Cultures' are elusive, complex and contested practices and attributes which defy simple definitions.
Academics take very different starting points when defining what constitutes 'culture'.
Second, and almost imperceptibly, culture is a concept that includes a refining and elevating element, each society's reservoir of the best that has been known and thought, as Matthew Arnold put it in the 1860s. In an economic perspective this includes, for example, attitudes towards material growth and its distribution, styles of consumption, work habits, and the organisation of production and exchange. These definitions are illuminative. What 'culture' is depends on the viewpoint of the observer, for cultures are not objective 'things' able to be described by a 'neutral and objective' observer. Cultures are understood through engaging in inter-cultural dialogue, either in personal contact or through representations and signs.