Cultural materialism (anthropology)

Cultural Materialism is an approach to anthropology that is concerned with the material things that make up a culture, such as its tools, clothes, food and buildings. It looks at how people find, craft, use, trade, and discard these material things, and how they get passed on from one generation to the next. It studies how people's actions and choices shape their material environment, and vice versa - how the material environment shapes people's actions and choices. For example, how people decide to farm, hunt or fish can depend on the tools and resources they have available.