CULTURE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does culture mean? 

• CULTURE (noun)
  The noun CULTURE has 7 senses:

1. a particular society at a particular time and place

2. the tastes in art and manners that are favored by a social group

3. all the knowledge and values shared by a society

4. (biology) the growing of microorganisms in a nutrient medium (such as gelatin or agar)

5. a highly developed state of perfection; having a flawless or impeccable quality

6. the attitudes and behavior that are characteristic of a particular social group or organization

7. the raising of plants or animals

  Familiarity information: CULTURE used as a noun is common.

• CULTURE (verb)
  The verb CULTURE has 1 sense:

1. grow in a special preparation

  Familiarity information: CULTURE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CULTURE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A particular society at a particular time and place

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

civilisation; civilization; culture

Context example:

early Mayan civilization

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

society (an extended social group having a distinctive cultural and economic organization)

Meronyms (parts of "culture"):

subculture (a social group within a national culture that has distinctive patterns of behavior and beliefs)

Domain category:

archaeology; archeology (the branch of anthropology that studies prehistoric people and their cultures)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

Aegean civilisation; Aegean civilization; Aegean culture (the prehistoric civilization on the islands in the Aegean sea and the surrounding countries)

Helladic civilisation; Helladic civilization; Helladic culture (the bronze-age culture of mainland Greece that flourished 2500-1100 BC)

Indus civilization (the bronze-age culture of the Indus valley that flourished from about 2600-1750 BC)

Minoan civilisation; Minoan civilization; Minoan culture (the bronze-age culture of Crete that flourished 3000-1100 BC)

Mycenaean civilisation; Mycenaean civilization; Mycenaean culture (the late bronze-age culture of Mycenae that flourished 1400-1100 BC)

Paleo-American culture; Paleo-Amerind culture; Paleo-Indian culture (the prehistoric culture of the earliest human inhabitants of North America and South America)

Western civilization; Western culture (the modern culture of western Europe and North America)

Derivation:

acculturate (assimilate culturally)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The tastes in art and manners that are favored by a social group

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

appreciation; discernment; perceptiveness; taste (delicate discrimination (especially of aesthetic values))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

counterculture (a culture with lifestyles and values opposed to those of the established culture)

mass culture (the culture that is widely disseminated via the mass media)

letters (the literary culture)

Derivation:

acculturate (assimilate culturally)

cultural (denoting or deriving from or distinctive of the ways of living built up by a group of people)

cultural (of or relating to the arts and manners that a group favors)

Sense 3

Meaning:

All the knowledge and values shared by a society

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

acculturation; culture

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

cognitive content; content; mental object (the sum or range of what has been perceived, discovered, or learned)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

meme (a cultural unit (an idea or value or pattern of behavior) that is passed from one person to another by non-genetic means (as by imitation))

Derivation:

acculturate (assimilate culturally)

cultural (denoting or deriving from or distinctive of the ways of living built up by a group of people)

cultural (of or relating to the shared knowledge and values of a society)

Sense 4

Meaning:

(biology) the growing of microorganisms in a nutrient medium (such as gelatin or agar)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Context example:

the culture of cells in a Petri dish

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

development; growing; growth; maturation; ontogenesis; ontogeny ((biology) the process of an individual organism growing organically; a purely biological unfolding of events involved in an organism changing gradually from a simple to a more complex level)

Domain category:

biological science; biology (the science that studies living organisms)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

starter (a culture containing yeast or bacteria that is used to start the process of fermentation or souring in making butter or cheese or dough)

Sense 5

Meaning:

A highly developed state of perfection; having a flawless or impeccable quality

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Synonyms:

cultivation; culture; finish; polish; refinement

Context example:

almost an inspiration which gives to all work that finish which is almost art

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

flawlessness; ne plus ultra; perfection (the state of being without a flaw or defect)

Sense 6

Meaning:

The attitudes and behavior that are characteristic of a particular social group or organization

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Context example:

the reason that the agency is doomed to inaction has something to do with the FBI culture

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

attitude; mental attitude (a complex mental state involving beliefs and feelings and values and dispositions to act in certain ways)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

cyberculture (the culture that emerges from the use of computers for communication and entertainment and business)

mosaic culture (a highly diverse culture)

Kalashnikov culture (the attitudes and behavior in a social group that resolves political disputes by force of arms)

Sense 7

Meaning:

The raising of plants or animals

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Context example:

the culture of oysters

Hypernyms ("culture" is a kind of...):

cultivation ((agriculture) production of food by preparing the land to grow crops (especially on a large scale))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "culture"):

monoculture (the cultivation of a single crop (on a farm or area or country))

tillage (the cultivation of soil for raising crops)

viniculture; viticulture (the cultivation of grapes and grape vines; grape growing)

cranberry culture (the cultivation of cranberries)

Derivation:

cultural (relating to the raising of plants or animals)

• CULTURE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they culture    ... he / she / it cultures   
Past simple: cultured   
Past participle: cultured   
-ing form: culturing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Grow in a special preparation

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Context example:

the biologist grows microorganisms

Hypernyms (to "culture" is one way to...):

grow (cause to grow or develop)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

 Context examples 

Angiotropin is a potent angiogenesis factor isolated from the serum-free media of cultured, lectin-activated peripheral monocytes. (from Arch Surg 1989;124:693-8).

(Angiotropin, NCI Thesaurus)

It has been used in some cultures to treat certain medical problems, including gastrointestinal problems such as loss of appetite, feelings of fullness, and gas.

(Angelica root, NCI Dictionary)

An herb with a root that has been used in some cultures to treat certain medical problems.

(American Ginseng, NCI Dictionary)

It has also been used in some cultures to treat certain medical conditions including high cholesterol, high blood pressure, infections, and cancer.

(Allium sativum, NCI Dictionary)

Possessing a broad range of therapeutic activities, graviola has been used in different cultures for its pesticidal, antifungal,, antispasmodic, anticonvulsant, vasodilator, smooth-muscle relaxant, and hypotensive properties.

(Annona muricata, NCI Thesaurus)

NK cells from haploidentical donors are expanded in culture and electroporated with the CAR mRNA.

(Anti-CD19-CAR-CD3zeta-4-1BB-Expressing Allogenic Natural Killer Cells, NCI Thesaurus)

After expansion in culture and reintroduction into the patient, anti-Her-2-CAR retroviral vector-transduced autologous peripheral blood lymphocytes, which express anti-Her-2-CAR on their cell surfaces, bind to Her-2 antigen on tumor cell surfaces.

(Anti-Her-2-CAR Retroviral Vector-Transduced Autologous Peripheral Blood Lymphocytes, NCI Thesaurus)

These TIL are transfected with a retroviral pGCsam vector encoding T-cell receptors specific for gp100, grown in culture, and then transferred back to the patient.

(Anti-gp100 TCR Retroviral Vector-Transduced Autologous TIL, NCI Thesaurus)

These PBL are transduced with a retroviral pGCsam vector encoding T-cell receptors specific for gp100, grown in culture, and then transferred back to the patient.

(Anti-gp100 TCR Retroviral Vector-Transduced Autologous PBL, NCI Thesaurus)

A type of culture in which cells grow as a monolayer that is attached to the culture substrate.

(Adherent Culture, NCI Thesaurus)