cultural materialism
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Define the word ‘Cultural MaterialismName: Vaishali Hareshbhai Jasoliya Class: M.A.Sem.- 2Roll No.: 28Paper No.: 08-C ( The Cultural Studies )Enrolment No.: 14101028Email ID: [email protected]: 2015-16Submitted to: Department of English Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University
What is Materialism? The word Materialism is a form of
philosophical monism which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all phenomena, including mental phenomena and consciousness, are the result of material interactions.
Materialism is the position that matter is the only thing that exists and that all things can be reduced to matter.
What is Cultural Materialism
Anthropology is the study of humans.
Cultural materialism is an anthropological school of thought that says that the best way to understand human culture is to examine material conditions – climate, food, supply, geography, etc…
Cultural materialism is the strategy I have found to be most effective in my attempt to understand the causes of differences and similarities among societies and cultures.
Marvin Harris
Cultural Materialism
The British critic Graham Holderness describes cultural materialism as ‘ a politicised form of historiography’.
We can explain this as meaning the study of historical material within a politicised framework, this framework including the present which those literary texts have in some way helped to shape.
The term ‘cultural materialism’ was made current in 1985 when it was used by Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield.
Critical method which has four Characteristic
Historical context
Theoretical method
Political Commitment Textual analysis
The two words in the term ‘cultural materialism’ are further defined:
‘culture’ will include all forms of culture. That is, this approach does not limit itself to
‘high’ cultural forms like the Shakespeare play.‘ Materialism’ signifies the opposite of
‘idealism’ : an ‘idealist’ belief would be that high culture represents the free and independent play of the talented individual mind; the contrary ‘materialist’ belief is that culture cannot ‘transcend the material forces and relations of production.
