Processes of Change

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Chapter 26

• Processes of Change

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Chapter Preview

• Why Do Cultures Change?
• How Do Cultures Change?
• What Is Modernization?

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Why Do Cultures Change?

• All cultures change.
• Some changes may be unforeseen, unplanned, and
  undirected.
• Changes will result in existing values and
  behavior changes.
• This may even involve the massive imposition of
  foreign ideas and practices through conquest of
  one group by another.

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How Do Cultures Change?

• The mechanisms of culture change include all of
  the following
• Innovation
• Diffusion
• Cultural Loss
• Acculturation/Ethnocide
• Genocide
• Directed Change

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Innovation

• This is the ultimate source of change in all
  societies.
• Innovation is any new idea, method, or device
  that gains widespread acceptance in the society.
• Can be primary innovation- chance, discovery, or
  invention of completely new idea, method, or
  device.
• Can also be secondary innovation- a deliberate
  application or modification of an existing idea,
  method, or device.

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Diffusion

• Diffusion is the spread of ideas, customs, or
  practices from one culture to another.
• Cultures that are geographically close in
  proximity are known to have a lot of diffusion
  between them.
• Travel, trade, modern communication can all help
  diffusion to occur and slowly change certain
  aspects of a culture.

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Cultural Loss

• When cultural loss occurs or the abandonment of
  an existing practice or trait it can often be
  replaced with a new practice or technology.
• This replacement can result in cultural change,
  although not all cultural losses result in a
  replacement.
• If a trait is lost and not replaced it can hinder
  a cultures growth and thus still causing a change.

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Repressive ChangeAcculturation and Ethnocide

• Massive culture change that occurs in a society
  when it experiences contact with a more powerful
  society is known as acculturation.
• This can lead to a forced change (often
  ethnocide) or change by power alone.
• In other words the change is inevitable because
  the stronger culture will force change onto the
  weaker culture.3

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Ethnocide Genocide

• Not all acculturation is violently forced as
  mentioned. However ethnocide is certainly a
  violent eradication of an ethnic groups cultural
  identity.
• May include the killing of people which is better
  known as genocide- the physical extermination of
  people by another outside group.
• Hitler's Germany Nazi regime is the most well
  known example of genocide.

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Directed Change

• Genocide and ethnocide are not focused on
  change rather eradication of a group of people.
• Directed change can often be seen when colonial
  entities attempt to help indigenous peoples.
• Often these powerful forces do not handle or
  assist the weaker groups in a positive way,
  whether their intentions were good or not.
• Due to a lack of understanding of native cultural
  practices and life ways.

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Response to Repressive Change

• Inevitably there is some type of response of
  indigenous peoples to the changes that have been
  thrust upon them
• Two documented responses to this type of change
  are tradition and syncretism.

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Tradition Syncretism

• Tradition- the customary ideas and practices
  passed down from generation to the next, which in
  a modernizing society may form an obstacle to new
  ways of doing things.
• Syncretism- in acculturation, change is the
  creative blending of indigenous and foreign
  beliefs and practices into new cultural forms.
• Trobriand Islanders embracing European Cricket
  with their own style is a great example of
  syncretism.

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Revitalization Movements

• As discussed in the chapter on religion and
  spirituality, revitalization movements can be
  used as a mechanism of change.
• Most commonly a reaction to repressive change-
  cargo cults are an example of this.

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Rebellion and Revolution

• If societal discontent reaches its boiling point
  one can witness rebellion and or revolution.
• Rebellion
• Organized armed resistance to an established
  government or authority in power.
• Revolution
• 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.

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Conditions for Rebellion and Revolution

• Factors that lead to resistance or overthrow of
  government
• Loss of prestige of established authority.
• Threat to recent economic improvement.
• Indecisiveness of government.
• Loss of support of the intellectual class.
• A leader or group of leaders with enough charisma
  or popular appeal to mobilize the population
  against the establishment.

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Modernization

• Modernization is the process of cultural and
  socioeconomic change, whereby developing
  societies acquire some of the characteristics of
  Western industrialized societies.
• This process can be best understood by looking at
  the five sub processes of modernization.

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Subprocesses of Modernization

1. Technological development
2. Agricultural development
3. Urbanization
4. Industrialization
5. Telecommunication

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Globalization

• The western view has held that non-western
  societies should be able to reach and maintain a
  level of living close to that of westerners.
• The reality is that the global population can not
  consume at the rate of westerners.
• A depletion of non-renewable resources will be
  inevitable and quick.