Culture, no doubt, was born with man. The need to comprehend the world and oneself, to influence reality, to develop some experience for future generations distinguishes a person from all other representatives of wildlife. Culture in the broad sense is the way of human existence in this world, and cultural universals are its peculiar systematization.
Culture code
Each community has its own norms, values, beliefs, ideas and stereotypes - its own set of codes that determines the perception of reality and dictates human behavior in a particular situation. People pass this experience on to the next generation - this is how history flows. But in each particular culture (people, nation, state) there are realities and related concepts that are common to all people on the planet.
The unifying beginning
Cultural universals are a kind of generalization of the experience of civilization. No matter what nationality a person belongs to, no matter what time he is born, whatever views and ideas he adheres to and no matter what social environment he belongs to, there is a certain system of signs that encodes common ideas for all people on Earth about the world and about interaction with him. This happens because all representatives of the human race are arranged according to the same biological laws, have the same needs, they are all equal in front of the tasks that nature sets before them.
The word "universal" came to us from medieval philosophy, as the sages of the past denoted general concepts. The term “cultural universals” contains the same meaning: universal cultural features that are characteristic of all representatives of humanity.
Examples of cultural universals
All people on Earth have a need for procreation and care for life and safety. In this regard, in culture there are ideas about kinship, about the requirements of hygiene, about ways to optimize labor. Without exception, all people are born and die: all peoples have traditions and rituals that accompany these two great processes. People tend to need to survive not one by one, but together. Therefore, all the inhabitants of the planet have customs associated with living together: division of labor, cooperation, greetings and goodbyes, etc. All people are united by the ability to laugh and cry, sleep, eat, show physical activity, etc. Around these categories certain material and spiritual activities of people. Its fruits are cultural universals. Examples are names, family ties, communication, education, professional association, technology, cosmogony, fortune telling, calendar, hygiene, cooking, games, dancing, clothing and body jewelry, decorative art, religion, social self-determination, politics, etc.
The matrix is one - the content is different
However, it should be understood that within each individual culture, the content of a cultural universal is specific. All peoples have a custom to start a family, but some consider their age to be 18 years old, while others can marry a girl at 8 years old. Or, for example, in different cultures the nature of funeral rites can vary significantly, although the very existence of funeral customs, symbols, and rules exists everywhere.
George Murdoch
The famous anthropologist who devoted his life to the study of man - his origin and interaction with the environment, was early imbued with the greatest interest in the cultures of the peoples of the planet. The scientist was about twenty-four years old when he traveled around the world, after which he began to study at Yale Research University in the United States the features of traditional cultures of tribes and peoples. Together with colleagues, Murdoch created an impressive database of world culture and classified elements inherent in representatives of all cultures, which are nothing more than cultural universals. The list, which includes more than eighty categories, is replenished with the development of civilization. Cultural universals were studied by famous ethnographers, anthropologists and sociologists - Bronislaw Malinowski, Adolf Bastian, Leslie White, Clark Wissler, Emil Durkheim, Marcel Moss, Georg Simmel, Talcott Parsons.
