Chapter Overview

Is art, like religion, a cultural universal? People in all cultures do seem to associate an aesthetic experience--a sense of beauty'with certain objects and events. The arts, sometimes called "expressive culture," include the visual arts, literature, music, and theater arts.

Students of non-Western art have been criticized for ignoring individual artists, and for focusing too much on the social nature and context of art. Many non-Western societies do recognize the achievements of individual artists. Community standards judge the completeness and mastery displayed in a work of art. Standards may be maintained informally in society, or by specialists, such as art critics.

Folk art, music, and lore refer to the expressive culture of ordinary, usually rural, people. The arts are part of culture, and aesthetic judgments depend, at least to an extent, on cultural background. Growing acceptance of the anthropological definition of culture has helped broaden the study of the humanities from fine art and elite art to popular and folk art and the creative expressions of the masses and of many peoples. Myths, legends, tales, and storytelling play important roles in transmitting culture and preserving traditions.

The arts go on changing, although certain art forms have survived for thousands of years. In today's world, a huge "arts and leisure" industry links Western and non-Western art forms in an international network with both aesthetic and commercial dimensions.