An Enactive Conception of Culture: Enculturation as a Dynamic Coupling between Human Beings and their Material Culture Environments

Abstract

Some traditional conceptions of culture tend to consider it as a repository of abstract representations (information or knowledge) while others consider it a set of symbolic mechanisms for controlling behavior. Both conceptions assume that the contents of culture are processed or internalized by the minds of individuals, either in a more or less direct way or by resorting to mental structures learned in processes of symbolic socialization. Embodied theories of cognition, especially enactivism, question these ideas by not clarifying how these enculturation processes take place. It is argued that culture should be considered beyond its results (knowledge, beliefs, values, customs, laws, etc.) and understood as a set of significant practices in which their enculturation processes are given by the dynamic coupling relationship between human agents and their material culture environments, through participatory sense-making. It is discussed if this idea of presenting culture from an enactive point of view can lead to biological reductionism, as well as how enactivism could be related to close approaches such as ecological psychology.