬
• In HICs, women have social standing more equal to
men, and there is widespread support for practices
such as divorce and abortion.

Values of Pakistani Culture
1. Democracy
2. Education
3. Family as Center of Activities
4. Hospitality
5. Humour
6. Charity
7. Helping the needy
8. Family Position not Success
9. Job instead of Business

4. Norms
• Norms are rules and expectations by which a
society guides the behaviours of its members.
• In everyday life, people respond to each other
with sanctions, reward or punishments that
encourage conformity to cultural norms.

Two types of Norms
1. MORES: norms that are widely observed
and have great moral significance.
• Mores include Taboos… e.g. adults
should not walk in public without dress.
2. FOLKWAYS: Norms of routine or casual
interaction.
• e.g. ideas about appropriate greetings
and proper dress.
• Mores distinguish between Right and
Wrong, Folkways draw a line between
Right and Rude.
Norms
Mores Folkways
WG Sumner.

• A student who does not wear a pair of shoes
in the classroom may raise eyebrows for
violating folkways….
• It would be a violation of Mores if he comes to
the class only wearing the shoes.

Ideal vs Real Culture
• Values and Norms do not describe actual
behaviour so much as they suggest how we
should behave.
• Ideal culture always differ from real culture.

• Ideal culture includes the values and norms
that a culture claims to have.
• It involves an idealized, uncompromising value
system that dictates perfect behavior.
• Using ideal culture as a standard, you are
either right or wrong.
• Rules are black and white, with no gray areas
and no exceptions.

• Real culture, on the other hand, includes the
values and norms that are actually followed
by a culture.
• It involves an adaptable value system that is
used mostly as a set of guidelines for
preferred behavior.
• Right and wrong are separated, but exceptions
exist for pretty much everything.

Examples
Ideal Culture Real Culture
Respect for guests in Hujra Many guests are killed in
Hujra
Women are honour of men. Many men sell their women
to other parts of Pakistan
Pakhtun-Wali

STRUCTURE OF A CULTURE
1. Cultural Trait
2. Cultural Complex
3. Cultural Pattern
4. Cultural Institutions
5. Cultural Ethos
Ethos
Institutions
Patterns
Complexes
Traits

1. Cultural Traits
• Trait is the smallest unit of a culture. It is the
atom of the whole.
– e.g. from m.C: use of chopsticks as eating
utensils.
– A chair in an office or a house.
– Knife from Upper Dir
– Chitrali Cap
• e.g from nm.C: Driving on the left side, salute
to the flag,
Each culture includes thousands of
cultural traits.
Is Poetry a trait?

2. Cultural Complexes
• A cultural complex is a collection of cultural traits.
Or, it is a combination of two or more cultural
traits.
• Poetry is a cultural complex: rhytheming, accents,
formula for organizing the words, and rhythmic
recitation.
• A prayer is a complex that is the combination of
traits such as Recitation of Quran, Qayam, Ruku,
Sajda, Qaida, and fixed timings of saying the
prayers.
Obviously, number of cultural complexes
are less than cultural traits.

3. Cultural Patterns
• A complex is intermediate between trait and Pattern.
• A cultural pattern constitutes of a number of
complexes.
• The Wedlock is a cultural pattern in Pakistan, involves
– Mutual agreement of spouses
– Two witnesses from each partner,
– Signing the Nikah deed
– Authentication by the Qazi
– and Dowry etc.
• Submissiveness in front of elders is a cultural pattern
that is a combination of many behaviours.

4. Cultural Institutions
• An institution is a series of complexes and
patterns centering around a configuration of
needs.
• e.g.: Family: match making complex, wedding
pattern, child rearing pattern, husband-wife
relation pattern, etc.
• Educational institution: admission system,
teaching pattern, examination pattern, and
administration patterns, etc.

5. Cultural Ethos
• Ethos is a Greek word meaning "character"
that is used to describe the guiding beliefs or
ideals that characterize a culture.
• The core of norms and values which gives a
distinctive feeling or overtone or flavour to a
culture is called its ethos.
• Ethos is a sort of spirit running through all the
aspects of culture which sets the tone of the
society.
ETHOS: shared fundamental traits
• Cooperative Japanese
• Competitive American
• Hardworking German

Cultural Diffusion
• The spread of cultural traits from one society
to another society.
• Can you identify some examples of cultural
diffusion in Pakistan?
BF/GF Culture
Mobile Phone
Copy/Paste
Jeans and T-Shirt
Burger and Pizza
Suicide Bombing
Arch making culture

High Culture and Popular Culture
• High Culture refers
to cultural patterns
that distinguish a
society’s elite.
• Popular culture
refers to cultural
patterns that are
widespread among
a society’s
population.
Which is more cultured?
Gulli Danda or Polo?

Subculture
• Subculture refers to cultural patterns that set
apart some segment of a society’s population.
• a subculture is a group of people with
a culture (whether distinct or hidden) which
differentiates them from the larger culture to
which they belong
• subcultures bring together like-minded
individuals allow them to develop a sense of
identity.

Counterculture
• Counterculture refers to cultural patterns that
strongly oppose those widely accepted within
a society.

Cultural Lag
• Some elements of culture change faster than
others.
• William Ogburn (1964) observed that technology
moves quickly, generating new elements of
material culture (things) faster than nonmaterial
culture (ideas) can keep up with them. Ogburn
called this inconsistency Cultural Lag.
• Cultural lag refers to the fact that some cultural
elements change more quickly than others,
disrupting a cultural system.

Is photography Halal or Haram?

Cultural Integration
• Cultural integration is the close relationship of
various elements of a cultural system.
– the process through which changes in certain
cultural elements trigger changes in others.
Women’s increased
interest in education Late Marriage
More women in
labour force in job
market

Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism
• Ethnocentrism
means the practice of
judging another
culture by the
standards of one’s
own culture.
• Alternative to
ethnocentrism is
Cultural Relativism
• Cultural relativism*
refers to the practice
of judging a culture
by its own standards.
*Relativism: Belief in changeable standards

How Culture Changes?
1. Invention
2. Discovery
3. Diffusion

1. Invention
• Invention is the process of creating new
cultural elements.
• Invention has given us telephone (1876), the
airplane (1903), and the computer (late
1940s).
• Each of these elements of material culture has
made a tremendous impact on our way of life.

2. Discovery
• Discovery involves recognizing and
understanding more fully something already
in existence
– E.g. discovery of nature and functions of human
body
– Discovery of Conditional Learning.
– Theory of Psychoanalysis

3. Diffusion
• Cultural Diffusion refers to the spread of
cultural traits from one culture to another.

Globally Diffused Cultural Traits
1. Cotton covers domesticated in
India
2. Wool from sheep
domesticated in Near East
3. Use of Silk was discovered in
China
4. Pajama was invented in India
5. Chair was invented in South
Europe
6. Window Glass was invented in
Egypt
7. Watermelon sown first in
Africa
8. Sugar was first made in India
9. Cigarette is a Mexican invention
10. Spoon is a derivative of Roman
original
11. Umbrella was first used in South
Asia
12. Rubber-shoes were first invented
by Central American Indians
13. Knife of Steel alloy was invented in
Southern India
14. Domestication of cows and the
idea of milking them was
originated in Near East
15. Wheat was domesticated in Asia
Minor

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