Nature Culture Dichotomy

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Worldview is established within a culture. It then makes up the accumulated knowledge and meanings that are associated with the world. Which finally forms the values and beliefs that people have. It is all of these gained attributes that directly relate to one’s sense of place because what they have done and experienced in a particular place, will create an attachment where they have learned their characteristics. This attachment to a place has a purpose for the people who have connected with the area. Now that a sense of purpose has been established, the people in this area can either make the decision to use the land for theirs for the taking or to do their part and protect it by living in harmony with the nature. How people interact with …show more content…
In this hierarchy of nature, humans are at the top and they have all of the control and this control can be used to benefit or destroy nature. Nature culture dichotomy is a term that describes a Western view of nature. Nature culture dichotomy is the view that nature and culture are two separate entities. This differs from the teleological viewpoint in the sense that in teleology, nature is allowed to be a part of and have purpose relating to our culture. Using nature culture dichotomy, a viewpoint may be that the way that we live our daily lives may not effect nature. Where a teleological viewpoint may see that some of our daily actions prevent our natural resources from realizing their full potential. Once again in the acorn example, a person might print a large amount of copies using only a single side of each sheet of paper. From a nature culture dichotomy standpoint, the person doing the printing may not think twice about the effect that printing that large quantity of copies has on the environment because the individual sees them self as something completely separate from what they are doing. If the same person had more of a teleological viewpoint, they might have printed double-sided, therefore cutting the amount of paper used in half. The person may think of printing as a necessity, but know that by reducing the amount that they use, the individual can help prevent a tree from being cut down before it reaches its full potential as described early in the paper. It is important to point out that Ingold notes that often in nonwestern cultures there is not a division of nature and culture (Ingold, 2000). People work with nature without destroying it to get their basic needs from nature while also replenishing the