VocabauraVOCABAURA

culture

noun · verb

Simple meaning

The way of life, customs, and arts of a group of people

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

kuhlcher

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈkʌltʃɚ

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. The arts, customs, lifestyles, background, and habits that characterize humankind, or a particular society or nation.

  2. The beliefs, values, behaviour, and material objects that constitute a people's way of life.

  3. The conventional conducts and ideologies of a community; the system comprising the accepted norms and values of a society.

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

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

  6. The growth thus produced.

verb

  1. transitive

    To maintain in an environment suitable for growth (especially of bacteria).

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
A1 · Beginner (estimated)
Frequency
Very Common
Typical Use
General English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: The arts, customs, lifestyles, background, and habits that characterize humankind, or a particular society or nation.

Used this way, culture is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

Share your sentence

Write your own example sentence using “culture”. We review each one before it appears.

Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Arts / ethnicity

american culturenational culture

Tastes / attitudes

political culture

Growing

culture medium

Beliefs

material culture

Other combinations

tissue culturemass culturecell culture

Tap the highlighted word to open its own entry.

Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • culturaladjectiveDerived adjective

    Related to The arts, customs, lifestyles, background, and habits that characterize humankind, or a particular society or nation.

  • culturallyadverbDerived adverb

    With regard to a culture.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • culture mediumnounCompound term

    A nutrient substance (solid or liquid) that is used to cultivate micro-organisms.

  • culture shocknounCompound term

    A condition of disorientation affecting someone who is suddenly exposed to an unfamiliar culture or way of life or set of attitudes.

  • helladic culturenounCompound term

    The bronze-age culture of mainland Greece that flourished 2500-1100 BC.

  • kalashnikov culturenounCompound term

    The attitudes and behavior in a social group that resolves political disputes by force of arms.

  • mass culturenounCompound term

    The culture that is widely disseminated via the mass media.

  • minoan culturenounCompound term

    The bronze-age culture of Crete that flourished 3000-1100 BC.

Related words

Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.

  • cultural anthropologynounRelated term

    The branch of anthropology that deals with human culture and society.

Related Words

Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: arts or customs or lifestyles or background

Use This Word

See how this word sounds in a real sentence.

Ask Vocabaura

Understand the word your way.

What Does It Mean Here?

Words can change meaning depending on context.

Use it yourself

Keep learning “culture” by choosing the kind of practice you need next.

Want to type words like this one without looking at the keyboard? Each typing round draws from words you've learned, saved or need to review. Follow the free Learn to Type lessons and type your own vocabulary with confidence.

Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.