Malcolm M. Willey

The Validity of the Culture Concept

Within the last decade the cultural group of sociologists has grown to occupy an important position in the field of sociology. The concept of culture, and the procedure outlined for its analysis, have, however, been vigorously attacked, especially by certain psychologists of whom Floyd Allport may be taken as typical. Allports objection to cultural sociology is based on two points: what he terms the group fallacy in social explanation, and his insistence that cultural phenomena may be described in cultural terms but explained only on the next lower level of phenomena, the psychological. Each of these objections upon examination may be seen to involve a fundamental error, as the attempt to analyze certain cultural problems from a purely psychological approach makes evident.

The Cultural Approach to Sociology

There is developing in the United States a definite challenge to the older sociological systems. The anthropological school has, through study of exotic peoples, gathered material wich makes evident the essentially philosophical nature of much sociological writing. The anthropologists are attacking the premises upon which the earlier social systems were erected. Neglect of the element of culture in society is advanced as the reason for sociological shorthcomings. What is culture, and how does it operate? A sound, and methodologically secure sociology, must in the future include a consideration of the cultural material that the anthropologists have brought to attention.