Culture

In social science, foodways are the cultural, social, and economic practices relating to the production and consumption of food. Foodways often refers to the intersection of food in culture, traditions, and history.

Ethnography is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. It explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnography is also a type of social research that involves examining the behavior of the participants in a given social situation and understanding the group members' own interpretation of such behavior.

Ethnography is a form of inquiry that relies heavily on participant observation. In this method, the researcher participates in the setting or with the people being studied, often in a marginal role, to document detailed patterns of social interaction and the perspectives of participants within their local contexts. It had its origin in social and cultural anthropology in the early twentieth century, but has, since then, spread to other social science disciplines, notably sociology.

A festival is an event celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or Eid. A festival constitutes typical cases of glocalization, as well as the high culture-low culture interrelationship. Next to religion and folklore, a significant origin is agricultural. Food is such a vital resource that many festivals are associated with harvest time. Religious commemoration and thanksgiving for good harvests are blended in events that take place in autumn, such as Halloween in the northern hemisphere and Easter in the southern.

Festivals often serve to fulfill specific communal purposes, especially in regard to commemoration or thanking to the gods, goddesses or saints: they are called patronal festivals. They may also provide entertainment, which was particularly important to local communities before the advent of mass-produced entertainment. Festivals that focus on cultural or ethnic topics also seek to inform community members of their traditions; the involvement of elders sharing stories and experience provides a means for unity among families. Attendants of festivals are often motivated by a desire for escapism, socialization and camaraderie; the practice has been seen as a means of creating geographical connection, belonging and adaptability.

Morality (from Latin moralitas 'manner, character, proper behavior') is the categorization of intentions, decisions and actions into those that are proper, or right, and those that are improper, or wrong. Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy, religion or culture, or it can derive from a standard that is understood to be universal. Morality may also be specifically synonymous with "goodness", "appropriateness" or "rightness".

Moral philosophy includes meta-ethics, which studies abstract issues such as moral ontology and moral epistemology, and normative ethics, which studies more concrete systems of moral decision-making such as deontological ethics and consequentialism. An example of normative ethical philosophy is the Golden Rule, which states: "One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself."

In religion, mythology, and fiction, a prophecy is a message that has been communicated to a person (typically called a prophet) by a supernatural entity. Prophecies are a feature of many cultures and belief systems and usually contain divine will or law, or preternatural knowledge, for example of future events. They can be revealed to the prophet in various ways depending on the religion and the story, such as visions, or direct interaction with divine beings in physical form. Stories of prophetic deeds sometimes receive considerable attention and some have been known to survive for centuries through oral tradition or as religious texts.

Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and between them and their in-laws. It is nearly a cultural universal, but the definition of marriage varies between cultures and religions, and over time. Typically, it is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually sexual, are acknowledged or sanctioned. In some cultures, marriage is recommended or considered to be compulsory before pursuing sexual activity. A marriage ceremony is called a wedding, while a private marriage is sometimes called an elopement.

Around the world, there has been a general trend towards ensuring equal rights for women and ending discrimination and harassment against couples who are interethnic, interracial, interfaith, interdenominational, interclass, intercommunity, transnational, and same-sex as well as immigrant couples, couples with an immigrant spouse, and other minority couples. Debates persist regarding the legal status of married women, leniency towards violence within marriage, customs such as dowry and bride price, marriageable age, and criminalization of premarital and extramarital sex. Individuals may marry for several reasons, including legal, social, libidinal, emotional, financial, spiritual, cultural, economic, political, religious, sexual, and romantic purposes. In some areas of the world, arranged marriage, forced marriage, polygyny marriage, polyandry marriage, group marriage, coverture marriage, child marriage, cousin marriage, sibling marriage, teenage marriage, avunculate marriage, incestuous marriage, and bestiality marriage are practiced and legally permissible, while others areas outlaw them to protect human rights. Female age at marriage has proven to be a strong indicator for female autonomy and is continuously used by economic history research.

A funeral is a ceremony connected with the final disposition of a corpse, such as a burial or cremation, with the attendant observances. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember and respect the dead, from interment, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honour. Customs vary between cultures and religious groups. For a dedicated overview of contemporary Australian practices, see Funeral rituals and trends in Australia. Funerals have both normative and legal components. Common secular motivations for funerals include mourning the deceased, celebrating their life, and offering support and sympathy to the bereaved; additionally, funerals may have religious aspects that are intended to help the soul of the deceased reach the afterlife, resurrection or reincarnation.

The funeral usually includes a ritual through which the corpse receives a final disposition. Depending on culture and religion, these can involve either the destruction of the body (for example, by cremation, sky burial, decomposition, disintegration or dissolution) or its preservation (for example, by mummification). Differing beliefs about cleanliness and the relationship between body and soul are reflected in funerary practices. A memorial service (service of remembrance or celebration of life) is a funerary ceremony that is performed without the remains of the deceased person. In both a closed casket funeral and a memorial service, photos of the deceased representing stages of life would be displayed on an altar. Relatives or friends would give out eulogies in both services as well.

Sacred groves, sacred woods, or sacred forests are groves of trees that have special religious importance within a particular culture. Sacred groves feature in various cultures throughout the world. These are forest areas that are, for the most part, untouched by local people and often protected by local communities. They often play a critical role in protecting water sources and biodiversity, including essential resources for the groups that protect them.

They were important features of the mythological landscape and cult practice of Celtic, Estonian, Baltic, Germanic, ancient Greek, Near Eastern, Roman, and Slavic polytheism. They are also found in locations such as India (Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu), Japan (sacred shrine forests), China (Fengshui woodland), West Africa and Ethiopia (church forests). Examples of sacred groves include the Greco-Roman temenos, various Germanic words for sacred groves, and the Celtic nemeton, which was largely but not exclusively associated with Druidic practice.

Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art [cf. pop art] or mass art, sometimes contrasted with fine art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a society at a given point in time. Popular culture also encompasses the activities and feelings produced as a result of interaction with these dominant objects. Mass media, marketing, and the imperatives of mass appeal within capitalism constitute the primary engines of Western popular culture—a system philosopher Theodor Adorno critically termed the 'culture industry'.

Heavily influenced in modern times by mass media, this collection of ideas permeates the everyday lives of people in a given society. Therefore, popular culture has a way of influencing an individual's attitudes towards certain topics. However, there are various ways to define pop culture. Because of this, popular culture is something that can be defined in a variety of conflicting ways by different people across different contexts. It is generally viewed in contrast to other forms of culture such as folk culture, working-class culture, or high culture, and also from different academic perspectives such as psychoanalysis, structuralism, postmodernism, and more. The common pop-culture categories are entertainment (such as film, music, television, literature and video games), sports, news (as in people/places in the news), politics, fashion, technology, and slang.

Greeting is an act of communication in which human beings intentionally make their presence known to each other, to show attention to, and to suggest a type of relationship (usually cordial) or social status (formal or informal) between individuals or groups of people coming in contact with each other. Greetings are sometimes used just prior to a conversation or to greet in passing, such as on a sidewalk or trail. While greeting customs are highly culture- and situation-specific and may change within a culture depending on social status and relationship, they exist in all known human cultures. Greetings can be expressed both audibly and physically, and often involve a combination of the two. This topic excludes military and ceremonial salutes but includes rituals other than gestures. A greeting, or salutation, can also be expressed in written communications, such as letters and emails.

Some epochs and cultures have had very elaborate greeting rituals, e.g. greeting a sovereign. Conversely, secret societies have often furtive or arcane greeting gestures and rituals, such as a secret handshake, which allows members to recognize each other.