95743 Chap.1 Defining Culture and Identity
Defining Culture and Identity
Why definitions come first
The opening module asks what culture is before it asks how culture affects health.
The lecture compares an early list-style definition from Tylor, a symbolic definition from Banks and McGee, and the working definition the subject adopts: shared patterns of behaviour, interaction, thinking and feeling that are learned through socialisation and that both mark members and separate groups.
Visible and hidden layers
Culture is split into external, materialist components such as language, food and traditions, and internal, psychological components such as values, ideologies and gender identity.
The iceberg image reminds you that the hidden layer is larger and usually decides whether a health message lands.
Identity as a process
Identity is presented as constructed from physical and psychological elements, so one person can belong to several cultures and never conform completely to any of them.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Tylor, Banks and McGee, and the working definition
- 02
External and internal components of culture
- 03
The iceberg understanding of culture
- 04
Exclusivity and conformity
- 05
Environment, history and cultural transmission
- 06
Memes versus cultural epidemiology
- 07
Identity as construction and identity politics
Worked example · free
Test whether night-shift nurses form a culture under the working definition
- 1Shared patterns: the handover routine is a shared behaviour, the jokes are a shared pattern of interaction, and the belief about day staff is a shared way of thinking and feeling.
- 1Learned through socialisation: new staff absorb these patterns by shadowing experienced nurses, so the patterns are taught and learned, not inborn.
- 1Marks members: knowing the routine and the jokes signals that a nurse belongs to the night shift.
- 1Separates groups: the belief about day staff draws a line between insiders and outsiders, which is the exclusivity the lecture highlights.
Key terms
- Working Definition
- The subject’s view of culture as learned, shared patterns of behaviour, interaction, thinking and feeling that mark members and separate groups.
- Iceberg Model
- An image of culture in which visible external features sit above the waterline and larger internal values and beliefs sit below it.
- Meme
- Dawkins’ term for a unit of cultural information, such as a tune or a catch-phrase, that spreads from person to person by imitation.
- Cultural Epidemiology
- An approach that treats cultural information as spreading like a virus, sideways between people rather than mainly down the generations.
Defining Culture and Identity FAQ
What is the difference between external and internal components of culture?
External, or materialist, components are features an outsider can observe, such as language, food, traditions and ethnicity. Internal, or psychological, components are patterns inside people, such as thoughts, values, ideologies and gender identity. The second group is larger and harder to see, which is why the lecture uses an iceberg image.
Why does the lecture say total conformity to one culture is impossible?
Because each person belongs to several groups at once, such as a family, a profession and a community, and each asks for different patterns. Identity is built from many physical and psychological elements, so no single culture can claim all of a person, and people shift between identities depending on the setting.
How do memes and cultural epidemiology differ?
Both explain how culture spreads. The meme idea, from Dawkins in 1976, compares cultural units to genes copied by imitation. Cultural epidemiology compares them to viruses instead: information moves more sideways between people living at the same time and less down the generations. Critics call the meme a scientific-sounding idea without a scientific basis.
What does the Rokeach Value Survey have to do with culture?
The Module 1 workshop asks each student to rank two lists of 18 values from most to least important. Because the working definition places shared values and ways of thinking at the core of culture, comparing rankings shows how much a class actually shares beneath visible differences such as language or birthplace, and where its members diverge.
Assessment move
Memorise the working definition in its four parts and practise applying it to groups that are not ethnic, such as a sports club or a workplace, because quiz questions often test whether you can recognise a culture outside the obvious cases. Make a two-column list of external and internal components from the lecture and add one health example to each.
For identity, rehearse the difference between identity as a noun and identifying as a verb, and be ready to explain why it matters for how health services label people.
