Culture and Definition

As anthropologist use the term, culture is the way of life shared by a group of people.

It is what makes people similar to one another and unites them as a group, overcoming individual differences in personality. Culture is acquired behavior; it is learned rather than inherited genetically.

Culture is passed on from one generation to the next through the process known as socialization.

Although the methods of teaching children the appropriate behavior patterns may vary from one society to another, all societies engage in some form of child training.

It is assume that early childhood experiences will last effect on an individual, and insofar as the same basic experiences are shared by most children in a society, a general personality pattern will be shared among most adults in that society.
Culture and Definition

Kalervo Oberg (1901 -1973) – anthropologist who introduced the term ‘culture shock’

Kalervo Oberg (1901 -1973) – anthropologist who introduced the term ‘culture shock’
He was born in British Columbia to Finnish parents in 1901. Kalervo Oberg was known as a world renowned anthropologist. He was a civil servant and a teacher.

He graduated from University of British Columbia with Bachelor of Economics before proceed to Master of Economics from University of Pittsburgh. He earned his doctorate from University of Chicago with dissertation, the Social Economy of the Tlingit Indians of Alaska.

He loved with his fieldwork and his extensive and wide ranging fieldwork was his biggest accomplishment. Oberg then worked in various government postings overseas, including the Institute of Inter-American Affairs, forerunner of the U.S. Agency for International Development, with assignments including Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, and Surinam.

He traveled the world and wrote about the experiences so others could enjoy them as well. He was a world-renowned applied anthropologist. He was the first to introduce the term "Culture shock" and he was the best known coined for the idea in 1954. He found that all human beings experience the same feelings when they travel to or live in a different country or culture.

He found that culture shock is almost like a disease: it has a cause, symptoms and a cure. Kalervo Oberg died in 1973.
Kalervo Oberg (1901 -1973) – anthropologist who introduced the term ‘culture shock’