Patterns of culture

Benedict, Ruth

Bibliographische Daten

Monographie

Strukturtyp:: Monographie

Werks-URN (URL):: https://digi.evifa.de/viewer/resolver?urn=urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-d-6472736

URN:: urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-d-6472736

Persistenter Identifier:: BV045453616

Titel:: Patterns of culture

Autor:: Benedict, Ruth

Erscheinungsort:: New York

Verlag:: The New American Library

Erscheinungsjahr:: 1953

Signatur:: A 139 (SA)

Sammlung:: Allgemeiner Bestand

Wissensgebiet:: Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie > Soziale Organisation und Praxis

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Strukturtyp:: Kapitel

Titel:: VIII. The Individual and the Pattern of Culture

Sammlung:: Allgemeiner Bestand

Volltext

VII 
The Individual and the Pattern of Culture 
THE large corporate behaviour we have discussed is 
nevertheless the behaviour of individuals. It is the world 
with which each person is severally presented, the world 
from which he must make his individual life. Accounts of 
any civilization condensed into a few dozen pages must 
necessarily throw into relief the group standards and de- 
scribe individual behaviour as it exemplifies the motiva- 
tions of that culture. The exigencies of the situation are 
misleading only when this necessity is read off as implying 
that he is submerged in an overpowering ocean. 
There is no proper antagonism between the rôle of 
society and that of the individual. One of the most mis- 
leading misconceptions due to this nineteenth-century 
dualism was the idea that what was subtracted from 
society was added to the individual and what was sub- 
tracted from the individual was added to society. Philoso- 
phies of freedom, political creeds of laissez faire, revolu- 
tions that have unseated dynasties, have been built on 
this dualism. The quarrel in anthropological theory be- 
tween the importance of the culture pattern and of the 
individual is only a small ripple from this fundamental 
conception of the nature of society. 
In reality, society and the individual are not antagonists. 
His culture provides the raw material of which the indi- 
vidual makes his life. If it is meagre, the individual suffers: 
if it is rich, the individual has the chance to rise to his 
opportunity. Every private interest of every man and 
woman is served by the enrichment of the traditional 
stores of his civilization. The richest musical sensitivity 
can operate only within the equipment and standards of 
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