Culture is a complex, multifaceted concept. It is a term used to cover the social structure, languages, belief systems, institutions, technology, art, foods, and traditions of particular groups of humans. The term is used to define each group’s way of life and its own view of itself and of other groups, as well as to define the material goods it creates and uses, the skills it has developed, and the behaviors it transmits to each successive generation.

The human world is composed of culture groups, each of which has its distinctive way of life as reflected in the group’s land-use practices, economic activities, organization and layout of settlements, attitudes toward the role of women in society, education system, and observance of traditional customs and holidays. These ways of life result in landscapes and regions with a distinctive appearance. Landscapes often overlap, thus forming elaborate mosaics of peoples and places.

These cultural mosaics can be approached from a variety of spatial scales. At one scale, for example, Western Europe’s inhabitants can be seen as a single culture group; at another scale they consist of distinctive national culture groups (e.g., the French and the Spanish); and at yet another scale each national culture group can be subdivided into smaller, regionally clustered culture groups (e.g., the Flemings and Walloons in Belgium).

As Earth evolves into an increasingly interdependent world in which different culture groups come into contact more than ever before, it becomes more important that people have an understanding of the nature, complexity, and spatial distribution of cultural mosaics.

Given the complexity of culture, it is often useful—especially when studying the subject from a geographic point of view—to focus on the languages, beliefs, institutions, and technologies that are characteristics of a culture. The geographically informed person, therefore, is an individual who has a thorough grasp of the nature and distribution of culture groups.

Language both represents and reflects many aspects of a culture. It stands as an important symbol of culture. It is seen as a sign of the unity of a particular culture group. It can be analyzed—in terms of vocabulary and structure—for clues about the values and beliefs of a culture group. Language is also a visible marker that provides a way of tracing the history of a culture. The complex and often tense relations between French-speaking and English-speaking people in Quebec illustrate and reflect the importance of language to culture groups and also the value of studying the geography of language.

Beliefs include religion, customs, values, attitudes, ideals, and world views. A person’s point of view on issues is influenced by cultural beliefs, which in turn influence decisions about resources, land use, settlement patterns, and a host of other geographically important concerns. The complicated and often difficult relations of Hindus and Muslims in India demonstrate how the spatial organization of a country can be shaped by the geography of religion.

Institutions shape the ways in which people organize the world around them; for example, sets of laws, educational systems, political arrangements, and the structure of a family shape a culture region. The Mormon culture region of the western United States shows how institutions are embodied in a distinctive place, demarcating it and influencing practically every aspect of daily life.

Technology includes the tools and skills a group of people use to satisfy their needs and wants. Levels of technology range from the simplest tools used by hunters and gatherers to the most complex machines and information systems used in modern industrial societies. Technologies can be usefully understood as either hardware—the tools themselves—or software—the skilled ways in which a society uses tools. The Amish of south-central Pennsylvania have created a distinctive landscape that is simultaneously an expression of technology, institutions, beliefs, and language.

Whatever characteristic of culture is considered, it is clear that the mosaics of Earth’s cultural landscapes are not static. Culture changes as a result of a variety of human processes, migration and the spread (diffusion) of new cultural traits—language, music, and technology—to existing culture groups. The processes of cultural change accelerate with improvements in transportation and communication. Each culture in the world has borrowed attributes from other cultures whether knowingly or not, willingly or not.

Students should be exposed to a rich appreciation of the nature of culture so they can understand the ways in which people choose to live in different regions of the world. Such an understanding will enable them to appreciate the role culture plays in the spatial organization of modern society. Rivalry and tension between cultures contribute much to world conflict. As members of a multicultural world, students must understand the diverse spatial expressions of culture.