Every normal child must learn their culture, whatever it may be, because… the norms of behavior or patterns that constitute a culture are not genetically or biologically determined. And throughout the socialization process, or as some endoculture anthropologists call it, the child requires the attitudes and ideas in use, the forms of behavior corresponding to the roles that correspond to him, as well as the cultural patterns and values of society in which it was born. How culture is learned constitutes what we have called social inheritance or historically created models of life. If culture had its origin in race, cultural change could only take place in the form of biological transmutation and it would be impossible in practice to direct not only the processes of change but even learning.
But due to the innate potentialities of the human infant and the plasticity of his mind, man not only learns a culture but can also forget or discard (which is the basis of the selection to which we have referred) some parts of it. and replace them with other forms of behavior, many times different. Animals also learn certain forms of behavior and we are calling that rudimentary culture, or perhaps better, animal culture, but in order for the learned behavior to be understood as culture, in the human condition it has to transmit ideas that can be deliberately applied to appropriate circumstances, which is impossible without abstraction and language. man not only learns a culture but can also forget or discard (which is the basis of the selection to which we have referred) some parts of it and replace them with other forms of behavior, many times different.
Animals also learn certain forms of behavior and we are calling that rudimentary culture, or perhaps better, animal culture, but in order for the learned behavior to be understood as culture, in the human condition it has to transmit ideas that can be deliberately applied to appropriate circumstances, which is impossible without abstraction and language. man not only learns a culture but can also forget or discard (which is the basis of the selection to which we have referred) some parts of it and replace them with other forms of behavior, many times different. Animals also learn certain forms of behavior and we are calling that rudimentary culture, or perhaps better, animal culture, but in order for the learned behavior to be understood as culture, in the human condition it has to transmit ideas that can be deliberately applied to appropriate circumstances, which is impossible without abstraction and language.
Man symbolizes, that is, he turns reality into signs and symbols that can be interpreted, thought, communicated, and preserved. With symbols you can think about things and relate them, thus giving rise to the notion of situations. By perfecting symbolization, man was able not only to convey ideas that can be deliberately applied to appropriate circumstances, which is impossible without abstraction and without language.
(…) Man symbolizes, that is, he turns reality into signs and symbols susceptible to being interpreted, thought, communicated and preserved. With symbols you can think about things and relate them, thus giving rise to the notion of situations. By perfecting the symbolization, man was able not only to transmit his perceptions, knowledge, and experiences much more effectively than animals, but he was able to bridge the gap between his isolated physical experiences to make them a continuous experience.
The habit of symbolization allows man to keep conserving a situation in the mind even if he is not physically before it, thus incorporating into his existence the notion of time, from the past to the present, by the memory of experiences, and the projection into the future by the logical ordering of symbols.
Without language, the existence of human culture would be impossible, because language is not only a communication system but culture itself turned into symbols. Although it is true that there are forms of communication between animals, some quite effective, as well as forms of learned behavior, they can only signal recognition, primary instinctive signals and simple emotions and learning occurs by simple imitation. But once the animal had to overcome the barrier that separated it from the human and it was the capacity for abstraction and the system of symbolization, derived from it, the way by which the anthropoid to the world of the human, the door that gave him entrance to culture and later to civilization.
Language as defined by Sapir is an exclusively human, and not instinctive, method of communicating ideas, conditions, and desires through a deliberately produced system of symbols.
