Have you ever asked yourselves if the culture is universal?

Question

The culture follows similar patterns despite being developed in far and distant places in the time or in the space. For example, three important civilizations developed the construction of Pyramids; the Egyptian culture, whose beginning dates around 3 200 before Christ; the Mayan culture, whose beginning dates around 1500 before Christ; and, finally, the Inca Culture, whose beginning dates around 1100 after Christ. Furthermore, these same cultures venerated to the felines and they believed that they were their gods. By the way, every culture needs to develop systems of codes that allow expressing their thoughts. And there are lots of things can make us to think that the culture is universal. Nevertheless, it seems all the cultures are so different. The fact that there are marriages among relatives it can be considered as a sin in some cultures and it can be completely licit in others. Anyway, the way every culture live is so different, or the way they spend their resources and they are organized. In the end, I only have to say this topic is one of my favourite topics I can talk about. Thanks.

Answer 1

I'm maybe not as expert as you on this subject. the abrahamic faiths seem to me to be the faiths most closely linked to the current modern culture. I cant speak for any other religion except that islam came to the arabs through angel gibreel. Prophet muhammed was a man who could not read according to historians. and he was forced to read through the power of the angel when he was meditating in some mountain. apparantly he was being considered as a man of piety before he was chosen for the task. when at the age of forty he received his first revelation.  in islam theres two types of creation mankind and geeny. Both have  the responsibility to pray to god and be muslims. amongst both mankind and geeny there are muslims. i have personaly seen some miraculous things. I'm in no doubt that this is true.  and im also in no doubt thaat not all geeny is bad. some are muslims are respect law and order whereas some are also disobdient. maybe those geeny that are arrogant somehow think their powers are infinate and can turn water into wine? what i do know is that the reason osama bin laden is fighting the west today(im against fighting) is because the bad geeny is to cheeky and wants to spread too much mischeif. wants to turn the world into a devils paradise.

Answer 2

Yes I have. What a very thought provoking topic. I think it must be related to our common origins. Human development seems to have a somewhat set pattern of social development. As far as pyramids go I guess there is a natural sequence of discovery that people follow. Different cultures arise however because of our vast array of different personalities. It seems that this along with geography and local resources is what veers social groups along different paths. It only takes one outspoken individual to alter the course of an entire society.

Answer 3

This is a fascinating question and is in fact one of the oldest debates in anthropology. Is culture universal or are human cultures immeasurably different?

In terms of cultures separate across the globe all building pyramids I actually believe that there was an ancient civilization that preceded this present cycle.. and that many aspects of modern life and thought proceed from this.. including the construction of pyramids worldwide.. there are also pyramids in China and even ancient ones in Europe if you know where to look. This idea isn't as radical as it seems .....

And Jon, I must say I have never heard of the "magical" theory concerning culture in cultural anthropology, some examples of cultural theories include schema theory or cognitive theory, in which culture is a psychological construct that exists in individuals and is continuously (re)informed through our social interactions and general life experience such as exposure to media (watching movies, reading books etc..), another model that is more popular is Geertz's semiotic (symbolic) theory, in which human beings are animals suspended in webs of meaning of our own (shared) creation (this is certainly a poetic model but I wouldn;t call it magical.... and we do attribute shared meaning to otherwise arbitrary forms i.e written language ). The idea that you are referring to is cultural ecology... which is a fascinating idea and certainly plays a part in the formation of culture, but I wouldn't hazard that it is the whole story....

To the original asker: if you want to research the idea of universal human culture more in depth have a look at Levi-Strauss and his structuralism, he argued that all human cultures and societies share deep underlying universal traits...

Thats my two bob :)

Answer 4

*the* culture??

The only "The Culture" I know is in Iain M Banks novels.

Do you mean "is culture universal?"

Well, you find what you look for, partly.

But I think you mean "Are there aspects of every culture which are universal?"

Then the answer is "of course". We're all the same species after all. And we seem to like cats.

As for pyramids, it makes sense to make the base heavier and the top lighter, so...

(and Mayan "pyramids" aren't the same as Egyptian pyramids)

Answer 5

If this is your favorite topic, we should have coffee sometime because I am absolutely enthralled by the similarities of ancient cultures! And don't forget the zigurats of ancient Mesopatamia.

I want to believe that there was some kind of ancient line of communication or world empire that united them all, but I highly doubt it... It sounds too scifi.

However, I do think that there are certain things that are inherent in humans, such as certain morals (that is unless they are completely corrupted by their religion, ie Al-Qaida).

Felines possess certain qualities that people tend to admire in others: strength, stamina, powerful hunters, agility, etc.

Also consider that in most cultures, males were typically the dominant s*x; murder, theft, rape, and lying were considered wrong; war is a part of every history. The list goes on and on.

Another thought too is that, as humans spread out of Africa, they took the idea of a pyramid from Egypt into the rest of the world...

Answer 6

All humans are different and similar at the same time. A subtlety we have appreciated in biology for a long time. Cultures are constructed by evolved humans in response to local conditions. They are not the disembodied " magic " that you and many cultural anthropologists think they are.

Answer 7

All humans have the same wiring, we seek answers, faith etc in similar ways. Early man would stare at the sky and worship the Sun for bringing warmth and light..only when we added rules to make others conform to a common pattern, did we begin to differentiate. As travel became easier, or undertaken by those filled with 'wonderlust'  we saw how others were ruled, and showed their faith. Then we started comparing others to our own..and the trouble started.

Answer 8

The catalogue is Great Universal