Elements of Culture

3. The belief systems that help people make sense of the world, understand their place in it, and provide moral guidance.
7. expresses cultural identity, with music, dance, theater, and visual arts reflecting a culture's history, traditions, and values.
9. focuses on individual achievement and critical thinking, or emphasizes group harmony and respect for authority in others.
10. mechanisms used to enforce cultural norms and values.
13. the beliefs, behaviors, values, traditions, and symbols that are shared and learned by a group of people.
15. promote health, build community, and express cultural pride.
16. serves as a precursor to marriage, which is another nearly universal cultural institution.

1. significant events such as harvests, births, weddings, and religious observances with festivals and ceremonies.
2. provide care, socialization, and support, and they are central to identity formation.
4. an abstract system of words, symbols, and gestures used to communicate and reflect a culture's history, values, and worldview.
5. traditional structures like igloos, yurts, and adobe houses to modern apartments and houses.
6. celebrates the coexistence of diverse cultures within a community.
8. protects us from the elements and carries symbolic meaning.
11. Exchange, involves sharing ideas, customs, and practices between different cultures.
12. collective conceptions of what is considered proper or improper in a culture that guide behavior and decision-making.
14. sustains life but also serves social, cultural, and even religious functions.
17. established standards of behavior maintained by society.