culture of poverty

poverty

nationality

American

occupation / innovator as

anthropologist

innovator in the field of

scientific organization

American Academy of Arts and Sciences

university teacher

cause of death

natural causes

is the idea that people entrenched in poverty become accustomed to their way of life and did not expect to be able to improve it, effectively perpetuating their own poverty.

culture of poverty. A theory developed by the anthropologist Oscar Lewis that in some societies (such as in Mexico) people in entrenched poverty became accustomed to their way of life and did not expect to be able to improve it, effectively perpetuating their own poverty. It has been challenged on the grounds that it blames the poor for social deprivation, rather than the system itself, and largely superseded in anthropological writing by later explanations. Also called the 'cycle of deprivation' (Morris 2012: 68) Morris, Mike (2012). Concise Dictionary of Social and Cultural Anthropology. Wiley-Blackwell Press.

is an adaptation and reaction of the poor to their marginal position in a class-stratified, highly individualistic, capitalistic society.

the culture of poverty is both an adaptation and a reaction of the poor to their marginal position in a class-stratified, highly individualistic, capitalistic society.'[2]

Oscar LewisThinkers

Oscar Lewis