... culture
is one of the two or three most complicated words
in the English language (87)
Over the last 50 or 60 years, culture has taken on new inflections
mdash;or rather inflected older senses and meanings—
many of which embody its current association
with digital computational tools
(Raymond Wlliams 1983)
Culture is a personal Keyword that first arose in my mind via the image on the cover of Ruth Benedict's Patterns of Culture on my mother's desk, instantiating the clear notion of variety among Homo sapiens. Multiple visits to the Peabody Museum (just a few hundred yards from 42 Quincy St) and the National Geographic trove in the attic gave flesh and bone to that image of humanity, and was surely instrumental in my undergraduate concentration in Anthropology. Also influential was The Family of Man (1955), to which I still return as photographer and as anthropologist.
I don't remember that there was any discussion of explicit senses of culture in either my undergraduate study or my graduate training. My undergraduate research assistant gig in the production of Robert B Textor's A Cross-Cultural Summary dealt with data on 400 named cultures, though 'ethnicities' might have been a better general term in the mid-1960s context. And Peace Corps in Sarawak facilitated a beginning and superficial acquaintance with Iban language and culture...
But it wasn't until my PhD Oral in 1971 that George Spindler asked the Question
by which I was simply struck dumb. I fumbled an answer, but had to admit that I just didn't know what to say. Spindler let me off, but there I was having nothing well-considered to say about THE central concept of Anthropology... and I've been working ever since on answers to the koan-like question. What is my idea/understanding/explication of the concept? Here I want to gather up and massage into coherence the elements of an Answer to George Spindler.
Attributes of Culture anthropologyguide
Eidos
eidetic Merriam-Webstereidos, eidetic, eidolon! edStuff/eteche (2011)
...eidos (n): "the formal sum of a culture, its intellectual character, ideas, etc."...eidetic — which means both "marked by extraordinarily accurate and vivid recall" and "pertaining to the faculty of projecting images" was derived from the german eidetisch, and coined by german psychologist Erich Jaensch (1883-1940) circa 1924. it also hails from the greek eidetikos — "pertaining to images" and/or "pertaining to knowledge," from eidesis (knowledge), and again from eidos (form, shape)
Eidos and eidetic numbers Bruce E. Camber, 12 December 2024
...Eidetic structure, within the earliest notations, is a term that Plato used (eidos)About Eidetic Imaging Katy Swafford
Pure Imagination has no words – beyond the world of rationality and reason lies a whole landscape of experience, creativity, and potential, waiting to be seen.The word "Eidetic" comes from the Greek word eidos, an unseen essence and eides, images that spring spontaneously in the mind
...The Eidetic image emerges on its own, springs unbidden from the center of the mind. It moves into the world through the body, mind becoming matter. Eidetic Images are, by their nature, dynamic and fluid, connecting the power of the mind with the reality of the body.
The science of the Eidetic Image is in concert with quantum principles of our time. Carried on a point of light in the eye, the image organizes the brain and its neurotransmitters, translating the sensory experience of seeing through experiencing in the body to a deep sense of knowing.
Eidetic Images open the mind to make our consciousness visible and ignite imagination. Seeing an Eidetic Image connects mind and body so we can experience what we see. The word comes from the Greek word "eidos" which is an unseen essence at the center of our being. The Greeks considered these images live beings deep with our souls. Eidetic Images are universal, they come from nature, the physical world that follow the laws of nature, and mythology the unseen spiritual world that follows the magical laws of mind.
Ethos
ethos anthrobase.comEthos Eidos and Habitus anthroholic.com
Ethos refers to the guiding beliefs or values that characterize a community or ideology. Eidos, in social sciences, signifies the distinctive characteristics of a group or culture. Habitus, a term used by Bourdieu, represents the ingrained habits, skills, and dispositions that individuals develop through life experiences, shaping their perceptions, feelings, and actions within their social world. Together, these concepts help understand social behavior and cultural identities....Ethos: Moral Fabric of Societies
Ethos, a Greek term meaning character, is employed within sociology to encapsulate the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize a community, nation, or ideology....Eidos: Ideational Forces
Eidos, another concept derived from Greek philosophy, means "form" or "essence." In sociology, it represents the collective consciousness or shared ideas and beliefs within a culture or society... Eidos impacts societal norms, language, customs, and collective behavior. It forms the "cognitive map" guiding social interactions and collective decision-making processes....Habitus: Structured and Structuring Structures
Coined by sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, Habitus refers to the deeply ingrained habits, skills, and dispositions that individuals develop in response to the objective conditions of their environment...Habitus is formed through socialization and personal experience and operates below the level of consciousness. It provides individuals with a sense of how to act and respond in various situations, shaping their behaviors, choices, and worldviews....Ethos, Eidos, and Habitus are not stand-alone concepts. Instead, they interact dynamically, contributing to the formation and perpetuation of social structures and cultural practices.
- Ethos and Eidos: Ethos (the moral fabric) and Eidos (shared beliefs) intertwine to form the cultural foundation of a society. They guide and shape the norms, behaviors, and expectations within a community.
- Eidos and Habitus: Eidos influences habitus by instilling shared beliefs and norms into individuals. Conversely, habitus, through collective practices, helps solidify and reinforce eidos within a society.
- Ethos and Habitus: Ethos informs habitus by guiding the development of attitudes and dispositions consistent with societal values. Habitus, in turn, reinforces ethos through the enactment of these values in everyday behaviors.
from Ted Striphas Algorithmic Culture Before the Internet
...The phrase Parsons and his colleagues landed on was "the ethos of a culture," which they defined as the "totality" of "patterns of basic value-orientation" prevalent within a society. The ethos, they added, gave "a distinctive 'style' or 'configuration' to all the activities of all its members and to its cultural products in thought, in art, even in utilitarian artifacts." The ethos of a culture was culture writ large—culture taken as a whole, in all its complexity.[Cliffrd Geertz's]...The Interpretation of Cultures. There, in the famous chapter in which he outlined the practice of "thick description." he referred to the "webs of significance" we human beings spin for ourselves, and within which we live out our individual and collective lives. "I take culture to be those webs," wrote Geertz, "and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning." Written at the behest of his editor at Basic Books, Geertz's intention was to summarize the whole of a theoretical and interpretive project he'd spent more than fifteen years developing. "Webs of significance," thus, was less a definition of culture than a capsule containing many, but not all, of the essential elements. (216)
...Culture is best seen not as complexes of concrete behavior patterns—customs, usages, traditions, habit clusters—as has, by and large, been the case up to now, but as a set of control mechanisms ... for the governing of behavior. (217)
...the word culture is doing exactly what it’s been doing for the last couple of centuries: shifting semantically as it encounters new technologies and other emergent aspects of reality. It baffles me why anyone would expect one of the most complicated words in the English language to cease being so complicated, and yet that’s precisely what critics who declaim the "death" of culture seem to be assuming. (225)