Cultural universal
Anthropological concept, element common to all human cultures
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Related on Lably
Through Culture, Nature versus nurture and Émile Durkheim
Donald Brown's list in Human Universals
In his book Human Universals (1991), Donald Brown defines human universals as comprising "those features of culture, society, language, behavior, and psyche for which there are no known exception", providing a list of hundreds of items he suggests as universal. Among the cultural universals listed by Donald Brown are:
Language and cognition
- Language is translatable
- Abstraction in speech and thought
- Antonyms, synonyms
- Logical notions of "and", "not", "opposite", "equivalent", "part/whole", "general/particular"
- Binary cognitive distinctions
- Color terms: black, white
- Classification of: age, behavioral propensities, body parts, colors, fauna, flora, inner states, kin, gender, space, tools, weather conditions
- Continua (ordering as cognitive pattern)
- Discrepancies between speech, thought, and action
- Figurative speech, metaphors
- Symbolism, symbolic speech
- Synesthetic metaphors
- Tabooed utterances
- Special speech for special occasions
- Prestige from proficient use of language (e.g. poetry)
- Planning
- Units of time
- Language employed to manipulate, misinform, or mislead
Society
- Personal names
- Family or household
- Kin groups
- Peer groups not based on family
- Actions under self-control distinguished from those not under control
- Affection expressed and felt
- Age grades, statuses, and terms
- Law: rights and obligations, rules of membership
- Moral sentiments
- Distinguishing right and wrong, good and bad
- Promise/oath
- Prestige inequalities
- Statuses and roles
- Leaders
- Inclination towards patriarchy (dominance of men in society)
- De facto oligarchy
- Property
- Coalitions
- Collective identities
- Conflict
- Cooperative labor
- Gender roles
- Males on average travel greater distances over lifetime
- Marriage
- Husband older than wife on average
- Copulation normally conducted in privacy
- Incest prevention or avoidance, incest between mother and son unthinkable
- Collective decision making
- Etiquette
- Inheritance rules
- Generosity admired, gift giving
- Mood- or consciousness-altering techniques and/or substances
- Redress of wrongs, sanctions
- Sexual jealousy
- Sexual violence
- Shame
- Territoriality
- Triangular awareness (assessing relationships among the self and two other people)
- Some forms of proscribed violence
- Visiting
- Trade
Beliefs
- Magical thinking
- Use of magic to increase life and win love
- Beliefs about death
- Beliefs about disease
- Beliefs about fortune and misfortune
- Divination
- Attempts to control weather
- Dream interpretation
- Beliefs and narratives
- Proverbs, sayings
- Poetry/rhetorics
- Healing practices, medicine
- Childbirth customs
- Rites of passage
- Music, rhythm, dance, and to some degree associations between music and emotion
- Play
- Toys, playthings
- Death rituals, mourning, funerals
- Feasting
- Body adornment
- Hairstyles
- Art
Technology
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Nicholas Christakis' innate social universals
Based on experiments and studies of accidental and utopian societies, sociologist and evolutionary biologist Nicholas Christakis proposes that humans have evolved to genetically favor societies that have eight universal attributes, including:
Non-nativist explanations
The observation of the same or similar behavior in different cultures does not prove that they are the results of a common underlying psychological mechanism. One possibility is that they may have been invented independently due to a common practical problem.
Outside influence could be an explanation for some cultural universals. This does not preclude multiple independent inventions of civilization and is therefore not the same thing as hyperdiffusionism; it merely means that cultural universals are not proof of innateness.