Raymond Williams – Analysis of culture (1961)

 Reading Response (Week 1):
  
        In this reading, Raymond Williams has categorized culture into three ways and has explained about the analysis of culture in these three types.

 *‘Ideal’- Where he defines culture as a state or process of Human perfection under a certain set of universal values to denote a timeless order.

 *‘Documentary’- Where culture is defined as a recorded form of intellectual and imaginative works by recording the thoughts and experiences. It can be related and is very similar to the ideal analysis denoted as discovery of ‘the best that has been thought and written in the world’

 *‘Social’-Where culture is designated as a particular way of life. This not only consists of the art and learning but also the ordinary behavior and institution.

He also mentions that there is no neat definition for culture as such and discusses about the problems in taking into account any one of those completely. To illustrate this he uses the example of the play ‘Antigone of Sophocles’ elaborating on the reverence and Kommos that the play deals with. The reading revolves around the lines that culture varies with different time periods and generations. “We never talk quite the same language”. There always exists some difference in style, speech and behavior. ‘Structures of feeling’ is a term that William uses based on the cultural artifacts. This promotes the general idea that any new generation would have its own structure of feeling which will not appear to have come from anywhere.  It also stresses on the fact that every culture belongs to a particular time period. Selective tradition employed in analyzing the culture should always follow the lines of growth of a society. Thus if more actively worked upon, the true value of culture can be viewed clearly and could be related to the whole organization within which it was expressed.