• A culture consists of the “objects” of a society, whereas a society consists of the people who

share a common culture. When the terms culture and society first acquired their current
meanings, most people in the world worked and lived in small groups in the same locale.

• The cultural bond may be ethnic or racial, based on gender, or due to shared beliefs, values, and
activities. The term society can also have a geographic meaning and refer to people who share a
common culture in a particular location.

• Unique Aspects of the Human Species

• The capacity to think.

• Sets humans apart from most other forms of life.

• Humans have the capacity to externalize the thought process.

• Tools

• Human reproduction

• Cloning

The Family as Human Universal

 The family is biologically based and is the primary social unit.

 Family is constant; the form of the family is variable.

 The development of culture exists because culture is transmitted from one generation to the
next through education not through the genes.

Language and Communication

 Language is defined as any transfer of meaning, but general usage refers only to spoken and
written messages.

 It is essential to be attuned to unspoken and unwritten language.

 Language structures reality

 Form and variability determine how members of the culture will view reality and
structure their thoughts.

Territoriality

 Tendency of people to seek and maintain a territory.

 The definition of spatial and interactional territories is paramount feature of any culture.

 Refers to the cultural ways people locate themselves in their universe and establish the
boundaries of their various human systems.

Qualities of a Society
 Culture is that complex whole that includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any
other capabilities and habits acquired by a human being as a member of society.

 Culture is viewed as the ways of doing, being, and explaining, as they exist in each particular
system.

Tools

 Amplifiers of human capacities:

 Sensory capacity

 Motor capacity

 Reasoning and thinking capacity

 Include devices, objects, and procedures that are extensions of human natural capacities.

 Tools of a culture include not only understanding their built-in purpose but, their purpose for
the user.