ANCESTRAL: Pertaining or relating to the ancestors. Traditional and of remote origin.
ANCESTOR: More or less remote ancestry of a person or group of people.
ABORIGINAL: A person native to the land in which he/she lives. Indigenous people of a certain place.
ACULTURATION: Adoption of one or more cultural traits from another society. This term is generally used in anthropological contexts and considers the change from the point of view of the society adopting the cultural traits. The process by which culture is transmitted through a constant continuum first hand, by different culture groups, one of which often has a more developed culture. The process may be unilateral or bilateral.
ANIMISM: According to the definition of E.B. Tylor (1832-1917) animism consists of the attribution of a vital principle, or soul (anima), that endows the objects of nature with personal traits, with which these, consequently, are supposed to possess life, feelings, will, etc., similar to those of the human being.
Tylor, an anthropologist of evolutionist tendency, studied animism in his work "Primitive Culture" (1871), in which he expounds his thesis that all primitive religions derive, in one way or another, from animism, so that this would be found in the genesis of all religions. This hypothesis, however, has not been contrasted by later cultural anthropology, whose experimental studies have called it into question.
ANTEMORTEM: Before the hour of death.
ANTIQUARIAN: Person fond of archaeology. Collector of ancient things and/or who trades with them.
ANTHROPIC: Relating to human beings.
ART: Art (from the Latin ars, artis, and this from the Greek τέχνη téchnē) is generally understood as any activity or product carried out with an aesthetic and also communicative purpose, through which ideas, emotions and, in general, a vision of the world are expressed, through various resources.
ASTRONOMY: Science that studies the stars and celestial bodies, their movements in the sky and, from the physical point of view, their composition and the origin of the universe.
ATYPICAL: Individual not common in a species. Object or artifact that is not typical of the cultural area where it has been found.
CABESTRO: Acial, whip or rope made from a strip of cattle hide, previously tanned.
CARNIVAL: the public celebration that precedes Lent in countries of Christian tradition, it is a non-religious movable festivity, usually celebrated during the month of February or March depending on the year.
Etymology: Carnival, Carnestolendas, Antruejo
Many have been the etymological proposals that have tried to explain this word. At the beginning of the Middle Ages the Catholic Church proposed an etymology of carnival: from the Vulgar Latin carne-levare, meaning 'to abandon meat' (which was precisely the obligatory prescription for all the people during all the Fridays of Lent). It is very likely that the Spanish word "carnaval" is an Italianism introduced at the end of the Middle Ages, as an adaptation of voices of the type of "carnevale", "carnovale" or "carnelevare". In that period, the most common voices were "carnestolendas" and "antruejo". The word "carnival" has been carving a niche for itself in popular speech, especially since the 18th century, and nowadays it has finally banished the previous terms. On the other hand, there is no total agreement among treatises and scholars when it comes to elucidating the meaning or origin of the word carnival.
CENIT: It is the highest point in the sky with respect to the position of an observer. If we stop to look at the sky, the zenith is the point above our head. It is said zenith sun when the sun is at its highest point, marking midday.
CEREMONY: Solemn act carried out according to established rules.
CEREMONIAL: Set of formalities for public and solemn acts.
CITY AND COUNTRYSIDE: Spaces of population distribution that were formed historically and appeared during the transition from the primitive communal regime to slavery, on the basis of the social division of labor. In the sphere of culture, the backwardness of the countryside with respect to the city is accentuated.
CLAN: Group of relatives descended from a common ancestor, generally represented by an animal that meets the characteristics of the group.
COLLECTIVE: relating to a group of individuals. A collective is a social grouping where its members share certain characteristics or work together to achieve a common goal.
COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY: is the comparative study of myths from different cultures in an attempt to identify common themes and characteristics. Comparative mythology has been used for a variety of scholarly purposes. For example, researchers have used the relationships between different myths to trace the development of religions and cultures, to propose common origins for myths from different cultures, and to support various psychological theories.
COMMUNITY: a group or set of individuals, human beings, or animals that share common elements, such as language, customs, values, tasks, worldview, age, geographic location, social status, roles. Generally, a community unites under the need or goal of a common objective, such as the common good; although this is not necessary, a common identity is enough to form a community without the need for a specific objective.
CONSTELLATION: Group of stars that, according to the traditions of each culture, form figures that are recognized when observing the sky.
CRAFTSMANSHIP: Basically, it includes works made manually and with little or no intervention of machinery, usually decorative objects for the home. The person who engages in this activity is called a craftsman.
CULTURAL AREA: Entity of common tradition that presents the following typical elements: a) certain general characteristics that distinguish it as a whole; b) defined limits in the greater space and in time; and c) although in them changes are detected, those of greater importance among them must be more or less.
CULTURE: Set of processes, way of life, according to which social structures are elaborated and given meaning and respond to vital needs of society, intimately structured to a historical-social-accumulative and dynamic context. Culture harbors the experience and perception of the world from which we understand, distinguish, define and position ourselves within our territory. Culture is intimately linked to identity, because it is neither absolute nor static, but is constructed throughout life.
The term culture, which comes from the Latin cultus, refers to the cultivation of the human spirit and man's intellectual faculties. Its definition has mutated throughout history: since the age of the Enlightenment, culture has been associated with civilization and progress.
CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY: branch of anthropology that focuses its study on the knowledge of human beings through their culture, i.e., customs, myths, beliefs, norms and values that guide and standardize their behavior as a member of a social group.
CULTURAL CHANGE: Changes in a culture that may include acculturation, assimilation and diffusion. The field of cultural dynamics generally includes the study of the time dimension in culture.
CULTURAL DIVERSITY: refers to the different types of behaviors such as customs, beliefs and even ways of thinking both globally and in certain areas, where there is interaction of different coexisting cultures (in short, different and diverse cultures). Many states and organizations consider the diversity of cultures as part of the common heritage of humanity and have policies or attitudes in favor of it. Actions in favor of cultural diversity usually involve the preservation and promotion of existing cultures.
CULTURAL EVOLUTION: Theory that holds that cultures develop historically from their simplest to their most complex forms. The concept has been greatly affected by the ideas of biological evolutionism and does not always take into account the complexity of cultural developments in which there is not only progress and positive changes, but also setbacks and regressions.
CUSTOM: entrenched social practices. They are particular forms of behavior that a community assumes and that distinguish it from other communities, such as their dances, festivals, food, language or crafts. These customs are transmitted from one generation to another, either in the form of oral or representative tradition, or as institutions.
DANCE: Dance is rhythmic body movements that follow a pattern, usually accompanied by music and serve as a form of communication or expression. All human beings have the ability to express themselves through movement.
DNA: Deoxyribonucleic acid present in all cells of the organism and carrying the hereditary message.
ETHNIC COMMUNITY: Groups of people defined on the basis of a set of cultural traits, transmitted by learning, not by genetic inheritance.
ETHOCESTRIM: The attitude or point of view whereby the world is analysed according to the parameters of one's own parameters of one's own culture. The ethnocentrism often involves the belief that one's own one's own ethnic group is the most important, or that some or all aspects of one's own culture are superior to those of other cultures. one's own culture are superior to those of other cultures.
EQUINOX: The date when day and night have the same length in seasonal countries. This occurs on March 21 when spring begins in the northern hemisphere and on September 21 when autumn begins. In the southern hemisphere the opposite happens; from September onwards spring begins and from March onwards winter. Many peoples around the world celebrate this event: Christians celebrate Easter, the indigenous peoples of the Amazon carry out agricultural ceremonies and in the Middle East they celebrate the New Year.
ETHNOGRAPHY: Part of anthropology that describes the customs and traditions of peoples and cultures.
ETHNOLOGY: The social science that studies and compares the different peoples and cultures of the cultures of the ancient and modern world.
FIESTA: A party or celebration is an act or event of social character organized in a public or private way in whose development time and space are shared by the participants and which is associated with leisure and amusement.
The term presents, according to scholars, a complex, extraordinary and paradoxical nature
Many authors consider that although it is not possible to identify party and rites, it is necessary to take into account that there exists in the interior of every party a kind of rites, although this concept has suffered a transformation throughout the time, so that having a sacred aspect has become a formal and routine behavior.
Etymology: The word fiesta is a patrimonial voice whose Latin origin is festa (plural form of festum), which comes from festus (festive) and appears very early in the Romance languages celebrate the Inti Raymi, or Festival of the Sun, to regain its strength during the southern winter solstice (June 21), and announce the rebirth of Inti, or the father Sun.
FOLKLORE: It is the expression of culture in all its manifestations: handicrafts and popular medicine, oral histories, legends, jokes and sayings, music and dance, beliefs and superstitions, as well as certain rites and customs, among many other things.
HOLISTIC: is the idea that all properties of a given system, (e.g. biological, chemical, social, economic, mental or linguistic) cannot be determined or explained by the parts by the component parts alone. The system as a whole determines how the parts the parts behave.
HYBRIDIZATION: In social sciences, hybridization is a process of cultural crossbreeding described.
Cultural hybridization: It is a multiform and highly complex phenomenon to which some of the social transformations of the last three decades are linked.
Social hybridization: reflects a condition of mediation between the global and the local, the general and the specific and the universal and the particular. It expresses a relationship of tension or conflict between hegemonic and subordinate practices.
IDENTITY: It is a set of characteristics of a person or a group that distinguish them from the rest. Identity can also be understood as the conception that a person or group has of itself in relation to others.
IDEOLOGY: The set of ideas about reality, general system or systems existing in the practice of society with respect to the economic, social, scientific-technological, political, cultural, moral, religious, etc., and which seek the conservation of the system (conservative ideologies), its transformation (which can be radical and sudden, revolutionary, or gradual - reformist ideologies), or the restoration of a previously existing system (reactionary ideologies).
HARVEST: Harvesting of sown products when they are ripe or sufficiently large.
HYBRID CULTURE: It is the process of integration encouraged by encounters, interaction and reconstruction of different local cultures, it is called hybrid culture; that is, it is a mixture of elements from different societies.
Characteristics of hybrid culture:
1.-It combines different elements.
2.-It is present in the majority of cultures.
3.-It involves a process of adaptation.
HYPOTHESIS: In epistemology, a conjecture that is proposed to describe or explain phenomena, and that needs to be verified by means of the scientific method.
Ideologies usually consist of two components: a representation of the system, and a program of action. The first provides its own particular point of view on reality, seen from a certain angle, beliefs, preconceptions or intellectual bases, from which it is analyzed and judged (critique), usually by comparing it with an alternative, real or ideal system. The second aims to bring the existing real system as close as possible to the intended ideal system.
MAGIC: The explicit act or performance by which explicit act or representation by which the individual believes to demonstrate his or her recognition of the existence of one or deities or forces that have power over power over his or her destiny, whom he or she obeys, serves and honours. Basically, magical praxis consists in the transaction between human beings and these powers in order to twist them in twist them in his favour. Magic would be a way of thinking that permeates the thinking and sometimes the life of the of the individual, from simply choosing a certain colour to a vocation.
From a broader point of view, magic designates metaphysical beliefs, the central and differentiating element of which is the human and differentiating element is the human ability to to modify reality without strictly causal means. causal means. Magic in general is also often referred to as witchcraft. often referred to as witchcraft. Many modern inventions inventions are magic for primitive societies, and supplement the abilities capabilities sought by ancient magicians.
MANIFESTATIONS: These are public activities whose characteristic lies in producing a communicational act around which a more or less defined group identifies itself. .... Each community or town has its own folkloric manifestation.
MELTING POINT: It is a biological and cultural meeting of different ethnic groups, in which they mix, giving birth to new ethnicities and new phenotypes. This term is frequently used to discover the historical process that took place in Iberoamerica that led to its current racial and cultural state.
MILKY WAY: Galaxy to which the solar system belongs and which we see in the sky as a path of stars that goes from one side of the horizon to the other. In many cultures it is known as the Way of the Souls. Its name comes from Greek mythology and means "way of milk".
MYTH: From the Greek mythos ("tale"), a myth refers to a tale of marvelous events whose protagonists are supernatural (gods, monsters) or extraordinary (heroes) characters.
Myths are said to be part of the religious system of a culture, which considers them as true stories. They have the goal of providing narrative support for the central beliefs of a community.
PAGANISM: is a generic religious concept used by Christians since the 6th century, in the Roman Empire, to designate the set of beliefs that belonged neither to Christianity nor to Judaism, that is, to monotheistic religions and that are considered false.
PEOPLE: People as "any group of people who constitute a community or other group by virtue of a common culture, religion or similar element", covers not only the whole set of citizens as a whole, but any subsection.
POPULAR: Refers to something that is known or admired by a large number of people. In this sense, a popular person is someone admired and accepted within a certain circle or group as is the case, for example, of popular girls or boys at school.
POPULAR CULTURE: Cultural manifestations of the heritage transmitted throughout generations, fundamentally in an oral way to vindicate the identity appropriation with the purpose of continuing believing, creating and recreating the daily cultural practices of the peoples. The popular culture becomes the answer and questioning to the globalizing processes of all kinds, either by its content, by its social actors, by the quality of its cultural manifestations or by the situation.
RESIGNIFY: A verb of psychoanalytical origin that has become widespread in contemporary texts since the "appropriation" tactics of post-modernism. There is talk of works from the history of art "re-signified" by contemporary artists or of how they "re-signify" their practice ("The difference between the art of the past and the art of today is the preponderance of reflection and its consequences as a re-signification of reality"). It is not so much what a work means that matters, but what it is "resignifying".
RITE: is a word with origin in the Latin term ritus. It is a custom or ceremony that is invariably repeated according to a set of established rules. Rites are symbolic and usually express the content of some myth.
Rite is a word with origin in the Latin term ritus. It is a custom or ceremony that is repeated in an invariable way according to a set of established rules. Rites are symbolic and usually express the content of some myth.
RITUAL: name given to the celebration of rites, which can be very varied. Some rituals are festive, while others are solemn. Rituals are carried out according to tradition and may be led by some kind of authority (in the case of Catholicism, rituals are led by priests).
SACRED ANIMAL: Animal that has religious significance or special meaning for a certain human group. These animals may be associated with specific duties and there may be prohibitions against eating or harming them. Some are associated with deities and may figure in myths or have developed sacred qualities of their own.
SACRED TREE: Tree associated with a religious cult. Trees have been widely used in connection with ritual since ancient times.
SACRIFICE: is a notion that comes from the Latin language (sacrificium) and has several uses. It can be a tribute or offering that is made to a divinity with the intention of paying tribute to him. In these cases, the sacrifice includes killing a human being or an animal.
SHAMAN: Person whose function is to act as an intermediary between humans and the supernatural world through altered states of consciousness that allow him/her to communicate with the spirits. The shaman is considered a healer, a wise person and often also a political leader.
SHAMANISM: A set of religious beliefs and practices that explain and regulate the relationships between society, nature, and the universe. It proposes the existence of different realities, some visible and others invisible, and of a stratified universe, to which the shaman has access through altered states of consciousness.
SOCIETY: term that describes a group of individuals marked by a common culture, a certain folklore and shared criteria that condition their customs and lifestyle and that relate to each other within the framework of a community.
SOWING: To put seeds in the earth, with the proper techniques, so that they germinate and produce fruits.
SOCIAL IMAGINARY: is a set of symbols, customs or memories that have a specific and common meaning for all the people who are part of a community. A term coined in 1960 by Edgar Morin.
SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION: It is an appreciable alteration of the social structures, the consequences and manifestations of these structures linked to the norms, the values and the products of the same ones.
SOLSTICE: It is the date, June 21 when the Sun in its annual apparent displacement rises more to the north giving beginning to the summer in the northern hemisphere and to the winter in the south, and on December 21 when the star appears more to the south giving beginning to the summer in the southern hemisphere and to the winter in the north. This event is celebrated all over the world; for example, the Incas celebrated it on December 22.
SYNCRETISM: term used in cultural anthropology and comparative religious studies to refer to the hybridization or amalgamation of two or more cultural traditions. It is commonly understood that these unions do not keep a substantial coherence. It is also used in allusion to culture or religion to emphasize its character of fusion and assimilation of different elements.
TECHNOLOGY: Technological of a social group is the set of representations, values and behavioral patterns shared by the members of the group in the processes of interaction and communication in which technological systems are involved.
TERRITORY: It is an element of the State, as is the population or the cultural identity of its inhabitants. In this case, the territory is the portion of the Earth that corresponds legally to administer a nation, taking into account the soil, the subsoil, the waters present in it and the air space.
TYPICAL: Proper of a type, or that is a type of something. Peculiar or characteristic.
TRADITION: Oral transmission of historical facts, doctrines, literary compositions, customs, etc., made from generation to generation. Doctrine, custom, etc., that prevails from generation to generation.
TRANSCULTURATION: A gradual process by which one culture adopts traits of another until it culminates in acculturation. Processes of diffusion or infiltration of cultural complexes or traits from one society or social group to another, it generally takes place by contact between two cultures of different degrees of evolution, usually as an effect of the existing gap between them. In contact, the more evolved behaviour is usually imposed with the absorption of that which is less evolved, and this in turn can substitute its original location, although denatured by the influence of the new culture.
UNCONSCIOUS: It is used as a noun to to designate the set of mental processes that do not need to be need not depend on a priority, as they are either not relevant to the task being relevant to the task at hand or because they already because they already have an established pathway that automatically attends to those events automatically, so they are not consciously thought about. consciously thought about.
VENERATION OF THE DEADS: Reverence towards an ancestor or person that symbolizes him by virtue of his previous situation as head of a family, tribe or state, who, after his death, became a god or spirit. It was practiced from the remotest antiquity and arose in part from the idea that a soul or spirit retains after death the influence and power it enjoyed in life. The belief is closely related to animism and polytheism.
ZODIAC: In Greek, "wheel of the animals". Celestial band in which the planets are contained and through which the Sun apparently moves in its annual trajectory. It is divided into twelve houses or signs, which in the Babylonian and Greek tradition are mostly represented by animals.
