What are the causes of cultural change?

The most common way that cultures change is through contact with other cultures. This change through contact is known as cultural diffusion. Contact between cultures can occur in a number of ways including trade, immigration, or warfare. With the proliferation of digital technology in the last half-century, cultural interactions are more common today than at any point in human history. When cultures come into contact with one another, they share ideas, religion, language, and technologies that inevitably change both cultures in meaningful ways.

Technology, or the tools that people use, also has a great impact on cultural change. An obvious example of how technology can change a culture is the invention and use of the automobile in the 20th Century and how it changed American culture. The automobile had an impact on economic development, communication, social class, and settlement patterns. Computers and the internet are revolutionizing how people live today and are relevant contemporary examples of cultural change through technology.

A change in the environment can effect cultures as well and force them to adapt. This is a modern issue as global warming has already impacted some cultures around the world (see Bangladesh.) As the climate becomes warmer, sea levels rise and cultures will need to adapt in an effort to survive. When Native Americans were challenged with the loss of the bison of the Great Plains, it changed the way they were forced to live in a remarkable way.

Another way that cultures change is through the introduction of new ideas. When cultures are challenged with a new way of seeing things, they are forced to change. I like to use the idea of equal rights for women and minorities in the second half of Twentieth Century America as an example of new ideas and how they change a culture.