In sum, The Interpretation of Cultures demonstrates how Geertz’s conception of culture as organized symbol systems that orient people to their environments, along with his insistence that the aim of anthropology is to interpret the meaning of those symbols, can be applied to concrete analyses of what constitutes and is happening in human societies. Geertz starts with an examination of Claude Levi-Strauss’ work and then analyzes the connections among a people’s sense of personhood, time, and social conduct, contextualizing his discussion of Balinese cockfighting. Part 5 contains three chapters that are connected by the theme of “savagery,” not in an evaluative or derogatory sense of the term, but rather in a way that is concerned with the psychic unity of humankind and what conclusions can be drawn from specific Balinese examples.

Although he discusses several countries, he focuses on Indonesia, where the bulk of his fieldwork took place. In Part 4, Geertz deals with ideology as a culture system, with the central object of analysis being sociopolitical development in newly independent states and the role of nationalist ideology in that development. Part 3 concerns religion as a culture system: After defining religion in a way that illuminates its role as a culture system, Geertz discusses specific examples of Balinese and Javanese religious tradition and their role in social integration and social change. Geertz continues articulating his conceptions of what it is to be human and what it is to think, both undergirded by the specificity of one’s cultural context, in his concrete analyses in later parts of the work. Part 2, consisting of two chapters on the concept of man and the concept of the mind, is particularly concerned with specificity: Geertz asserts that the power of an interpretive approach to the study of culture lies in the ability of anthropology to draw out general theory from the multifaceted, complex situations that the anthropologist at once describes and interprets.

In Part 1, which consists only of one chapter, Geertz lays the groundwork for his ensuing analyses by explaining what culture is and what anthropology seeks to do as an interpretive endeavor.

The interpretation of cultures