Does Culture Evolve Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Does Culture Evolve - Essay Example In White’s opinion, human civilization has always attempted to the control over nature through culture. According to White’s perspective on the evolution of culture, the more a culture is able to harness energy from nature using efficient technology, the more evolved a culture becomes. From his point of view, both energy and technology play major roles by bringing about a much better evolvement of ideology and social organization of culture. In his article Eric Wolf, looks at culture from a very different angle when compared to White’s perspective. According to Wolf, culture evolved and progressed through trade and commerce. Wolf explains how traders traveled across the rivers and carried on fur trade along the coasts. Due to the increase in trade, there was great development in different kinds of transport which was so necessary to carry on trade across different borders. During the 18th century, traders made use of Native American middle men to deliver their pr oducts but gradually trade took on a whole new dimension by becoming more organized and sophisticated. Gradually, traders got rid of the middle men and carried on the business directly with the primary producer.