CULTURE

AND
MORALITY
CULTURE
"It is that complex whole
which includes knowledge,
belief, art, morals, law,
custom, and any other It is a way of life
capabilities and habits
acquired by man as a
member of society, " Tylor,
E. (Spenceroatey, 2012)
 Types
• Formal Culture points Material Culture refers to all the physical, corporeal,
to all the abstract, solid, spatial, sensible, temporal, actual, observable
non-physical, spiritual, (visible and audible) and tangible objects such as
the artifacts, actions or behaviors, arts, buildings,
mental, immaterial,
technology, music, "popular" (television, movies,
invisible elements such mass media, social media, fads, digital gadgets),
as knowledge, costumes, architectures, food, utensils, designs,
philosophy, beliefs, dances, smell, means of transportation, tools and
ideas, morals, laws, inventions.
customs, values, As a vehicle or expression, Material Culture is
emotions, shaped by Formal Culture in the same way as the
assumptions, systems, Material Culture (e.g. popular culture) may also
orientations. shape Formal Culture (e.g. new radical religious
sects).
Cultural Relativism
• there are different cultures • It is well known by just about
and each has different ways every human on the planet
of behaving, thinking and that people do things
feeling as its members learn differently around the
globe. People dress differently,
such from the previous
eat differently, speak different
generation languages, sing different songs,
have different music and
dances and have many
different customs.
Descriptive Relativism

• in different cultures •What is thought to

one of the variants is be moral in one
the sense of morality: country may be
the mores, customs thought to be
and ethical principles
immoral and even
may all vary from one
culture to another made illegal in
another country.
 Cultural Relativism: strengths and weaknesses
strengths
It recognizes cultural and human
difference.
It promotes respect and tolerance to
diversity or cultural sensitivity and
uniqueness.
It produces a peaceful and harmonious society
despite mass migration and differences.
It rejects moral absolutism, imperialism and
superior ideologies.
weaknesses
It fails to accept that not all beliefs
and cultural or social practices are
equally admirable.
It leads to mediocrity, moral
indifference and no moral progress.
It promotes social anarchy because
each culture claims and stands for
“a true culture”
It upholds democracy, consensus,
and fairness to other ideologies.
 Cultural Relativism: strengths and weaknesses
strengths weaknesses
It promotes humility and acceptance of It promotes skepticism and atheism.
limitation or probability of things.

It recognizes the natural sociality, conformity It seems culture has the sole influence on
and interdependency among peoples human life and morality.

It strengthens personal responsibility: each is It weakens social responsibility as if humans

fully responsible or his own moral actions cannot do anything to change culture.
and beliefs.
It advocates true multiculturalism and IT leads to deterioration or corruption of
adjustments for changing factors in society. moral values, institutions and societies.
 Cultural Relativism: strengths and weaknesses
strengths
It recognizes that language is not neutral
because culture determines language.
It supports non-judgmental attitude that
foster dialogue, cooperation and learning
It allows one culture to solve its own moral
problems and grow naturally in its morality.
It accepts other ethical theories that can
bring a good life.
weaknesses
It discourages common languages for unity
and common standards to judge moral
beliefs or actions.
It makes the job of ethics as purely
descriptive. (nonprescriptive), thus,
ineffective.
It rejects any interference by one culture in
the morality of one another.
It fails to determine other ethical theories
that can bring a good life.
 Something to think about
In China, South Korea, and other parts of Asia, dog meat is considered
a delicacy, and people sometimes kill dogs to eat them (Dunlop,
2008). As one observer provocatively asked about eating dog meat,
"For a Westerner, eating it can feel a little strange, but is it morally
different from eating, say, pork? The dogs brought to table in China
are not people's pets, but are raised as food, like pigs. And pigs, of
course, are also intelligent and friendly" (Dunlop, 2008). Should we
accept the practice of eating dog meat on its own terms? Is it any
worse than eating pork or slaughtering cattle in order to eat beef? If
an Asian immigrant killed and ate a dog in the United States, should
that person be arrested for engaging in a practice the person grew up
with?
• Moral practices are basically peculiar to a society and
society changes, its culture and practices also changes.
Using changing culture as a basis for decisions and
actions is not enough and quite dangerous.
• The need for enduring belief and values as bases can
bring, more convincing and strong actions. Though
humans have different languages, they can use their
capacity for language to create a globalizing language
that all children can learn and use to study other cultures.
 examples
Acceptable in USA Immoral in

Eating beef India

Drinking alcohol, gambling Middle Eastern Islamic Countries

Women in school or business Afghanistan under the Taliban

Women wearing shorts, face Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan

uncovered
 examples
Immoral in USA Moral/acceptable

Kiling newborn females China, India

Female genital mutilation Many African nations

Family member who is Somalia, Sudan

raped
Summary

•the concept of cultural relativism threatens

the discipline of ethics since, if values are
relative to a given culture then this must mean
that there are no universal moral absolutes by
which the behavior of people can be judged.
QUESTIONS?
 SHARING: ETHICS AND CULTURE

How does your culture promote

or not promote
ethics and morality?