Transcript Intro-to-Culture

Do Now: Mon. Dec. 6th
• Take out a blank sheet of paper, and
respond to the following question:
• What is culture?
• How would you describe your
culture?
• How is culture expressed?
What is culture?
• Culture: the shared experience, traits,
and activities of a group of people who
have a common heritage.
• Rubenstein describes culture as:
• what we care about
• what we take care of
• Based on this, what is the cultural landscape?
Focus Questions
• What is folk culture most concerned
with?
• What is pop culture most concerned
with?
• What do they have in common?
• How are they different?
Trivia....
1. She had a breakdown in 2008 that involved
shaving her head and stabbing a papparazzi car
with an umbrella.
2. After playing the Joker, he died from a drug
overdose.
3. He interrupted Taylor Swift at the MTV VA to
protest her winning the best video award. He just
released a new album My Beautiful Dark Twisted
Fantasy
4. Insisting that she is a singer and has talent, this
star of “The Hills” released a music single and
successfully tried to perform it.
more trivia...
• In the movie “A Mighty Wind,” this is the name of
the 3-man folk band that reunites to play a
concert memorializing a fictional folk music icon.
• This sport is played on a court with 3 walls, and
the players fling a goatskin ball at speeds up to
180 mph. It became popular in Florida.
• This vegetable is a favorite folk food, and is
often buried in the ground to be fermented for a
few weeks, then it is added to dishes with meats
and potatoes, or becomes the crucial ingredient
in kimchee.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JhLuVu-Ch
Folk vs. Pop Culture
• For each of the following images, you will
decide whether it is related to folk culture or
popular culture or both (how?).
• Draw a t-chart on your page where you will take
notes on these two main cultural categories.
• As you look at these images, write down any
ideas you get for what these two types are all
about
The Forbidden City
Beijing, China
2004
Beijing, China
2004
Folk Vs. Pop
Characteristics
• As each student describes a
characteristic and reads it, write it down
on your t-chart under the appropriate
type of culture.
Focus Questions
• What is folk culture most concerned
with?
• What is pop culture most concerned
with?
• What do they have in common?
• How are they different?
Material vs.
Nonmaterial
• Material culture- physical, visible
infrastructure- instruments, tools, buildings,
the built environment.
• Nonmaterial culture- mentifacts, sociofacts,
oral tradition, songs, stories and behavior.
• Customs- behaviors, arts, traditions and
conventions
• Cultural Hearth - region from which culture
originates (example: Hip Hop, Grunge, Jazz)
Cultural Determinism
•
•
environment places no restrictions
on humans whatsoever
I’ll tell you
what isn’t
possible...
only restrictions are ones we place
on ourselves
•
ex. golf courses - what do they
require?
•
•
•
are there golf courses in desert?
how?
if this is possible - what isn’t?
humans create everything
from cultural perspective
Agree or Disagree?
•
How are folk and popular culture
spread?
spatial diffusion:
•
•
the spread of any
phenomenon (such as
disease) across space
2 main types of cultural
diffusion:
•
Pop culture = expansion
Folk culture = relocation
Expansion Diffusion
•
spreads outward from hearth
1. Stimulus Expansion Diffusion innovative idea diffuses from
hearth, original idea is changed
by new adopters.
Expansion Diffusion
2. Contagious Expansion
Diffusion - many
people near the point
of origin become
adopters
Expansion Diffusion
3. Hierarchical
Expansion Diffusion innovation or concept
spreads from a place
or person of power to
another in a pattern
Diffusion of Pop and
Folk Cultures
• Refer to the following diagram:
Take 2 minutes
and think of one
example of
contagious
diffusion and one
example of
hierarchical
diffusion
Relocation Diffusion
• the spread of culture through migration
• example: language, food, traditions from
the homeland brought to the U.S.
• `folk culture can fade with time
• acculturation - when people gradually
adopt the customs and cultures of those
around them (people become more
American)
• assimilation - the gradual dying of old
culture to be replaced with new culture
Focus Questions
• What is folk culture most concerned
with?
• What is pop culture most concerned
with?
• What do they have in common?
• How are they different?