Adams] SHONTO: ROLE OF NAVAHO TRADER 233 



be said to influence the nature, rather than the intensity, of culture 

 contact. 



QUANTITATIVE VARIABILITY IN CtTLTURE CONTACT 



All models for the structural analysis of culture contact have given 

 some attention to differences in kind of contact resulting from vari- 

 ables in the contact situation. On the other hand, differences in degree 

 of contact have been comparatively ignored. To some extent such 

 differences are subsumed under the heading "Intercultural Communi- 

 cation" in the model formulated by the Summer Seminar (1954, p. 

 982 ) . It is noted here that 



Intercultural communication may be specifically or diffusely channeled. Spec- 

 ificity in this sense has to do with whether a cross-cultural message appropri- 

 ately applies to any member or just to certain members of a receiving group. 

 Extremely diffuse are forms of dominance, discrimination, fear, respect, or 

 approbation which uniformly engage most members of one group vis-a-vis the 

 other. [ Summer Seminar on Acculturation, 1954, p. 982. ] 



If culture contact takes place within any sort of normal social 

 system, it is apparent that differences in degree as well as in kind of 

 contact must be comprehended. In purely physical terms, the fre- 

 quency and duration of direct contact between Shonto institutions and 

 Navaho individuals varies enormously (cf. chart L, p. 258). More- 

 over, there are considerable variations among them in regard to ability 

 and opportunity to communicate, and in Navaho cultural receptivity. 

 Many of the factors in the contact situation at Shonto, identified in 

 table 37, affect what might be called the intensity of contact, in con- 

 trast to the character of contact, between Navahos and Whites. 



THE MEASUKE OF CULTURE CONTACT 



Anthropologists have, in general, directed their attention toward 

 culture contact as one of the obvious causes of culture change (cf. 

 Albrecht, 1946 ; Adair and Vogt, 1949 ; Eaton, 1952) . The term "cul- 

 ture contact" is itself used as a synonym for "acculturation" by 

 British as well as some American students (e.g., Mair, 1938; Malin- 

 owski, 1945 ; Wilson and Wilson, 1945 ; Herskovits, 1938) . From this 

 approach culture contact is necessarily viewed as a process (cf . Fortes, 

 1936) which must therefore be studied diachronically (cf. Kedfield, 

 Linton, and Herskovits, 1936; Linton, 1940, pp. ix-x; Malinowski, 

 1945, p. 73; Spindler and Goldsclmaidt, 1952; Summer Seminar on 

 Acculturation, 1954) . The effects of contact over a given length of 

 time are measured in terms of certain kinds and degrees of culture 

 change. 



In the case of Shonto, data for such a diachronic approach to cul- 

 ture contact are not available. It should nevertheless be possible, to 

 a certain extent, to assess the effects of contact synchronically. If it 

 can be assumed that the presence of certain factors in the contact sit- 



