Effects of Art, Music and Film on Culture (Essay Sample)

Culture
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Culture
Culture refers to norms and social behaviors that exist in the human societies. Culture is an essential aspect of anthropology that entails knowledge and skills that that are passed to others or from generation to generation through learning in various human societies. There are some of the human behaviors that are common in almost all the human societies referred to as the cultural universals, and they can take the form of religion, rituals, dance, music, art plus technologies such as clothing, shelter, cooking and tool usage. Culture can be perceived as material culture, immaterial culture and also regarding science. The material aspect of culture entails the physical expressions of culture that surrounds the human beings which include art, architecture, and technology (Samovar et al., 2015). The immaterial aspect of culture on the other side include principles of literature (both oral and written), philosophy, mythology and social organization such as the practices of social institutions and political organization. The science concept of culture entails all the intangible cultural heritage of the society such as the skills, knowledge, expression, and practices. Humanity perceives culture as the ability of an individual or level of person to learn, interpret and understand the various level of sophistication in manners, education, science, and arts. The degree of sophistication in culture helps in distinguishing the less complex or simple cultures from civilization characterized by urbanization and improved communication system.
Culture can be classified depending on the ability to access cultural capital into class base distinctions between low culture, folk culture or popular culture and the high culture. Culture is used in common parlance to refer to the symbolic markers of various ethnic groups to visibly distinguish themselves through jewelry, clothing or modification of the body with tattoos. A mass culture which represents the advanced version of culture and western capitalist society emerged in the 20th century triggered by the mass media. The launch of mass culture represents the beginning of continuous production or flow production of standardized products, especially in the assembly sector. Human symbolic cultures develop from the material conditions that humans encounter in the daily life while the role of the human is to formulate the conditions for surviving physically as per the theoretical perspective of cultural materialism portrayed in social sciences. Culture can be defined as a count noun to refer to a system of values, traditions, and customs of a community or a society such as a nation or an ethical group (Samovar et al., 2015). Culture can also be used to refer to a set of knowledge acquired over time. Culture can also be used to refer to various practices that are unique to a specific subgroup of a community or society. Culture is also prone to change that can be brought about by transformation, indigenization, modernization, syncretism, eclecticism, borrowing, osmosis, diffusion, progress, mutation, revolution, revivalism, innovation, reform, reconception, renovation, involution, evolution, development, and growth. Change or modification of culture is what leads to modernization which refers to the incorporation of new practices and believes such as the notion of progress, democracy, commerce, industry, rationalism, and science. It is always difficult to change the culture of a given group, society or community but can only be influenced by expressive forms such as music, films, and art plus other media.
Effect of Art on Culture
Art is one of the forms of expressing culture in the society and also translating experiences across space and time as well as installing values and changing opinions. Art refers to a range of human activities associated expressing the authors technical and imaginative skills, auditory and creating visuals to show appreciation to emotional power and beauty. Art has existed for a long time since the prehistoric period up to date that it is continuing to influence the culture of humankind. Society always considers literature, sculptures, and painting to be a great repository for collective memories. Art helps in preserving many cultural practices and components that cannot be archived by fact-based historical records and can also be used to preserve sensitive aspects like how an individual felt in a given situation. Many cultures communicate through art making art a significant aspect of communication in various cultures (Greenblatt, 2013). For instance, art allows people to communicate via stories, unique sounds, and images. A given image, painting or sound can be made to create a given emotion or inspiration to other members of the community or society. In the modern days, studies have been carried to determine the relationship between the human brain and art, and the results revealed that viewing contemporary visual art had a positive effect in an individuals’ life especially the ones in the nursing homes.
Effect of Music on Culture
Music refers to a special type of art that and also a special form of expressing culture using sound as the probable medium organized in time as opposed to art that is more of painting and image formation. Music can be classified or described according to sonic qualities of texture and timbre, dynamics, rhythm and pitch which controls harmony and melody. Generally, culture affects music but also music affects culture in various ways because first of all music seems to define and describe cultures. Many cultures consider music as a medium of sharing ideas, expressing emotions and telling stories to each other in a society. Music is also another method of storing or keeping records of cultural practices and activities apart from writing. Some tribes use music to tell stories and teach cultural lessons and values that can also be passed to many more generations to come (Boer & Fischer, 2012). Music also reflects the cultural attributes of a community or a society, for instance, the big band music sang during the world war II was to express patriotism in America. Some communities consider music as a medical aspect to console or comfort a patient.
Effect of Film on Culture
Film come into existence in the early 20th century, but it has brought a lot of impact in many cultures worldwide because of its rapid growth. Films are used to express visual action or practices of a given culture to the community or the society. Fil