Background Thinking

What is culture anyway?

The word culture is a common word and like many common words is used to refer to all sorts of things.    There is culture in the sense of values and beliefs shared by people living in a country (as in, “Americans are very individualistic”).  There is culture in the sense of an ethnic identity (as in, “I lost my culture when I came to Canada”).  There is organizational culture (as in, “how things get done around here.”)  It does not take much thinking to realize that these definitions of culture are neither consistent nor useful.  It launched me on a search for a good definition of culture.   

Culture is, in fact, one of the most complicated words in the English language.  

This is so partly because of its intricate historical development, in several European languages, but mainly because it has now come to be used for important concepts in several distinct intellectual disciplines and in several distinct and incompatible systems of thought. (Williams 1976:87)

The first time the word culture was used in English in reference to people (as opposed to yogurt or crops) was by the British anthropologist and member of the Royal Society, E. B. Tylor.  Culture is “that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.” (Tylor, 1871)

In an effort to lay the conceptual groundwork for the development of a theory of culture, Kroeber and Kluckhohn reviewed over 150 definitions of the word and published their seminal “Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions” in 1952.  While avoiding a formal definition of culture, they summarized thinking about culture as follows:

Culture consists of patterns, explicit and implicit, of and for behaviour, acquired and transmitted by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievement of human groups, including their embodiments in artifacts; the essential core of culture consists of traditional (i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and especially their attached values; culture systems may, on the one hand, be considered as products of action, on the other as conditioning elements of further action.  (Kroeber and Kluckhohn, 1978, p. 181)

Others have build on this original thinking and offered other definitions of the word culture.

Culture is “the sum total of a way of life of a people; patterns experienced by individuals as normal ways of acting, feeling, and being.” (Hall, 1969)  

Culture is “the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group from another - the software of the mind.” (Hofstede, 1991)

But I think that some of the best thinking about culture was done by the anthropologist, Clifford Geertz.  He suggested that human beings are suspended in “webs of significance” that we have spin for ourselves. “I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.  (Geertz, 1973, p. 5)

… Culture is not a power, something to which social events, behaviours, institutions, or processes can be causally attributed; it is a context, something within which they can be intelligently described. (Geertz 1973, p. 13)

Building on this idea of culture as a context that people draw from to make sense of the world, Ann Swidler described culture as a tool kit.

Culture is a set of malleable and changing cognitive options, a “tool kit” from which individuals and groups choose in order to accomplish specific goals.  (Ann Swidler, 1986)

Crandall (2008), an anthropologist, argues that the conception of culture as a coherent whole is more a product of our academic need for pattern recognition than it is a reality.  Culture is, in fact, much less coherent and unified than often presented and it is better thought of as the “shreds and patches” of schemata that we draw upon to make sense of the world. (Crandall, 2008, p. 48).  

This idea of culture as a fluid, ever-changing can be traced back to Geertz.

Cultures are not perfectly tidy systems, they are “a multiplicity of complex conceptual structures, many of them superimposed upon or knotted into one another, which are at once strange, irregular, and inexplicit…” (Geertz, 1973, p. 10).   

We understand and talk about culture in terms of narrative (plots, characters, timing, staging) and we are continually engaged in telling and re-telling our narrative in the various settings that make up our lives.  We construct these narratives in dialogue with other in fluid social environments.  For this reason, I offer the following definition of culture:

The shreds and patches of narrative swirling around us that we draw upon to make sense of our lives.  (Eyford, 2011)

This way of thinking about culture has important implications for those of us working to make corporations and organizations more inclusive.  Inclusion is not about accommodating mutually exclusive systems of belief and values but, rather, it is about creating new stories together that include a diversity of perspectives and narratives.  

References

Crandall, D. P. (2008). The transformation of indigenous knowledge into anthropological knowledge: whose knowledge is it? In N. Halstead, E. Hirsch, & J. Okely (Eds.), Knowing how to know: fieldwork and the ethnographic present (pp. 38– 54). New York, NY: Berghahn Books.

Eyford, H. B. (2011). The acculturation of international medical graduates.  Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary.  

Geertz, C. (1973). The interpretation of cultures. New York, NY: Basic Books.Hall, E. T. (1969). The hidden dimension. Garden City, NY: Anchor/Doubleday. 

Hofstede, G. (1991). Cultures and organizations: the software of the mind. London: McGraw-Hill.

Kroeber, A. L. and Kluckhohn, C. (1952/1978). Culture: A critical review of concepts and definitions. Cambridge, MA: The Peabody Museum of American Archeology and Ethnology.

Swidler, A. (1986). Culture in action: symbols and strategies. American Sociological Review, 51, 273–286.

Tylor, E. B. (1871/1920). Primitive Culture. New York, NY: J. P. Putnam’s Sons (quoted in Kroeber and Kluckhohn, 1952, p. 11.)

Williams, R. (1976). Keywords. London: Fontana.

Culture shock is another one of those common words (like paradigm, culture, aesthetic, etc.) that are used in a confusingly imprecise manner. Culture shock is actually an interesting and important concept. It refers to the disorientation that one feels when one is engaged in a culture different from one’s own. It applies more to people living or working in another culture that to tourists, because tourists can retreat to their hotel (and the hotel bar) when things get frustrating.

The first person to coin the term culture shock was Kalvero Oberg in a talk that he gave to the Women’s Club of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August of 1954. He published a version of this talk in the Journal of Practical Anthropology in 1960. In this article he defines culture shock as the psychological disorientation experienced when working in a different culture, cut off from the familiar cultural cues and known patterns of behaviour.

Culture shock is precipitated by the anxiety that results from losing all our familiar signs and symbols of social intercourse. … All of us depend for our peace of mind and our efficiency on hundreds of these cues, most of which we do not carry on the level of conscious awareness. Now when an individual enters a strange culture, all or most of these familiar cues are removed. He or she is like a fish out of water. No matter how broad-minded or full of good will you may be, a series of props have been knocked from under you, followed by a feeling of frustration and anxiety. (Oberg, K., 1960)

A whole field of study has arisen to study how people adapt to living in other cultures. Some authors don’t like the term culture shock because it implies that the disorientation occurs suddenly. In fact, culture shock typically builds up slowly below the level of conscious awareness. These writers suggest other terms for culture shock such as transition stress (Bennett, 1977), adjustment stress (Weaver, 1993), or acculturative stress (Berry 1997).

People immigrating to Canada can experience culture shock just as Canadians working and living in other countries can experience culture shock. There are a few signs that you might be experiencing culture shock:

• Feeling isolated and helpless

• Sleeping a lot or tiring easily

• Withdrawal – excessive reading, avoiding contact with host nationals, excessive washing of hands

• Getting sick more often

• Longing to be back home

• Unduly criticizing local customs

• There has also been quite a bit of research on the stages of culture shock:

The Honeymoon Stage

You are positive, curious and excited. There is a tendency to idealize the host culture.

Irritability and Hostility

Your strategies for getting things done do not work as expected and you can get frustrated. You blame the new culture and idealize you home culture. This is when people are in danger of an early return.

Gradual Adjustment

You begin to learn how things work in the new culture and you develop a more balanced picture of your experience.

Adaptation

You feel comfortable in the new culture and perhaps even a sense of belonging. This is when you sign an extension to your contract.

Re-entry Shock

This is the culture shock you experience if and when you go home. Things are not like you remembered them. You have had a life changing experience and your friends and family have not. You talk longing and annoyingly about your experience. Some may even continue to wear clothing from their posting or bring food from their posting to potlucks. This stage can be even more difficult and disorienting than the original culture shock.

References

Berry, J. W. (1997). Immigration, acculturation, and adaptation. Applied Psychology: an International Review, 46, 5–34.

Bennett, M. J. (1977). Transition shock: Putting culture shock in perspective. International and Intercultural Communication Annual, 4, 45–52.

Oberg, K. (1960). Cultural Shock: Adjustment to New Cultural Environments. Practical Anthropology, 7, 177-182.

Weaver, G. R. (1993). Understanding and coping with cross-cultural adjustment stress. In R. M. Paige (Ed.), Education for the intercultural experience. Yarmouth, ME: Intercultural Press.