Society and culture: comparison and confrontation

Abstract

This text attempts to clarify the contents and relations between two concepts: "culture" and "society". These notions compete nowadays with each other due to the fact that, at different moments of the twentieth century, each was chosen as the core of an unified vision for human matters (so, for instance, many historians spoke of social history as an approach for historical synthesis in the 1960's, but of cultural history as a center of interest in the 1990's). The article treats "culture" more carefully, because this is a concept more fraught with dangers and ambiguities. So, its history since the eighteenth century is summarized and the different contexts of its use discussed. The au­thor's opinion is that in no sense could "culture" expel "society" as a core concept. In fact, it is his conviction that it would be useful to abandon "culture" as an obstacle concept. This will not happen, nevertheless, so the best way to use both concepts use­fully is sketched according to the contentions argued for in the text.