What is Culture? Part One: The Word

high culture : the serious, intellectually-rigorous, and often difficult art forms celebrated in museums, galleries, symphony halls, opera houses, and academies. High culture is supposed to have “permanent value” and provide standards of excellence.

For the last century, the most vibrant culture has been popular culture — the movies, hit songs, TV shows, fashion styles, smartphone apps, slang, foods, and memes that fill our leisure time.

we use a single seven-letter expression to describe at least four diverse, and often oppositional parts of life: (1) high culture , (2) communal culture , (3) popular culture , and (4) organizational norms .

Communal culture is an unconscious storehouse of behaviors, rules, and norms that guide individual lives.