Judea Warri E.
Alvior
MAED-Social Studies
WRITTEN REPORT
TITLE OF THE REPORT: WHAT IS
CULTURE? (The Scientific Theory of Culture
by Bronislaw Malinowski)
"The culture is the integral whole consisting of
implements and consumers' goods, of
constitutional characters for various social
groupings, of human ideas and crafts, beliefs
and customs" An anthropologist confronts a vast
apparatus when he considers any culture
whether primitive or complex. This cultural
apparatus as Malinowski has said… "Partly
material, partly human and partly spiritual, by
which man is able to cope with the concrete,
specific problems that face him." The problems
in question are mere manifestations of the
organic needs of the human body. The problems
set by man's nutritive, reproductive and hygienic
needs require to be solved and hence
construction of a new artificial environment.
This particular environment Malinowski calls
culture.
Malinowski had a set of ideas, which he
used to guide his approach to cultural behavior.
These statements show that Malinowski’s
concept of culture included material culture,
concrete categories of human activity and
constitutional charters for social groups, and
beliefs.
A. The first category, i.e., material-culture
includes implements and consumer
goods. These were artifacts or physical
objects. They were the products of
human actions and were instrumental in
satisfying human needs.
B. The second component, i.e., concrete
categories of human activity, is covered
by the term custom, which included
elements of social organization.
C. The third component, i.e., constitutional
charters for social groups and beliefs,
included cultural objects and also some
aspects of social organization.
The above description shows that
Malinowski treated culture as almost everything
that concerned human life and action and that it
was not a part of human organism as a
physiological system. For Malinowski, culture
was that form of behavior which individuals
learnt and held in common and passed on to
other individuals. It included also the material
culture linked with such learned patterns of
behavior.
Malinowski drew a line of distinction
between material objects on the one hand and
customs, beliefs and social groupings on the
other. Material objects functioned as implements
and consumer goods. Customs, beliefs and
social groupings were properties of those
individuals who were involved in socio-cultural
behavior. Malinowski in a way used ‘culture’ as
equivalent to society or social system.
Malinowski states that for him culture
comprises inherited artifacts, goods, technical
processes, ideas, habits, and values. Moreover,
besides social organization the concept of
culture also includes the set of forces colliding
on the individual born into each society. For
Malinowski this idea of the “social heritage” is
the key concept of cultural anthropology. He
was convinced that human beings have
biological needs that culture satisfies, that
culture is an instrumental reality derived from
human needs: "...rites, beliefs, and customs,
however extraordinary they appear to an
observer, it actually fill 'needs' whether
biological, psychological, and social.” Each
culture represents for him a closed system, and
therefore all cultures are comparable.
Malinowski added the concept of individual
and group survival to that of individual impulse.
He constructed a model of types of needs. It
comprised three types, namely, basic, derived an
integrative needs.
Basic Needs
The basic needs focused on the conditions
essential to both individual and group survival.
The table of basic needs is as follows:
Basic Needs Cultural Responses
Metabolism Food Supplies
Reproduction Kinship
Bodily comforts Shelter
Safety Protection
Movement Activities
Growth Training
Health Hygiene
Culture, in terms of the table of ‘basic needs’, References
has the value of biological survival. This may be
described as ‘primary determinism’. Malinowski, Bronislaw L. The Scientific Theory
of Culture. Pp. 36-42
Derived Needs
The human being’s life as a social creature www.sociologyguide.com.ph
brings about a ‘secondary determinism’. You
can also say that for the satisfaction of basic
needs culture creates its own needs. These are,
according to Malinowski ‘derived needs’ or
imperatives:

Need Response
Requirements of
maintenance
of cultural apparatus Economics

Regulation of human
behavior Social Control

Socialization Education

Exercise of authority Political Organization

These derived needs or imperatives do not

however include all imperatives established
among human beings. The young of many
animals can also be taught these rules. But none,
except human beings, have the ability to
transmit them to their young. No doubt, apes are
able to ‘teach’ their young how to behave and in
this sense they have rules. This happens only
when habit changes into custom.

Integrative Needs
Human social life is characterized by what
Malinowski calls the ‘integrative imperatives’.
Through integrative imperatives, habit is
converted into custom, care of children into the
training of the next generation and impulses into
values. The phenomena such as tradition,
normative standards or values, religion, art,
language and other forms of symbolism belong,
according to Malinowski, to the sphere of
integrative imperatives. In other words, we find
that for Malinowski the essence of human
culture is contained in symbolism or in values.

Malinowski’s Concept of Culture

According to Malinowski culture is an
instrument which enables man to secure his bio-
psychic survival and a higher mental-intellectual
survival. Since each aspect of culture, whether it
is economic organization or social organization
or religion or language is rooted in the needs of
the human being, they are all interrelated to each
other through the common ground in which they
are rooted—the human being with his needs.