Culture theory is the branch of anthropology and other related social science disciplines (e.g., sociology) that seeks to define the heuristic concept of culture in operational and/or scientific terms. In the 19th century, "culture" was used by some to refer to a wide array of human activities, and by others as a synonym for "civilization". In the 20th century, anthropologists began theorizing about culture as an object of scientific analysis. Some used it to distinguish human adaptive strategies from the largely instinctive adaptive strategies of animals, including the adaptive strategies of other primates and non-human hominids, whereas others used it to refer to symbolic representations and expressions of human experience, with no direct adaptive value. Both groups understood culture as being definitive of human nature. The Cultural Theory of risk, often referred to simply as Cultural Theory (with capital letters), is a theory developed in anthropology and political science to explain risk perception. ... This article is about the social science. ... The social sciences are a group of academic disciplines that study human aspects of the world. ... Sociology (from Latin: socius, companion; and the suffix -ology, the study of, from Greek λόγος, lógos, knowledge [1]) is the scientific or systematic study of society, including patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and culture[2]. Areas studied in sociology can range from the analysis of brief contacts between anonymous... For other uses, see Heuristic (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Culture (disambiguation). ... An operational definition is a description of something — such as a variable, term or object — in terms of the specific process or set of validation tests used to determine its presence and quantity. ... Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. ... For other uses, see Culture (disambiguation). ... This article is about modern humans. ... Central New York City. ... This article is about the social science. ... The eye is an adaptation. ... For other uses, see Instinct (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Animal (disambiguation). ... Families 15, See classification A primate is any member of the biological order Primates, the group that contains all the species commonly related to the lemurs, monkeys, and apes, with the latter category including humans. ... Genera The hominids are the members of the biological family Hominidae (the great apes), which includes humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans. ... It is generally agreed that people know and understand the world and reality through the act of naming it; thus, through language and representations (Oxford English Dictionary, cited in Vukcevich 2002). ... For other uses, see Human nature (disambiguation). ...

According to many theories that have gained wide acceptance among anthropologists, culture exhibits the way that humans interpret their biology and their environment. According to this point of view, culture becomes such an integral part of human existence that it is the human environment, and most cultural change can be attributed to human adaptation to historical events. Moreover, given that culture is seen as the primary adaptive mechanism of humans and takes place much faster than human biological evolution, most cultural change can be viewed as culture adapting to itself. The word theory has a number of distinct meanings in different fields of knowledge, depending on their methodologies and the context of discussion. ... For the song by Girls Aloud see Biology (song) Biology studies the variety of life (clockwise from top-left) E. coli, tree fern, gazelle, Goliath beetle Biology (from Greek: Βιολογία - βίος, bio, life; and λόγος, logos, speech lit. ... Existentialism is a philosophical movement that posits that individuals create the meaning and essence of their lives, as opposed to deities or authorities creating it for them. ... Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Change For other uses, see Change (disambiguation). ... HIStory – Past, Present and Future, Book I is a double album by American singer Michael Jackson released in June 1995 and remains Jacksons most conflicting and controversial release. ... For the history of humans on Earth, see History of the world. ...

Although most anthropologists try to define culture in such a way that it separates human beings from other animals, many human traits are similar to those of other animals, particularly the traits of other primates. For example, chimpanzees have big brains, but human brains are bigger. Similarly, bonobos exhibit complex sexual behaviour, but human beings exhibit much more complex sexual behaviours. As such, anthropologists often debate whether human behaviour is different from animal behaviour in degree rather than in kind; they must also find ways to distinguish cultural behaviour from sociological behaviouur and psychological behavior. Type species Simia troglodytes Blumenbach, 1775 distribution of Species Pan troglodytes Pan paniscus Chimpanzee, often shortened to chimp, is the common name for the two extant species of apes in the genus Pan. ... For other uses, see Brain (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Bonobo (disambiguation). ... Animal sexual behavior takes many different forms, even within the same species. ... This article is about human sexual perceptions. ... Human Behaviour is Icelandic singer Björks first solo single, taken from the album Debut. ... Ethology is the scientific study of animal behaviour (particularly of social animals such as primates and canids), and is a branch of zoology. ...

External links

• Article Database of topics about the human culture.

See also

• Cultural studies
• Cultural behavior
• Culture industry
• Critical theory
• Dual inheritance theory
• Intercultural relations
• Popular culture studies
• Structuralism

v • d • e Sub-fields of and approaches to Human geography Sub-fields Cultural · Development · Economic · Health · Historical · Language · Marketing · Military · Political · Population · Religion · Strategic · Time · Tourism · Transportation · Urban Cultural studies is an academic discipline which combines political economy, communication, sociology, social theory, literary theory, media theory, film/video studies, cultural anthropology, philosophy, museum studies and art history/criticism to study cultural phenomena in various societies. ... Cultural behavior is behavior exhibited by human beings (and, some would argue, by other species as well, though to a much lesser degree) that is extrasomatic or extragenetic, in other words, learned. ... Culture industry is a term coined by Theodor Adorno (1903-1969) and Max Horkheimer (1895-1973), who argued that popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods to manipulate the masses into passivity; the easy pleasures available through consumption of popular culture make people docile and content... In the humanities and social sciences, critical theory has two quite different meanings with different origins and histories, one originating in social theory and the other in literary criticism. ... Dual inheritance theory, (or DIT), in sharp contrast to the notion that culture overrides biology, posits that humans are products of the interaction between biological evolution and cultural evolution. ... Intercultural relations is a relatively new formal field of social science studies. ... Popular culture studies is the academic discipline studying popular culture. ... Structuralism as a term refers to various theories across the humanities, social sciences and economics many of which share the assumption that structural relationships between concepts vary between different cultures/languages and that these relationships can be usefully exposed and explored. ... Population density by country, 2007 Human geography, is a branch of geography that focuses on the study of patterns and processes that shape human interaction with the environment, with particular reference to the causes and consequences of the spatial distribution of human activity on the Earths surface. ... Cultural geography is a sub-field within human geography. ... Development geography is the study of the Earths geography and its relationship with economic development. ... Economic geography is the study of the location, distribution and spatial organisation of economic activities across the Earth. ... Historical Geography is the study of the: Human Physical Fictional Theoretical and Real geographies of the past. ... Marketing geography is the study of marketing in certain places and where to market certain things. ... Political geography is the field of human geography that is concerned with the study of both the spatially uneven outcomes of political processes and the ways in which political processes are themselves affected by spatial structures. ... Strategic geography is concerned with the control of, or access to, spatial areas that have an impact on the security and prosperity of nations. ... Please wikify (format) this article or section as suggested in the Guide to layout and the Manual of Style. ... Tourism Geography (or the Geography of Tourism) is the study of travel and tourism as an industry, as a human activity, and especially as a place phenomenon. ... Urban geography is the study of urban areas. ... Approaches Behavioral · Critical · Culture theory · Feminist · Marxist · Non-representational theory Modernism (Structuralism • Semiotics) · Postmodernism (Post-structuralism • Deconstruction) Image File history File linksMetadata Pepsi_in_India. ... Behavioral geography is an approach to Human Geography that examines human behavior using a disaggregate approach. ... The critical geography is one of the four major turning points in the history of geography (the other three being environmental determinism, regional geography and quantitative revolution). ... Feminist geography is an approach to study in human geography which applies the theories, methods and critiques of feminism to the study of the human environment, society and geographical space. ... Marxist geography is a critical geography which utilizes the the theories and philosophy of Marxism to examine the spatial relations of human geography. ... Non-representational theory is a theory developed in human geography, largely through the work of Nigel Thrift (Warwick University)[1], and his colleagues such as J.D. Dewsbury (University of Bristol). ... For Christian theological modernism, see Liberal Christianity and Modernism (Roman Catholicism). ... Structuralism as a term refers to various theories across the humanities, social sciences and economics many of which share the assumption that structural relationships between concepts vary between different cultures/languages and that these relationships can be usefully exposed and explored. ... Semiotics, semiotic studies, or semiology is the study of signs and symbols, both individually and grouped into sign systems. ... Postmodernism (sometimes abbreviated Po-mo[1]) is a term originating in architecture, literally after the modern, denoting a style that is more ornamental than modernism, and which borrows from previous architectural styles, often in a playful or ironic fashion. ... Post-structuralism encompasses the intellectual developments of continental philosophers and critical theorists that wrote with tendencies of twentieth-century French philosophy. ... Deconstruction is a term in contemporary philosophy, literary criticism, and the social sciences, denoting a process by which the texts and languages of Western philosophy (in particular) appear to shift and complicate in meaning when read in light of the assumptions and absences they reveal within themselves. ...