Cultural Thought and its Origins

Abstract

The modern academic concept of culture arose in response to the Enlightenment and its universalist claims about knowledge and scientific method. Cultural thought denied the universal relevance of rationalism and empiricism, asserting the importance of customs, tradition, local knowledge, historical specificity, pluralism and interpretative understanding, especially for the study of society. This chapter examines the origins of cultural thought in the critique of the Enlightenment and considers the main ideas and implications. It then discusses the neglect of culture in the economics discipline, propelled by the long-standing desire to imitate natural science and keep a distance from the humanities. The resulting economics/culture divide has narrowed the perspective of economics and obscured the cultural context of economic activity.