8.3 Environmental Inequality and Culture
Kimberly Puttman and Avery Temple
The environmental crisis is a social problem because people contribute to the problem and experience it differently based on their race, class, gender, and ability among other social locations. A portion of this inequality is historically rooted in the destruction of culture caused by colonialism. To understand this, we must define both culture and colonialism.
In every interaction, we all adhere to various rules, expectations, and standards that are created and maintained in our specific culture. In Chapter 1, we learned that these social norms have meanings and expectations. When we do not meet those expectations, we may receive some form of disapproval. For example, someone trying to connect with you may ask: “What do you think of the weather we’re having?” A common response in Oregon might be, “I’m so tired of the rain.” If you ignored the question, you would be violating a norm. Alternatively, if you responded with your detailed analysis of climate change, you would also violate the norm of a “greeting.” These norms and the norm violations are concrete examples of culture.
Culture is the shared beliefs, values, and practices that are transmitted within a social group. Culture includes:
- shared values,
- beliefs that strengthen the values,
- norms, and rules that maintain the values,
- language so that the values can be taught,
- symbols that form the language people must learn,
- arts and artifacts,
- people’s collective identities and memories.
We examine social situations to discover the expectations for norms and behaviors. People who interact within a shared culture create and enforce these expectations. Sociologists examine these circumstances and search for patterns.
Enculturation and Cultural Universals
Anthropologist Edward Tyler (1871) was one of the earliest social scientists to define culture, stating that it was “that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits” that people learn from other members of their group. In other words, culture is taught and learned. Anthropologists call the process of learning culture enculturation.
A Western example of enculturation is the belief that we must work to earn the right to live. Children are taught from a young age that we must work jobs until we are old to afford our basic necessities, such as food, shelter, water, and belonging within our communities. This is steadily reinforced throughout adolescence and into adulthood through toys, media, job fairs, career days, and paychecks.
All cultures have to solve similar problems: how to find enough to eat, how to raise children, how to care for the sick, and how to memorialize those who have died. Although cultures vary, they also share common elements. Cultural universals are patterns or traits that are globally common to all societies (Murdock 1949).
One example of a cultural universal is the family u