DiffusionSyncretismTrobriand Cricket

• When British missionaries pressed Trobriand Islanders to celebrate their yam harvests with a game of cricket rather than traditional “wild” dances, Trobrianders transformed the staid British sport into an event that featured sexual chants and dances between innings. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jTP7a9I0dU -10 min

Cultural LossAbandonment of an existing practice or trait

• Example: – In ancient times wagons

were used in northern Africa and southwestern Asia, but wheeled vehicles disappeared from Morocco to Afghanistan about 1,500 years ago.

– They were replaced by camels due to their endurance, longevity, ability to ford rivers and traverse rough ground.

– While a wagon required a man for every two animals, one person manage six camels.

Question

• The spread of cultural elements from one culture to another is called ______________

A. cold fusion.B. transfusion.C. diffusion.D. bifusion.E. confusion.

Answer: C

• The spread of cultural elements from one culture to another is called diffusion.

Question

• In biblical times, chariots and carts were widespread in the Middle East, but by the 6th century roads had deteriorated so much that wheeled vehicles were replaced by camels. This illustrates that cultural change is sometimes due to

• a. primary invention.• b. secondary invention.• c. diffusion.• d. revitalization.• e. cultural loss.

Answer: E

• In biblical times, chariots and carts were widespread in the Middle East, but by the 6th century roads had deteriorated so much that wheeled vehicles were replaced by camels. This illustrates that cultural change is sometimes due to cultural loss.

Repressive ChangePeople don’t always have the liberty to make their own choices and changes are forced upon them by some other

group, in the course of conquest and colonialism.• Acculturation

– Culture changes that people are forced to make as a consequence of intensive, firsthand contact between societies.

• Ethnocide– Violent eradication of an ethnic group’s cultural identity; occurs when a

dominant society sets out to destroy another society’s cultural heritage.

• Genocide– Extermination of one people by another, in the name of “progress,”

either as a deliberate act or as the accidental outcome of activities carried out by people with little regard for their impact on others.

Repressive Change: GenocideEthnographic Examples

• Two examples of attempted genocide in the 20th century: Hitler’s Germany against Jews and Gypsies in the 1930s and the 1940s; and Hutus against Tutsis in Rwanda, as in this 1994 massacre.

Repressive Change: GenocideCivil War in Darfur (ex from Ch. 12)

Example: http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/places/countries-places/sudan/sudan_overview.htmlDarfur (part of Sudan). Also see for more info: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/15/opinion/15iht-edofahey_ed3_.html?pagewanted=1. Emmanual Jal (Child soldier in Sudan):

http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/places/countries-places/sudan/sudan_thewarchild.html

Escaping Repressive ChangeInternational Refugees

Opposition of ChangeTradition

• In a modernizing society, old cultural practices, which may oppose new forces of differentiation and integration.

Opposition of ChangeRevitalization Movements

• A movement that forms in an attempt to deliberately bring about change in a society– Usually occurs when a dominating culture overwhelms (politically, socially,

economically) a subordinate one.– Introduction of items/technologies to the subordinate culture might mean the

destruction of the culture and assimilation into the dominating culture.– If people from the subordinating culture survive, they are more often than not living

on the fringes of the dominating society and are demoralized (their worldview, culture, mythology has either been destroyed or changed so radically as to be unrecognizable).

– Revitalization movements then occur• Ex: Celtic revival in Ireland

Opposition of ChangeRebellion and Revolution

• Rebellion – Organized armed resistance to an established

government or authority in power.• Revolution– Sudden and radical change in a society or culture. In the

political arena, it refers to the forced overthrow of an old government and establishment of a completely new one.

– A revolution is a more severe and total change than a rebellion.

Rebellion and RevolutionConditions

1. Loss of prestige of established authority.2. Threat to recent economic improvement. 3. Indecisiveness of government. 4. Loss of support of the intellectual class. 4. A leader or group of leaders with enough

charisma or popular appeal to mobilize the population against the establishment.

Rebellion and RevolutionArmed Conflict

Rebellion and RevolutionChild Soldiers

(Slide from Ch 12)

• Today, there are more than 250,000 child soldiers, many as young as 12 years old. Among them are these boys training to be guerrillas in Sahel, Eritrea.

• Emmanual Jal (Child soldier in Sudan):– http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/places/countries-places/sudan/

sudan_thewarchild.htmlMore on the Civil War in the Darfur area of Sudan…

Modernization

• Modernization refers to a process of change by which traditional, nonindustrial societies acquire characteristics of technologically complex societies.

• Accelerated modernization interconnecting all parts of the world is known as Globalization.

Modernization Subprocesses

1. Technological development2. Agricultural development3. Industrialization4. Urbanization