U

Module 4
Significance of Cultural, Social,
Political and Economic Symbols
and Practices
What I Need to Know

Analyze the significance of cultural, social, political and

economic symbols and practices.
Explore the significance of material remains and artifactual
evidence in interpreting cultural and social, including political
and economic processes (UCSP11/12HBS-If-13)
At the end of the module, you should be able to:
K: Describe the role of culture in human adaptation.
S: Evaluate the importance of artifacts in relation to cultural
and social aspect.
A: Form interest on the processes involved in cultural and
socio- political evolutions.
In this module students will learn about early humans’ capacity
and their determination to survive the elements of their
environment and the methods used by early humans in
creating tools as well as their cultural and sociopolitical
evolutions.
It is important to understand how early humans outlive the
pressure from their environment through their material
remains and evidences. The shift in stone tool technology
informs us of the capacity of humans to continuously alter their
behavior to suit their circumstances. Humans set of behaviors
are constantly changing and adapting to their perceived needs
until now.
 IMAGINING YOURSELF
Direction: Read the paragraph below and answer the questions that
follow.
The earth contains many buried objects from the prehistoric past.
Finding and interpreting these objects require training. Assume that
you are an archeologist or an anthropologist looking for evidence of
material remains of the prehistoric past as well as other evidence of
human activity.
1. What specific evidence will you look for?
2. What material evidence will you be interested to know and learn
about?
3. What are some of the tools/technology used that an
archaeologist/anthropologist carries with them when they excavate
material and human remains.
Directions: List down at least 5 tools that were used in the
primitive times and think of how these have advanced over the
course of time. Fill in the table with necessary information
about the evolution of primitive tools.
An artifact is an object remaining from a
particular period.
An artifact, or artefact is something made
or given shape by humans, such as a tool
or a work of art, especially an object of
archaeological interest. In archaeology,
however, the word has become a term of
particular nuance and is defined as: an
object recovered by archaeological
endeavor, which may be a cultural artifact
having cultural interest.
Tool Traditions
Oldowan tools are part of the Lower Paleolithic
stage of technological development. They were
made by Homo habilis, and also by early Homo
erectus.
There were two main types of Oldowan tools:
1. core tools
2. flake tools
 Core tools- were made by
using a rock as a hammer to
knock flakes off another
stone, resulting in a
chopping tool that could be
held easily in the hand. The
tool could also be used for
hammering or digging.
 Flake tools-were the flakes of rock
that were removed in the process of
making the core tools. Flake tools
were used as knives. They were used,
for example, to butcher animals, as
evidenced by cut marks on animal
bones found in association with the
tools.
Fossils are the remains of living
things (plants, animals, people), not
of things that were made.
Artifacts refers to human-associated
tools and materials that exist as a
creation of those ancient humans.
These are the remains of things that
were made, not the remains of living
things
Acheulian Tools
Homo erectus developed a more
complex tool from what they inherited from
Homo habilis. Using the same process of
percussion flaking, Homo erectus created
hand axes that were bifacial, shaped in both
sides and with straighter and sharper edges.
These stones were used in multiple
activities such as light chopping of woods,
digging up roots and bulbs, butchering
animals, cracking nuts and small bones.
Homo erectus made other tools such as
choppers, cleavers, and hammers as well as
flakes used as knives and scrapers.
 Mousterian Tools
Was developed by Homo
neaderthalensis (Neanderthals) in
Europe and West Asia. The tools
from this industry combined
Acheulian industry technique,
which involved the use of
premade core tool and extraction
of a flake tool that has sharpened
edges. This type of tool is very
efficient as all the sides of the
flake tool are sharpened and are
more handy.
 Upper Paleolithic Tools
By about 75 thousand years ago, some early
modern humans began making tools that were
significantly different from the earlier
Mousterian tools. They have been categorized in
several different tool traditions in the Upper
Paleolithic stage of technological development.
These new tools have been found in sites in
Europe and elsewhere in the Old World and
more recently in the New World. They range
from blades of various shapes and sizes to
barbed harpoon heads.
Types of Society
1.Hunting and Gathering
Societies
The members of hunting and
gathering societies primarily
survive by hunting animals,
fishing, and gathering
plants. Most of them were
nomadic, moving constantly
in search of food and water.
2. Pastoral Societies
Members of pastoral societies, which first
emerged 12,000 years ago, pasture animals or
food and transportation. Domesticating
animals allows for a more manageable food
supply than do hunting and gathering. Hence,
pastoral societies are able to produce a surplus
of goods, which makes storing food for future
use a possibility. Pastoral societies allow certain
of its members (those who are not
domesticating animals) to engage in non-
survival activities. Traders, healers, spiritual
leaders, craftspeople, and people with other
specialty professions appear.
3. Horticultural Societies
Horticultural societies rely on
cultivating fruits, vegetables, and
plants. These societies first appeared
in different parts of the planet about
the same time as pastoral societies.
Like hunting and gathering societies,
horticultural societies had to be
mobile. Depletion of the land's
resources or dwindling water
supplies, for example, forced the
people to leave.
4. Agricultural Societies
Agricultural societies use
technological advances to cultivate
crops (especially grains like wheat,
rice, corn, and barley) over a large
area. Sociologists use the phrase
Agricultural Revolution to refer to the
technological changes that occurred
as long as 8,500 years ago that led to
cultivating crops and raising farm
animals.
5. Feudal Societies
The 9th to 15th centuries, feudalism
was a form of society based on
ownership of land. Unlike today's
farmers, vassals under feudalism
were bound to cultivating their lord's
land. In exchange for military
protection, the lords exploited the
peasants into providing food, crops,
crafts, homage, and other services to
the owner of the land.
6. Industrial Societies
Industrial societies are based on using
machines (particularly fuel‐driven ones) to
produce goods. Sociologists refer to the
period during the 18th century when the
production of goods in mechanized factories
began as the Industrial Revolution.
As productivity increased, means of
transportation improved to better facilitate
the transfer of products from place to place.
Great wealth was attained by the few who
owned factories, and the “masses” found
jobs working in the factories.
 7. Post-industrial Societies
Sociologists note that with the advent of
the computer microchip, the world is
witnessing a technological revolution.
This revolution is creating a
postindustrial society based on
information, knowledge, and the selling
of services. That is, rather than being
driven by the factory production of
goods, society is being shaped by the
human mind, aided by computer
technology. Although factories will
always exist, the key to wealth and
power seems to lie in the ability to
generate, store, manipulate, and sell
information.
Processes of Cultural and
Sociopolitical Evolution
a. The Neolithic Revolution
This period is characterized by a
major shift in economic
subsistence of early humans
from foraging to agriculture. This
dramatic shift affected the other
aspects of their lifestyle, as
foraging made them nomads
and agriculture encouraged
permanent settlement.
b. Early Civilization and the Rise of the State
The earliest civilizations rose by the end of the
Neolithic period as the complexities brought about by
the shift in food production demanded a more rigid
social structure that would manage the opposing
perspective of various sectors. As a conflict between
groups developed and intensified, the need to create a
more cohesive society became definite.
Early civilizations were characterized by the presence of
city-states, a system of writing and a ceremonial center
where public debates and decision were made.
However, it must be noted that not all societies during
this period could be considered as civilizations as not all
possessed a political system that could be equated to a
state. A state is apolitical entity that has four requisite
elements: territory, sovereignty, people and
government.
c. Democratization of Early Civilization
The traditional view on the history of
democracy highlights its development
among the city states of ancient Greece,
around 507 BCE. It is believed that an
Athenian statesman named Cleisthenes
Greek Word
proposed demokratia as a political
Demos-people
ideology that aimed at dispersing power
from the monopoly of theKratos—power
elites to the
masses. This allows for the closing on of
or rule
social gaps between diverging social
groups.
 Assignment
Create a photo collage of the early humans focusing on
their survival means of day to day living.
Example
Direction: Based on the activities and readings on this module, write the things
you have learned about the Significance of Cultural, Social, Political and Economic
Symbols and Practices. Do this in your activity notebook.
END OF THE LESSON!
Happy weekend
everyone! God
Bless!