ard to become consciously aware of his or her own cultural assumptions and thus be able to perceive a different culture objectively. Culture for most people operates almost entirely unconsciously, and the ideals and values of a culture are in effect predetermined for its members, not freely chosen. The unconscious factors in culture were studied in depth by the great cultural historian Alfred Kroeber.
Another great cultural historian, Leslie White, who was also an avowed albeit maverick Marxist, pointed out that classic Marxist theory erred in attempting to link specific social structures with specific economic systems within Western civilization. White proposed that there have been only three major economic stages in all of history -- hunting and gathering, agriculture-based, and fuel-based -- and therefore three major stages of social evolution, the third, current one being still in process. Given this qualification, he validated the basic Marxist equation that
economic production --> social structure --> ideology
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