What is the difference between cultures and co-cultures?

Culture- the way of life of a particular society or group of people, including patterns of thoughts, beliefs, behavior, customs, traditions, rituals, dress, and language, as well as art, music, etc. A shared pattern of belief, feeling and adaption, which people carry in their minds. An organized group of ideas, habits and conditioned responding shared by members of a society. A blueprint for living.

Co-culture- a group whos beliefs or behaviors distinguish it from the larger culture of which it is part of and with which it shares numerous similarities.

The difference between a culture and a co-culture is that co-cultures are broken down into small groups of people with whom they already share common beliefs with. In other words they are a group inside of a group in which they have more in common with then with everyone else in their culture. Cultures are large groups in which everyone associates with almost everyone.

For example: I am a huge cow girl, I love country music and to wear cow girl boots. I have friends who are just like me and friends who aren't so much like me. I like to be around friends with whom I have more in common with and can listen to country music and wear my boots with rather then the people who think country music is just ok and are big city people. In other words the people that are like me would be considered part of my co-culture and the people who I have things in common with but not as much would be in my culture.

This plays a big part in our lives today. We are attracted to people with whom we have similar interests, weather that be a sports team, food, clothes, music, studying the same things in school. We all want to be part of a group and alot of times that is how we make friends and grow as people is by being around other people with similar interests.