Culture

Abstract

In its most general sense, culture refers to the sum of all products of human activity. Human beings shape pre-existing things, produce innovations as part of their collective way of life, and transmit them to the next generation. In contrast to other primates, humans are biologically dependent on culture. ‘A culture’ most usually is used to describe the way of life of a group that is different from that of another (national, religious, language, spatial) group. Whereas culture is seen holistically as an encompassing phenomenon in anthropology, in the humanities it is mostly conceived as a component or functional subsystem in the social sciences. In current global interactions, culture is often used as an economic asset and as a political means to include and exclude people or ideas. With a concept of culture that focuses more on commonalities than difference, we could empirically find a common humanity within the diversity of cultures.