The Folk Society and Culture

Abstract

Differences in concept, problem, and field procedure between anthropology and sociology are in part functions of differences in their usual subject matters: the primitive societies as contrasted with the urbanized societies. Awareness of this fact has been developed by studies made of peasant societies and of primitive peoples changing under urban influence. There results a conception of an ideal primitive or folk society. The urbanized, peasant, and tribal society may be compared in part in terms provided by Maine, Durkheim, and Tonnies. The concept of "culture," developed by anthropologists, reflects the integrated body of conventional understandings corresponding to a self-sufficient community, as observed in folk life. Other characteristics of anthropological analysis of society, as contrasted with sociological, similarly expressive of the nature of folk society, are the disposition to represent the society and culture in terms of "pattern" or "structure"; the relatively small development of problems of sampling, the emphasis on formalized kinship institutions, and certain emphasis of meaning in such words as "status" and "class." These considerations lead toward a recognition of opposing or complementary processes: that by which the ultimate values of a society develop an organization and consistency wich gives a group moral solidarity; and the expansion of the technical and economic system with consequent impairment of the moral organization.

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