Some things you need to know about social roles and relationships to help you navigate other cultures
Contents
Importance of understanding social roles and relationships
Male and female: gender roles
Race and ethnicity
Social class, status and other forms of social hierarchy
Strangers and foreigners
Sexuality
Age
Definitions of friendship vary by culture
Family
Business and working relationships
Concept of face
Importance of understanding social roles and relationships
The second subtopic in this module is about understanding some of the things that shape a person’s social statuses (status = socially defined positions, like male/female, friend, rich/poor, employee/boss, older person, teacher/student, etc.) in a given society, and the roles and relationships that are related to those roles. These categories play a very powerful role in shaping how you behave and how you relate to and see others. An extensive body of research shows that some of these categories (e.g. race, gender) are learned very early when we are children. These categories impact our socialization— the process in which how we learn and apply these concepts. For example, if a female child wears pink clothes, plays with dolls and kitchen play-sets, and observes how their female relatives act and dress, the child will grow up with certain expectations of what it means to be female within their family context. They can extend these concepts to broader society and make comparisons and judgments based on previous experience and memories.
To successfully navigate other cultures, you need to understand how the expectations for people in these roles, which you learned as a child and may seem as totally “natural” to you, will differ cross-culturally and how any intercultural encounter will vary depending on what roles you and the other people have. Different roles will affect intercultural interactions in different ways. For example, a male U.S. American will relate to male Saudi Arabian differently than to a female Saudi Arabian, and certainly it will be different than relating to males or females from the U.S. Perhaps less obvious, a wealthy Chinese international student will have a very different experience navigating U.S. culture compared to a poor Chinese farmer who immigrates to the United States to work in a restaurant. Equally important, we also want you to understand how common types of relationships (friendship, boss/subordinate, teacher-student, family, etc.) can vary cross-culturally.
While we cannot cover every type of role and relationship here, we will cover some key types of roles and relationships below.
How you navigate a culture depends on your specific social roles and relationships
Navigating another culture is not just about learning basic beliefs and behaviors that are generally considered appropriate for that “culture” as a whole. It is also about knowing the variations in how these beliefs and behaviors among people with different social roles in that cultural setting. What is “culturally appropriate” behavior in any one place or setting can vary depending on the roles and relationships of the people involved.
Many people can identify with a “higher level” culture(s), such as nationality, but this is a simplification of culture— just because two individuals from different places in Bolivia may claim themselves as Bolivians and share similarities that can be counted as a part of a “Bolivian culture” doesn’t mean there are not cultural differences between people of the same nationality. These differences are not only tied to location but to the social positions and roles we are born and achieve over the course of our lives. People also usually have social roles in that culture—male, female, close family, friend, neighbor, old, young, rich, poor. Therefore, one important area to consider when navigating another culture has to do with understanding the various social roles and relationships in that society, and what are the expectations for these. You probably know this is the case with people you consider culturally similar. The key point here is that you should also be aware of how your “native” ideas about your social roles may be different from local ideas.
To give you one example, if we view “stranger in the street” as a social role, how we relate to strangers varies cross-culturally. In many societies, there is a stronger distinction between “in-group” and “out-group” status, so expectations about smiling to, making small talk with, or helping strangers may be less than they would be in the United States.
Here is another simple example to illustrate the importance of understanding how there can be different social roles in any one society, and how these roles will affect how you interact with people in that society. Let’s say you learn that to greet someone in Vietnam, it is common to say “Xin Chao”. That’s great! But as you will learn in this subtopic, you need to learn to look for the various social roles and relationships that might exist in a given society. In the case of Vietnam, this will affect exactly how you greet them; you do not say “Xin Chao” in the same way to everybody, as you can see in this video clip below. Notice the differences between the gestures and duration between each group.
Cautions about culture
Contents
Overview
Caution about culture in John Davis piece on food in Japan
Writing against culture
Cautions about culture based on initial student essays about culture
Cultural Personal or Universal?
Review sheet on cautions about culture
Overview
So far, the key goal in this module about culture has been to introduce you to the basics about what “culture” is and how understanding this concept will help you in future intercultural situations. The goal of this section “Cautions about culture” is to help you avoid thinking about culture in a simplistic way. This will dramatically increase your expertise as a cultural navigator. After completing this section, you should have a better understanding of the uses and limitations of the concept of culture for understanding differences in how people act and view the world.
Although the idea that “culture” rather than “biology” or “race” explained differences in human behavior was a revolutionary concept in the early 1900s, today anthropologists question simplistic understandings of the term “culture”. The following basic cautions will help you avoid a simplistic understanding of culture:
Culture is more of a process than a list of things: As Sarah Mahler put it, you should think of culture “not as a thing you have but as ways of thinking and doing that you share with others…we do culture more than we have culture.”” (Source: Sarah Mahler, 2013, p. 33). Cultural traits and cultural differences are not natural, unchanging parts of a person, but instead are created and practiced in day to day life. That does not mean it is easy for somebody to create a new culture for themselves or to avoid their cultural upbringing, but it does mean you should be careful about labeling yourself or other people using rigid cultural categories.
Culture is relational: Anthropologist Michael Agar argues that, “Culture becomes visible only when differences appear with reference to a newcomer, an outsider who comes into contact with it. What it is that becomes visible in any particular case depends on [the cultural background of the newcomer and the culture they come into contact with] […] a newcomer who might be an ethnographer, or perhaps an immigrant, or a new employee, or a tourist. Different […] combinations, different rich points, different translations, different cultures.”
Stereotypes represent a key caution— that’s why we spent a whole module on the issue of stereotypes. A big danger in thinking about culture is creating stereotypes about people from our own or other cultures. A stereotype in this sense is simply an oversimplified belief about members of a group of people (“all members of group X do Y” or “she is from X culture, therefore she must believe Y”, or “he is Japanese, therefore he will have a hard time being direct”). As one anthropologist writes,
“One instance of the extreme that this trajectory can lead to is an example from a workshop for federal employees in which the audience was told that whites “know through counting and measuring,” Asians “know through striving toward the transcendence,” and blacks, Hispanics, and Arabs “know through symbolic imagery and rhythm” (Harris 1995:12–13). Cultural difference has metamorphosed into quick-fix silver bullets.”
(Source: González, Norma. 1999. What Will We Do When Culture Does Not Exist Anymore?. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 30: 431–35).
Context: For our purposes, context refers to the broader social, cultural, historical, situational, and political setting in which an intercultural encounter occurs. It’s the wider background that shapes an interaction–the stage in which an interaction occurs. For example, think of interactions between individuals of African descent and of European descent in Alabama versus such interactions in Canada, France, or Brazil; there will be a difference due to different historical legacies and patterns of racial relations in those places. Context can also refer to the more immediate variables when an interaction takes place: a bar or an office, for example, and to the purpose of the interaction: social or business, for example. All of these variables will influence the nature of an intercultural interaction.
Individuals and groups sometimes will break their cultural rules: While most people may follow the conventions of their culture most of the time, in certain situations, even people who follow the norm will break it depending on context and individual preferences. Anthropologists, for example, have studied how in certain cultures during certain holidays, such as carnivals, gender and social class roles are reversed; certain behaviors that are not OK at other times of the year become allowable. An example of this might be Halloween in the United States, when it is OK for children to knock on stranger’s doors and ask for candy. Other people may decide to change a certain facet of their cultural makeup, for example, a female in another country may become influenced by Western women’s liberation ideas and decide to incorporate those into her gender role by challenging traditional, local gender roles. Think of the times you may have broken some cultural rule or norm, either temporarily or permanently.
Individual variation: In a given cultural group, there will always be individuals who deviate from the norm. Do you know any people from your cultural group who may not fit in the norm? For example, a male or female who does not follow commonly expected behaviors for their gender? Culture is a useful tool for understanding why other people behave and think the way they do, but it does not explain everything. Certain aspects of human behavior may relate to individual or personal variation. Thus, when exposed to a different cultural setting, not everything you about that cultural setting will apply equally to all individuals from that culture. However, knowing about an exceptional individual’s culture will still still help you understand them, even if they are “odd” or “exceptional” within their culture, their culture is still the framework for their uniqueness. As one anthropologist wrote, “Obviously, anarchists who eat shrimp and bacon on Yom Kippur are Jewish—if they weren’t why would that be a significant thing to do at all? The whole point of the idea of cultural patterning or cultural structure is that the same pattern or structure can produce a wide variety of different practices.”
Subcultural variation: To differing degrees, each culture can be broken down into various subcultures. For example, urban and rural, male and female, upper class and lower class, political orientation, religious affiliation, education, career. For example, the following posting to a discussion forum by an ANP200 student illustrates subcultural variation shaped by religious beliefs. This student still shares many broader cultural traits with other U.S. Americans but in this case religion defines some sub-cultural variation:
“When I was a freshman at MSU, a number of us kids developed a study group for our psychology class. There was a dude in the group who had failed the class 3 times, and was taking it his fourth time. I had recently gotten saved, or became a “born-again” Christian, and somehow my group happened to get on the subject of religion. I recall saying something about the Bible, and all of a sudden, this group member said why would I believe in the Bible? I was completely flabbergast[ed]. At that point, in my eighteen years on earth, I had never heard anyone say anything negative about the Bible. To go further, this young man went on to say the Bible contradicts itself: “I am a Muslim, not Nation of Islam, because it is an organization, but Islamic”. I began to debate with him about scriptures, which I did not know many of because I had recently gotten saved, and our other group member jumped in. She did not profess a religion of her own, but began to attach me with this other guy, because she felt that I had no right to point out his wrongs, as he pointed out the Bible’s “wrong.” Although all of this went on in our first encounter with each other, I still continued on in the group. Interestingly enough, the subject of religion never came up again, and we never got into another argument. This experience, however, was an eye opener for me. From that point on, I knew that being apart of American culture did not mean we have the same sub-culture, or “super-culture” if you will, of religion.”
Culture is not static: Some early anthropologists portrayed the cultures they studied as “timeless”, sort of as if they were museum exhibits frozen behind a glass cage. In other words, they assumed that what they saw at the time of their research was how that culture had always been, ignoring the possibility that that culture may have not always been that way. The unspoken assumption was that while the anthropologist came from a culture (the United States or a European nation) that had history, the people they were studying (in Africa, Asia, or Latin America) had no history. While this assumption was rarely, if ever, correct, it is increasingly further from the truth in today’s globalized world, where interconnected individuals and groups of people shape each other. Thus in many parts of Latin America, being punctual is increasingly the norm. This is not to say that business people there are evolving to become more like the United States or Germany, but rather that they are adapting to the business practices of their trade partners.
A second reason culture is not static is that it is learned, and in the process of transmission it is inevitably altered. The implications of this caution for cross cultural interactions are very important. While there are useful “do’s and don’ts” for different cultures, these should not be applied mechanically. On the other hand, beware of the fallacy of the modern “Other”: don’t assume that just because you see elements of “Western” culture abroad, that people have totally “lost” their culture: more likely outside cultural elements are combined with local ones.
An example could be the impact of the U.S. economic crisis on consumer behavior:
“Amid weak job and housing markets, consumers are saving more and spending less than they have in decades, and industry professionals expect that trend to continue. Consumers saved 6.4 percent of their after-tax income in June, according to a new government report. Before the recession, the rate was 1 to 2 percent for many years. In June, consumer spending and personal incomes were essentially flat compared with May, suggesting that the American economy, as dependent as it is on shoppers opening their wallets and purses, isn’t likely to rebound anytime soon.
On the bright side, the practices that consumers have adopted in response to the economic crisis ultimately could, as a raft of new research suggests, make them happier. New studies of consumption and happiness show, for instance, that people are happier when they spend money on experiences instead of material objects, when they relish what they plan to buy long before they buy it, and when they stop trying to outdo the Joneses.
If consumers end up sticking with their newfound spending habits, some tactics that retailers and marketers began deploying during the recession could become lasting business strategies. Among those strategies are proffering merchandise that makes being at home more entertaining and trying to make consumers feel special by giving them access to exclusive events and more personal customer service.”
(Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/08/business/08consume.html?ex=1297742400&en=6982f7303dd7cc1d&ei=5087&WT.mc_id=NYT-E-I-NYT-E-AT–0818-L20:).
Another example refers to the rapid pace of cultural change in China caused in part by its rapid economic growth:
“When you live in China as a foreigner, there are two critical moments of recognition. The first occurs immediately upon arrival, when you are confronted with your own ignorance. Then, just as you beginning to catch on, you realize that everybody else feels pretty much the same way. The place changes too fast; nobody in China has the luxury of being confident in his knowledge. This second moment of recognition is even more frightening than the first. Awareness of your own ignorance is a lonely feeling, but there’s little consolation in sharing it with 1.3 billion neighbors.”
(Source: quote from Peter Hessler of the New Yorker used in China: The Pessoptimist Nation by William A. Callahan. Oxford University Press. Cited in http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2012/06/15/what-money-cant-buy-the-moral-limits-of-markets/ accessed June 18, 2012).
Culture is not like fur: This expression, invented by a famous anthropologist, emphasizes that people are not born with culture – they learn it. Anybody has the capacity to learn any culture. The following example shows how this caution applies to Korea, where a dominant belief is that culture is a kind of fur, in the sense that Korean identity is based on a people descended from a single bloodline, and that their culture is tied to ethnic homogeneity. It also shows a second caution at work: how the impact of a very specific global flow of people and increased multiculturalism on Korean national identity — the increase in numbers of “non-Korean” wives who have moved to Korea to be with their Korean husbands.
Please click here to read the short article and listen to the audio clip about cultural change in South Korea
. Think about how this situation illustrates the idea of “culture is not static”. (Source: National Public Radio website. South Korea Tackles Multiculturalism by ANTHONY KUHN. June 23, 2008 4:00 PM. accessed May 27, 2013)
Power issues 1: This refers to a specific contextual variable. In some human interactions or relationships, there will be differing degrees of power – when an employer interacts with their maid, for example, or when a judge interacts with an uneducated person in court. This inequality can occur in intercultural relationships too. Thus, simply understanding the culture of another individual will not in itself account for all the variables shaping that relationship. Differences in wealth and political standing can shape the interaction (of course, culture will shape how differences in power are perceived and acted upon).
For example, in a situation in Mexico where you interact with a street vendor who has a fraction of the wealth you have as a college student, there may be an element of power introduced by this difference in wealth. That encounter will differ from one with a wealthy Mexican who has traveled extensively to the United States. Power differentials may not be an issue, but it would be naive to think that they never are an issue.
Power issues 2: The concept of ideology refers to the process where beliefs and practices help benefit dominant or powerful groups in a given society, for example by justifying the dominant role of males in a male-dominated society, or the wealth of rich people in a society with high income inequality.
In a given society, groups or categories of people with power over others may enforce certain cultural rules in order to maintain their power. In Mexico, for example, the idea of what constitutes a legitimate Mexican for a long time excluded Indians, who were and are an underprivileged group in Mexico. In many countries, the idea of “proper female behavior” can be seen as a way of controlling women; think of how this idea has changed in the United States and Europe in the past 100 years, largely as result of women contesting prevailing norms about proper female behavior (such as the idea that a woman’s place is in the home).
At the same time, cultural values can be fought about. There may be different views and struggles over what it means to be a woman in a certain society, for example (think of debates about the rights and roles of women in the United States). Recently, Argentina passed a national law legalizing gay marriage which was very controversial, raising issues about the relationship of Catholicism and sexuality to “Argentinean culture”.
Power issues 3: OK, not everything cultural relates to power. That some cultural groups are OK with eating insects in most cases will not have much to do with power relations in their society.
Culture does not always equal nation or religion: Though we often think of culture in terms of national cultures (the Japanese, the Mexicans, the French, etc.), the idea that a group of people living in a nation-state shares a common culture is relatively new. Be aware that there are many other “types” of cultural groups: there are subcultures, ethnic cultures (in fact, many nations that exist today are largely artificial creations that incorporated many different cultural groups), there may be cultures that transcend national boundaries (for example, Jewish or Latino culture).
It’s true that we may find useful rules for national cultures that will work most of the time, but be aware that culture does not always correspond to nation. Of course, the notion of one single Jewish, African-American, Catholic, or Muslim culture is also simplistic. A person’s religious background and national origins will combine with their class position (rich, poor…), gender, and so on to form their “culture”.
Culture is more than just a laundry list of traits: For all the above reasons. Of course, there will be certain do’s and don’ts that will be useful to know, but the intelligent cultural navigator will know the limitations of such lists.
Caution about culture in John Davis piece on food in Japan
At this point,
please click here to review Professor John Davis’ audio clip about food in Japan
. Think for yourself, what caution(s) about culture listed above does it illustrate? (Hint: it has to do with his comment about Western Japan). Next, write down at least one of those cautions in the box below. Once you submit your answers, you will be able to see what other students have answered.
Writing against culture
Image of Lila Abu-Lughod, professor in Anthropology and Women and Gender Studies. Her work, including “Writing Women’s Worlds” challenges what we perceive as culture. Culture is more than “mainstream” or society-wide; culture includes everyday lived experiences and struggles that intersect with local and global realities (e.g. politics, media, economics, etc.)
Here, anthropologist Edward Bruner discusses anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod’s idea of “writing against culture” and restates several key cautions about culture. Be sure you understand how he describes writing against culture and what he means by culture being both contested and shared.
“Abu-Lughod (1991) says that anthropologists should be ”writing against culture“, that is, against culture as a homogeneous, shared set of meanings. The phrase writing against culture conveys Abu-Lughod’s notion of culture as a contested and partial arena of struggle and captures current [anthropological] disciplinary thinking… Abu-Lughod’s stance is a reaction against the concept of culture as integrated, functionally consistent, and static. Taking a longer view, though, I maintain that culture can be conceptualized as both contested and shared, in part because in the contestation there is sharing. If the parties to a conflict have nothing in common, they have no grounds to disagree.”
Source: Edward M. Bruner. 2005. Culture on Tour: Ethnographies of Travel. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 249–48.
Cautions about culture based on initial student essays about culture
Over the years that we have offered this course, we have found the initial essays on “culture” that students write at the beginning of the course are very interesting to read and generally very insightful. After reading the materials in this module about culture, by now you should realize there is no one correct definition of what culture is, so there is no one right or wrong answer for these essays. Student essays do illustrate the importance of a few cautions regarding what we think about culture:
Limiting culture to the idea of race or religion: Yes, there can be links, but remember to think in terms of levels of culture, and the multiple forms of cultural identity discussed in this module. For example, people talk about “Muslim culture” which is a very high/general level of culture about which only a few broad generalizations can be made and which ignores the diverse local cultures where Muslim religion is practiced: a Muslim from Indonesia will be culturally different than a Muslim from Saudi Arabia or from Detroit. A rich Muslim from Senegal will act/think differently than a poor Muslim from Senegal. And so on. You could make similar cautions about African American culture, Asian American culture, and Christianity. Anthropologist Terence Turner warns against this tendency of,
“essentializing the idea of culture as the property of an ethnic group or race: it risks reifying cultures as separate entities by overemphasizing their boundedness and mutual distinctness; it risks overemphasizing the internal homogeneity of cultures in terms that potentially legitimize repressive demands for communal conformity; and by treating cultures as badges of group identity, it tends to fetishize them in ways that put them beyond the reach of critical analysis—and thus of anthropology.”
(Source: Turner 1993:412, cited in González, Norma. 1999. What Will We Do When Culture Does Not Exist Anymore?. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 30: 431–435.)
Describing culture by nationality: Same problem as the previous item. Of course, nationality may describe a very high (abstract) level of culture, in the sense that people from a nation state identify as “a people” and may have been educated in certain ways (for example, in many nation states, school systems teach a certain version of that country’s history, and we can assume students have learned that nation-state’s national anthem). On the other hand, though, many nation-states are culturally diverse. Just witness the cultural divisions dramatized by inter-ethnic conflicts in Iraq, the Ukraine or Syria (there is some debate about whether these national conflicts can be reduced to “ethnic” roots, but my main point here is simply that a “nation” is not a culturally homogeneous group of people). To take another example, China contains many subgroups, such as Tibetans, who question the role of the central Chinese government, or the idea of what “Chinese culture” is.
Realizing that the United States has a history that pre-dates European arrival: Some students have compared the United States to a Middle Eastern country or Europe and stated that the United States does not have an “ancient history” like other places. This is not true.
Understanding the interaction between culture and individuals: A few students gave great responses to culture by arguing that while culture shapes an individual, people also shape their own culture through decisions they make. This reinforces the point that it is more accurate to view culture as a flexible set of rules rather than as a set of fixed traits.
One past TA for this course noted about these essays that: The students are quite insightful really in their initial thinking about culture. Some themes, which students seem to grapple with are:
- Romanticizing culture
- Understanding identity
- Is culture static?
- Is culture inherent or learned?
- Is there an American culture?
- Many students reflecting upon past and future study abroad experiences, tending to romanticize (and homogenize) culture.
Also, although some students are able to see a multiplicity of identities among Americans, for example when traveling abroad, the majority seem to lump all Americans together.
Another TA has noted the essays are generally good, but that they need to acknowledge two key cautions about culture:
“In general, students’ definitions of culture were insightful and multifaceted. Nearly everyone defined culture along the lines of a set of values, heritage, and way of life. A lot of students mentioned the importance of history and other aspects of culture in forming individuals’ identities, which did well to get at the interplay between large-scale phenomena and personal experiences. The best essays expanded on different aspects of value systems: for example, mentioning not only that culture includes value systems, but values about family relationships, gender roles, aspirations, education, and so on. Although some students mentioned media and the relative importance of wealth or consumption as a cultural value, few mentioned general social structures such as the economy, inequality, or political matters in their definitions. Only a few students discussed that cultures have variation within them (i.e., subcultures). Most students focused on their families as the primary sites where they learned cultural values. Absolutely—families are our closest source of enculturation but the best essays described how their families’ values related to larger cultural patterns.”
Cultural, Personal, or Universal?
“It was really hard to tell in the beginning if something was cultural or just personal. I remember one time asking my host parents out to dinner at what for me was kind of an expensive restaurant. When we were getting ready to go I was a little frustrated when I saw my host father’s brother and his family had arrived to join us. I didn’t say anything because I know family is important in Mexico and what would I say anyway? When the bill came I figured that my host father would help out – after all, he was the one who invited his brother and his brother’s family. As it turns out, I got stuck with the bill and felt really taken advantage of. I had found Mexicans to be so generous and then this really made me think my host father was a jerk.” ~ Kelly Lavin, Mexico.
Source: Excerpted from Maximizing Study Abroad: Strategies for Language and Culture Learning and Use. University of Minnesota: The Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA)
Kelly’s experience brings up an issue that can be challenging: How do you sort out what’s normal cultural behavior and what is behavior related more to somebody’s individual traits. In this case, is the host father really a “jerk,” or is he following some cultural rule or norm? How can you figure this out?
Let’s start with some definitions from the Peace Corps Cross-Cultural Workbook:
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Cultural refers to what a group of people have in common with each other and how they are different from other groups.
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Personal refers to ways in which each person is different from everyone else, including those in the same group.
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Universal refers to ways in which all people in all groups are basically the same.
Some important points to remember:
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Personal preferences exist everywhere. Oftentimes a preference may very well have cultural and historical roots. The longer you are in the country the better you can distinguish between what is cultural and what is more personal.
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When something is cultural, this means there is a recognizable pattern of behavior. When you have learned the patterns, then you know when something is out of the norm. You’ll be better able to know, for example, when someone is being unusually friendly.
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Your awareness of cultural patterns also helps you figure out your own perceptions of events and your adaptation strategies.
Kelly found out several weeks later that an invitation to one family member is, in fact, an invitation to other family members who know about the upcoming event. In other words, the father’s behavior was related to a cultural norm rather than to any individual personal characteristics of the father (in other words, the father was not a jerk). This became clear when she saw her host father in a similar situation, when people who she knew hadn’t been directly invited showed up to the restaurant, and he paid the bill for everyone. She also learned something important about distinguishing between a universal (in this case, hosting a social event) and culturally specific patterns – the details that differ between cultures during such events.
Sports and games: universal activity with many different cultural forms
Caption for image above: A game of buzkashi in Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan. Sometimes in teams, buzkashi players fight to drag a goat or calf carcass to the goal. (Source: “Games and Sports” by Gary Chick, July 23, 2015 in HRAF Explaining Human Culture website,
http://hraf.yale.edu/ehc/summaries/games-and-sports
)
Anthropological evidence shows that playing sports and games is a cultural universal. One comprehensive survey of sports and games in a cross-cultural context provides some examples:
“Boards and pieces for games similar to draughts (checkers in North American English) have been found in the ancient city of Ur in modern day Iraq dating to approximately 3,000 BCE….The Mesoamerican ballgame, known as öllamalitzli in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, is one of the best-known team games of physical skill from the ancient world. It is depicted in frescoes, stone carvings, on painted pottery, and by clay figurines of players found in numerous sites in Mexico and Central America. The oldest of these, at Paso de la Armada, in the western Mexican state of Chiapas, dates to approximately 1400 BCE. Game play often had important symbolic or ritual (sometimes involving human sacrifice) aspects as well as more practical purposes, including dispute resolution, status acquisition, and as a vehicle for gambling.”
(Source: “Games and Sports” by Gary Chick, July 23, 2015 in HRAF Explaining Human Culture website, http://hraf.yale.edu/ehc/summaries/games-and-sports)
But at the same type, the types of games and sports vary cross culturally:
“types of games and sports are not randomly distributed in the world’s cultures. Cross-cultural research has found that type of games and sports vary in some very predictable ways–they are related to social and political complexity, to how children are raised, and aggressive sports are related to warfare. [For example, we] know that societies with more political hierarchy and more social stratification are more likely to have games of strategy.”
(Source: “Games and Sports” by Gary Chick, July 23, 2015 in HRAF Explaining Human Culture website, http://hraf.yale.edu/ehc/summaries/games-and-sports)
Review sheet on cautions about culture
After finishing this sub-topic “Cautions about Culture” in Module 3 you should be able to:
- Understand the various cautions of culture listed in this section and be able to choose which caution would be most applicable to any given scenario; you don’t need to memorize this list but should be able to identify these cautions if I give you a list and be able to say if an item is not from this list
- Understand the general idea in the list of cautions about culture well enough so that you can identify a statement that would NOT belong on this list
- Understand what Abu-Lughod means by “writing against culture” recall key ways student initial essays illustrate “cautions about culture”
- Recall key points of NPR audio piece on South Korea multiculturalism and determine which caution(s) about culture it illustrates
- Apply the idea of differentiating universal vs cultural vs personal
END OF SECTION
Concluding essay topic
For your concluding essay, think about the most likely or significant area of your life where you think you will have some form of intercultural interactions (example: doing business, travel, in the workplace, charity work, relations with people where you live, friendships, etc.). Then, select and write about the two most important topics (concept, exercise, an article, an image or video) from this course that will have a positive impact on those future intercultural interactions.
You must structure your essay as follows and include the part numbers/letters in your essay:
· Part 1- In one short introductory paragraph, describe the circumstance where you anticipate you will have those intercultural interactions, characterize what type of cultural difference you expect to encounter, and describe what potential challenges you might encounter (stereotypes, communication issues, etc.) and why you selected that particular circumstance.
Note: If you anticipate encountering intercultural difference in several areas of life, focus on just one area. If you already encounter this scenario (for example, if you travel a lot already) you can use that scenario if you anticipate that you will continue encountering this scenario in the future. If you seriously do not anticipate having intercultural encounters or really have no plans to come into contact with culturally different people, then you could write about coming into contact with another culture on a dream vacation that you win as a prize and that would take you to any desired location in the world.
· Part 2- Briefly introduce and describe the two very specific topics from this course that you chose to write about here and why you chose them. Important suggestion: Although there is no right or wrong topic, in most cases, try to strike a balance between too general (e.g. choosing a general concept like “culture” or “stereotype”) or too specific (e.g. simply describing the “video about saying no in Japan” without explaining its broader significance to your situation). Examples of appropriately specific topics might be things like, “Bennett’s stages of intercultural awareness”, or “rules for forming accurate generalizations rather than stereotypes”. Focus on picking topics that you can clearly see yourself using as tools to improve your intercultural interactions. This can include topics that improve your intercultural understandings, attitudes, or behaviors. You may have to select a variety of topics, and start writing a bit before you decide what your best two choices are.
· Part 3 – For the first of the two topics you select, write a paragraph or two with the following structure:
· Part 3A. Number and name the topic using all capital letters (e.g. “1. LEVELS OF CULTURE”) and cite its source (example: “Module 3: Part 1: Definitions of Culture“, section subtitled ”Levels of Culture”). In most cases, you will write a better essay if you do not pick something too general such as “culture” or “stereotypes” instead, you’d want “levels of culture” or “media based stereotypes”. Or instead of choosing “cautions about culture” which refers to a long list, say “culture is contextual” which is one of the cautions about culture we mentioned.
· Part 3B. Write 2 to 3 sentence summary or description of what this topic is about and say whether the topic is explained with text, audio, video or images in the module.
· Part 3C. The rest of the paragraph explains how this concept relates to the intercultural interaction scenario you anticipate encountering..
· Part 4: Do the same thing as describe above in Part 3 but for your second topic. Remember to include part 4A, 4B, and 4C.
· Part 5: After you’ve done the above for the two topics, write one concluding paragraph where you summarize what you wrote about and its significance, and whether you would change/improve how you teach about these topics (for example, if the module covered the topic using text and you feel a short video clip would be better).
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