The human is an amazing animal. A human, unlike any other animal on earth, has the ability to think reason and process as well as adapt. Cultural ecology is, simply, the study of how humans adapt to social and environmental factors in order to survive and prosper. There are certain cultures that would have long died out if they hadn’t adapted to the physical landscape. Those adaption have become synonymous with those cultures and have very much become engrained as the way of life. That, in short, is the entire concept of cultural ecology.
Some examples may better illustrate the concept of cultural ecology. For example many people connect Adobe-style housing with the Southwest and the native American culture that once thrived there. The home, while a symbol of the culture, is a prime example of cultural ecology. The people who built the homes did so with the purpose of surviving the hot, dry climate. The bricks use abundant dirt as the staple of building. The lack of windows keeps heat in when needed and out when needed and the flat roofing catches the rainfall that is precious and scarce in the southwest. To those in other parts of the world it’s just a structure, but to the people of the southwest it was survival.
Alternatively the people of India revere their cows. They believe eating such a sacred animal to the paramount of terrible deeds. For some people in other cultures it seems quirky and strange, but for the Indian population the cow is sacred. Cows in India provide milk, a precious entity; in order to preserve a cow and ensure the milk is always available one must keep the cows alive and well cared for. The cow is a food source, even if not in the way that, say, an American or European would view it. The sacredness of the Cow was an adaptive measure by the Indian people to keep a precious, renewable resource safe.
Culture happens all over the world, there are thousands upon thousands of cultures, but what is truly interesting is how we, as a group, adapt, change and meet the needs of our society in order to form our cultures. Culture ecology touches on all of those very abstract concepts and makes them concrete.
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