Purpose: Cultures have been in contact for many years. The movement of goods, people, and ideas have changed cultures. How we do things and what we see have been influenced by distant cultures. Think of Marco Polo and how he traded silk for other goods. This contact to the outside world brought changes to the people. Architectural styles have crossed over from place to place. It is easy to find Chinese food in many of our communitites.

Urbanization has been a dramatic change in the way we live. Millions move to the cities to find jobs. What motivates people to move to the city? Are the cities able to cope with the growing population. Where will people live? Will there be enough resources to help them survive in the city? What happens to women's role in the household? What ideas do people take with them when moving to the city?

People, ideas, and goods always moved. And, they usually brought change. How is it different today? The influences of distant cultures used to come slowly. But, in many places, with technologies, cultural influences spread rapidly. Transatlantic cables increased telephone calls, television competed with radio and print media, air travel became faster, and telecommunications through satellite hosts or networked computers and the spread of internet increased the global network.

The purpose of this lesson is two-fold:
In Part I, students will expand their knowledge of what culture is.
In Part II, students will analyze how culture influences spread through technology and its effect on places.

Focus Question: How does the role of technology affect the ways in which culture influences spread and influence the way people live?

Essential Element: Places and Regions

Hawaii Geography Content Standard: Students analyze how people organize their activities on earth through their analysis of human populations, cultural mosaic, economic interdependence, settlement, and conflict and cooperation.

National Geography Standard: (10) The geographically informed person knows and understands the characteristics, distribution, and complexity of earth's cultural mosaics.

Knowledge: How the characteristics of culture affect the ways in which people live, how cultures change, the processes of cultural diffusion, and the spatial characteristics of the processes of cultural convergence and divergence

Geographic Skills: Throughout the unit students will ask geographic questions; acquire, organize, and analyze geographic information; and answer geographic questions.

Objectives: Students will be able to:

• Identify and explain culture
• Identify the major components of culture Identify and compare the cultural characteristics of students' community with another place
• Describe changes (including technology)n culture Describe how the role of women has changed
• Use historical data, primary and secondary documents, illustrations, and other sources of information to describe changes in a cultural characteristic
• Describe and explain the significance of patterns of cultural diffusion (including technology)
• Analyze how technology influences cultural diffusion and affects places

Vocabulary: culture, cultural diffusion, cultural mosaics, technology

Materials:

• Transparencies of "Geography, a Cultural Collage" (Transparencies can be made from the map drawings found on the back of the poster in the GAW 1995 packet)
• Supplies - paper, pencil, pens
• Overhead projector
• Blank transparencies
• Poster paper
• Old magazines to cut up pictures

• Resources:
• * NGS magazine, August 1999 "Global Culture" (includes map entitled, "Cultures")
• * The Material World. A Global Family. Portrait by Peter Menzel. 1994. Sierra Club Books. ISBN 0-87156-430-0
• * Women in the Material World by Faith D'Aluisio and Peter Menzel. 1996. Sierra Club Books. ISBN 0-87156-984-1
• * The Material World (Portraits of 12 Families Around the World) Poster Education. P.O. Box 8774. Asheville, NC 28814. Phone 704-253-4995
• * Geography for Life, National Geography Standards 1994.

Procedure:
Part 1: Learning About Culture

Activity 1: Identify and explain what culture is. What is culture? Discuss. [Culture is a way of life shared by a group. It is a learned behavior, passed on by each generation. culture embraces a people's lifestyle, values, and beliefs.] Ask students to list items they think are part of a culture [ex., music, literature, art, religion, traditions, dress, food, architecture, education, government] gather information and write a definition of what culture is.
Assessment: Check students' understanding of their definition of culture.

Activity 2: Identify the major components of culture Prepare transparencies from GAW '95 "Geography: A Cultural Collage" poster. The transparencies represent the major components of culture. Overlaid, one atop the other, they paint a portrait of complex interrelationships.

Begin with the land map on the overhead projector. Discuss how the physical landscape sets the "stage" upon which culture develops.

Build the concept of culture by laying the transparencies one at a time. Have students identify and list the cultural characteristics for each layer, followed by a discussion. Each layer is a different part and there is no hierarchy or order of the overlays.

Put one overlay on the projector alone. Discuss why each layer is meaningless without the others.

Have students use the components of culture and write a brief description of their culture, including at least one statement about each component.
Assessment: Are students able to apply the major components that make up their culture? Check students' understanding of culture as it relates to their own.

Activity 3: Compare cultural characteristics of their community with another place Have students research and prepare their own overlays of their community and another community. Students should include a short essay of their findings. Copy the drawings on transparencies for student presentations. Students should also summarize their findings for their presentation.
Assessment: Check drawings and essay for understanding of the cultural differences and similarities of both communities. Are they able to compare major components of culture (i.e., land, people, language, institutions and beliefs, and technology)?

Part 2: How culture influences spread through technology and its effect on places.

Activity 4: Describe changes in culture over time Have students interview parents and grandparents to understand cultural change, especially with the influence of technology (i.e., how radio and television changed leisure activities in the U.S.; how the role of women in society has changed and how that has affected life in the U.S. and other regions)
Assessment: Are students able to relate how technological changes have society?

Activity 5: Describe how the role of women has changed. Use a variety of instructional materials to describe the current and former types of work done by women in developed and developing countries. Suggest reasons for any changes (i.e., changes in the role of women in providing food in sub-Saharan Africa and in the U.S.)
Assessment: Check students' understanding for reasons of changes. How have they discussed technology's role in women's work?

Activity 6: Use historical data, primary and secondary documents, illustrations, and other sources of information to describe changes in a cultural characteristic (i.e., the role of children in society, clothing styles, modes of transportation, food preferences, types of housing, attitudes toward the environment and resources) How does architecture cross cultures? Students should be able to site examples of their findings. See HGA website [click on ASGI 99] for a glimpse on how architecture has played a role in Downtown Honolulu.
Assessment: Are students able to give examples of their findings using the historical data, primary and secondary documents, and other sources as resources? How well are they able to describe changes that have taken place?

Activity 7: Describe and explain the significance of patterns of cultural diffusion in the varied cultural mosaics. Have students create a collage of pictures from at least four countries that illustrates a pattern of cultural diffusion (i.e., the use of terraced rice fields in China, Japan, Indonesia, and the Philippines; the use of satellite television dishes in the U.S., England, Canada, and Saudi Arabia; the spread of the internet). Students should also write an explanation of their collage that reflect patterns of cultural diffusion and how technology has played a role.
Assessment: Do the students collages and explanations illustrate a pattern of cultural diffusion? Were they able to justify how technology has played a role in the diffusion?

Activity 8: Examine and analyze how technology influences the spatial processes of cultural convergence and divergence. Have students examine and analyze how communications and transportation technologies contribute to cultural convergence (i.e., how electronic media, computers, and jet aircraft connect distant places in a close network of contact through cross-cultural adaptation). How do they see themselves in this convergence? Students should draw a map and write an essay reflecting their findings. They should address the question: How does the role of technology affect the ways in which culture influences spread and influence the way people live?
Assessment: Check for students' understanding on the role of technology and how cultural influences spread and affected their own culture. How well could students relate their culture with technology? How well did the map help to clarify their findings?