• What we eat, when we eat and how we eat is an example of cultural differences
– Some Asian cultures eat with the right hand, East Asian cultures use chopsticks, Western cultures use knife, fork and a spoon.
– Certain foods are considered delicacies by some cultures, unclean and unfit for consumption by others. E.g. shrimp, snails, worms, insects, etc.
• Voice-tone and level are very culturally specific.
• Body gestures-Japanese bowing, Western shaking hands, tipping of the hat
• Various marriage customs-intermarriage is accepted in some societies, but not others

• Chapulines (grasshoppers) in the Market in Oaxaca, Mexico

•
Habit -a repetitive act by an individual.
•
Custom -when an entire group does it.
•
Tradition -the same as a custom-the term implies longevity.
•
Folk culture -the enduring, traditional practices of a people.
• Popular culture -the rapidly changing tastes and customs of a group.

Folk or Local Culture:
A group of people in a particular place who see themselves as a collective or a community, who share experiences, customs, and traits, and who work to preserve those traits and customs in order to claim uniqueness and to distinguish themselves from others.

The Hutterites are an example of a local culture.
Hutterite Colonies in North America

Why are
Hutterite colonies located where they are?

Popular Culture:
A wide-ranging group of heterogeneous people, who stretch across identities and across the world, and who embrace cultural traits such as music, dance, clothing, and food preference that change frequently and are ubiquitous on the cultural landscape.
Madonna wearing a red string Kabbalah bracelet.

• Kenya and India-
November is the most popular month for weddings.
• Wedding day, the
Maasai bride is led to her new home by her family where she is given a new name. The
Indian couple have Sikh ceremony at 7 am and a
Hindu wedding at 11:30 am
• Gifts-Kenya-cattle, India statues of Ganesha, a elephant-headed deity to bring luck

How do cultural traits diffuse?
Hearth: the point of origin of a cultural trait.
Contagious diffusion
Hierarchical diffusion

Employing the concept of hierarchical diffusion, describe how you first became a
“knower” of your favorite kind of music – where is its hearth, and how did it reach you?

Local cultures are sustained by maintaining customs.
Custom:
a practice that a group of people routinely follows.

Material and Nonmaterial Culture
Material Culture
The things a group of people construct, such as art, houses, clothing, sports, dance, and food.
Nonmaterial Culture
The beliefs, practices, aesthetics, and values of a group of people.
Examples-religion, language, traditions & customs

Local Cultures often have two goals:
1. keeping other cultures out to avoid assimilation . (ie. create a boundary around itself)
2. keeping their own culture in. (ie. avoid cultural appropriation -the adoption of customs by other cultures)

What role does place play in maintaining customs?
By defining a place (a town or a neighborhood) or a space for a short amount of time (an annual festival) as representing a culture and its values, members of a local culture can maintain (or reestablish) its customs and reinforce its beliefs.

Rural Local Cultures
• Migration into rural areas is less frequent.
• Can better separate their culture from others and from popular culture.
(Amish, Mennonites,
Hutterites & Mormons have done this
• Can define their own space.
• Daily life my be defined by a shared economic activity.

Makah (Neah Bay, Washington)
Why did the Makah reinstate the whale hunt?
To reinvigorate the local culture.

Little Sweden, USA (Lindsborg, KS)
Why did the residents of
Lindsborg define it as a
Swedish place?
Neolocalism : seeking out the regional culture and reinvigorating it in
response to the uncertainty of the
modern world.

Urban Local Cultures
• Can create ethnic neighborhoods within cities.
• Creates a space to practice customs.
• Can cluster businesses, houses of worship, schools to support local culture.
• Migration into ethnic neighborhoods can quickly change an ethnic neighborhood. ie: Williamsburg, NY, North End
(Boston), MA

NYC Marathon Runners in Williamsburg, (Brooklyn), NY

Commodification
How are aspects of local culture (material, nonmaterial, place) commodified? what is commodified? who commodifies it?

Authenticity
Claims of authenticity abound – how do consumers determine what experience/place is
“authentic” and what is not?

Irish Pub Company Pubs
Irish Pub Company and Guinness Brewing Company created 5 models of pubs and export them around the world.

Little Bridge Pub in Dingle, Ireland (not an Irish Pub
Company Pub)

How are hearths of popular culture traits established?
• Typically begins with an idea/good and contagious diffusion.
• Companies can create/manufacture popular culture.
(ie. MTV)
• Individuals can create/manufacture popular culture.
(ie. Tony Hawk)-video games involving extreme sports popularized skateboarding and other sports.

The hearth of Phish concerts is in the northeastern United
States, near where the band began in Vermont.

With Distance Decay, the likelihood of diffusion decreases as time and distance from the hearth increases.
With Time-Space Compression, the likelihood of diffusion depends upon the connectedness among places.
Which applies more to popular culture?

Why are popular culture traits usually diffused hierarchically?
How is fashion in popular culture an example of hierarchical diffusion?

•
Reterritorialization of popular culture occurs when an aspect of popular culture is modified to adapt locally-e.g. Japanese baseball, European
Hip Hop-MC Solaar-France, Die Fantastischen
Vier-Germany, Jovanatti-Italy.

•
Syncretism -a fusion of old and new to create a new cultural trait-this concept is similar to reterritorialization.
• The examples below are foreign foods that have been modified to fit American tastes.

Brazil , the McCalabresa is a hamburger-sized slab of pepperoni on a bun.
Quebecois McDonald's patrons can get McPoutine.
Greece, burgers in pita bread with yogurt sauce, tomato, lettuce & onions Greek Mac.
Israelis get to enjoy McShawarma and McCabe.
Japan Tamago Double Mac—two beef patties, pepper sauce, bacon. and a poached egg.
Pakistanis McChutney Burger and Poland's McKielbasa.”

• The influence of Europe, the US and Japan in global popular culture makes many people feel threatened.
• France’s govt. subsidizes the French film industry and sets limits on foreign music on the radio

• The imprint of people on the land-how humans use, alter and manipulate the landscape to express their identity.
• Examples;
– Architecture of buildings
– Methods of tilling the soil
– Means of transportation
– Clothing and adornment
– Sights, sounds and smells of a place

Cultural Landscape
The visible human imprint on the landscape.
How have people changed the landscape?
- What buildings, statues, and so forth have they erected?
- How do landscapes reflect the values of a culture?

The cultural landscape is fashioned from a natural landscape by a cultural group. Culture is the agent, the natural area the medium, the cultural landscape is the result. Under the influence of a given culture, itself changing through time, the landscape undergoes development, passing through phases, and probably reaching ultimately the end of its cycle of development. With the introduction of a different-that-is alien culture, a rejuvenation of the cultural landscape sets in, or a new landscape is superimposed on remnants of an older one.
Carl Sauer, 1925

Convergence of Cultural Landscapes:
• The widespread distribution of businesses and products creates distinctive landscape stamps around the world.
• What are some other examples of businesses that can be found around the world?

Convergence of Cultural Landscapes:
• Diffusion of architectural forms and planning ideas around the world.

Convergence of Cultural Landscapes:
• Borrowing of idealized landscape images blurs place distinctiveness.-right
Las Vegas, Nevada-below
Toronto, Canada

Placelessness: the loss of uniqueness in a cultural landscape – one place looks like the next.

House Types
• Kniffen’s traditional
American house types:
New England
Mid-Atlantic
Southern Tidewater

• The New England “Large” house is a modern adaptation of a Yankee folk house that added a wing as the style migrated westward. It is a 2 ½ story house built around a central chimney.

•
The Georgian Style (1700-1800) used Renaissance inspired classical symmetry. Typically it was 2 rooms deep and 2 rooms high with end chimneys and pilasters around the door.

• The “Cape Cod” style dwelling from New England features a steep roof with side gables and a symmetrical layout with the door in the center.

• The Victorian or Queen Anne style of architecture was dominant in the United States from 1880 to 1900.

• The Tudor Revival (1910-1940) became popular in suburban areas in the 1920s. The style is loosely based on
Medieval construction.

• The “bungalow” (1900-1920) was supposedly a modified version of an Indian rural vernacular form. The bungalow typically has a low-pitched roof with wide overhang eaves.

• This narrow home fits easily on small city lots. In the
Midwest this version of the “bungalow” is known as the
“Chicago bungalow” style.

• This “California Ranch” with all rooms on one level takes up a larger lot and has encouraged urban sprawl.

• Commonly built in the 1950s and 1960s, this style of home is an good example of maladaptive diffusion since it was intended for the year round living of southern
California .