How Cultures Vary

This is a summary of what I do in my American culture classes at the Center for English as a Second Language.

We hold these truths to be self-evident…

What’s good for me is good for you…

In our culture it is common, and even considered generous, to view all humans as more alike than different. We imagine that what we like, value, enjoy, and even believe is shared by all of humanity. Yet once you start interacting with people from other cultures, you realize that, in fact, we share very little. You realize that all of these questions, from what we think is beautiful to what is polite to what is enjoyable and even what is real fluctuate greatly from one culture to the next and are indeed culturally bound rather than part and parcel of our shared humanity.

When I travel to Spain, I give two kisses to just about everyone I meet, regardless of age, gender, and situation (work, social, etc.), and even regardless of if I have ever met them before. Yet Americans would wonder if I started homing in on them for the traditional “dos besos”, and in Latin America the two kisses become one or three, depending on the country. My Asian students avoid kissing socially at all costs, considering it a far too intimate act to be shared generally. Meanwhile, my Arab students understand the kissing, but they do it only with family and the same gender, as women kiss women socially while men kiss men. And as the Arab men living in the United States kiss each other, some Americans look on wondering about their sexual persuasion. Greetings are a minor display of a culture’s values, yet the codes of “what’s right” and “what’s wrong” vary drastically among cultures. At the more transcendental end the cultural divergence spectrum, imagine you walk out into the middle of a gorgeous glade with a fervent believer in God (or Allah) and an atheist. To the former, everything around her is proof of God’s actions, whereas that contention would be viewed as absurd by the latter, who would view nature’s bounty as nothing more than the evolution of the Earth since its inception. All of these differences show that most of what we do and believe is cultural more than universal.

I often tell my students that as humans we share little more than our biology: we are conceived and born the same way, and we grow and die the same way. Beyond that, virtually everything is cultural. We all seek happiness and fulfillment, but what makes an individual happy and fulfilled is cultural. Therefore, our opinions about the world around us, both the familiar and the unfamiliar, are inevitably colored by our culture. We interpret every person, every thing, and every act through the lens of our culture. And yet, most people are unaware of this; since culture in this sense is rarely taught or discussed, most people believe that their way of doing things is the natural way, and that any other way is, beyond good or bad, simply strange.

Like students in most English-language programs in the United States, my students come from all over the globe: Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Palestine, Egypt, Libya, Burundi, Burkina Faso, Togo, Mozambique, Turkey, Spain, Honduras, Nicaragua, Colombia, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Japan, Taiwan, China, Korea, ... and more. Each of them comes to the U.S. wearing the lenses of their culture. None comes totally unaware of our culture thanks to cultural globalization, yet their notions are often erroneous based on the media, which unquestionably exaggerates certain glamorous (big houses, beautiful people) or horrifying (violence) traits of American life, while totally ignoring the more mundane ones. My students’ commentaries on the United States and its people and culture, and on our English program, even after they have been here several months, are fascinating. They include:

“Old people in the U.S. are lonely because their families don’t care about them.”

“Americans are cold and inexpressive.”

“American talk too loud.” (Notice the contradiction with the previous statement.)

“American children/students don’t respect their parents/teachers.”

 “American teachers are unfeeling because they are inflexible about assignment deadlines.”

“My teacher doesn’t really care about me because she doesn’t want to be my Facebook friend.”

 “When I go to my teacher’s office, sometimes she won’t meet with me even though she’s there.”

Yet equally fascinating – and erroneous – are the comments by my colleagues on our students:

“Our students try to manipulate and intimidate us by visiting us in groups.”

“Our Latin/African students are too boisterous – they dominate in the classroom.”

“Our Japanese students never speak up.”

“I’d really like my students to call me by my first name, but they insist on addressing me formally.”

 “Our students expect us to break the rules just for them.”

“Our students don’t understand that we are not there to be their friends, but that doesn’t mean we don’t care about them.”       

 “Our students expect us to be endlessly available.”

What is happening here? What is happening is that we all judge other cultures based on our own; we see other cultures through the lenses of our own, and therefore, we see them wrong.

Many Dutch and British researchers have performed both longitudinal and latitudinal studies of different cultures, particularly corporate cultures, and they have tried to break down the cultural differences into different dimensions. All told, around fifteen dimensions (and counting…) of cultural variation have been identified. Following are some of the dimensions that I have found to be the most useful when interpreting the cultural differences that we find in the students in our program, and that our students find in us. Each dimension is followed by a brief description of the features of a culture of this kind. These dimensions are not absolute; in other words, a culture is not either one or the other. Rather, they are continua, and the goal is to map both our own culture and the target culture along each continuum. Obviously, the closer the cultures are, the more the other’s culture will seem “natural” and will not even register on our radar; conversely, the further away they are, the more the other’s behavior will seem “wrong” and will thus draw our (usually irate) attention.

Individual vs. Collective

INDIVIDUAL }  Autonomy }  Standing out from the crowd, creativity }  Self-realization }  Satisfaction and identity come from one’s own independence

COLLECTIVE }  Togetherness }  Blending in with the crowd, conformity }  Group wellbeing }  Satisfaction and identity come from group belonging

A person from an individualistic culture like the U.S. tends to label collectivists as weak, dependent, or immature, while a person from a collectivistic culture tends to view individualists as cold and selfish. An individualist takes pride in being self-sufficient and solving his or her own problems, whereas this independence simply has no value for a collectivist. This is not to say that individualists do not care about others; bulldozing others to get to the top is not accepted; rather, they simply make their own choices and do their own thing, regardless of the collective. And in an individualist culture the collective, specifically the family, would never dream of imposing its will or needs on them.

Since most cultures are more collectivistic than American culture, our students’ misconception that “Old people in the U.S. are lonely because their families don’t care about them” is understandable. Yet what they don’t take into account is that many old people here cherish their independence; it is, in fact, what keeps them youthful and maintains their self-esteem. Likewise, as members of an individualistic society, we often think that “Our students try to manipulate and intimidate us by visiting us in groups,” but what we don’t realize is that individuals in a more collectivistic society rarely deal with problems on their own. Visiting us in groups is not meant to intimidate; it is more for the students than us. These are perfect examples of how all of us misinterpret and negatively label each other’s behaviors based on what they would mean in our own culture, not what they mean in the target culture.

Neutral vs. Affective

NEUTRAL }  Emotions are not displayed }  Expressing emotions = offensive, imposing }  Effusiveness and touching are awkward/uncomfortable

AFFECTIVE }  Displays of emotions are OK }  Expressing emotions = honesty }  Effusiveness and touching are welcomed ways of sharing

The neutral vs. affective dimension defines to what extent emotion and expressiveness are accepted in our cultures. Interestingly, the U.S. seems to be in the middle of the spectrum worldwide. Therefore, international students from more affective cultures – Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East, for example – often find us cold and milquetoast, whereas that is how we label our students from cultures that are even more neutral than ours, such as most of the Far Eastern cultures – Japan, China, and Korea, just to name three. So as teachers we may say “Our Latin/African students are too boisterous – they dominate in the classroom,” or “Our Japanese students never speak up,” in each case bemoaning the fact that the other is not just like us on the neutral vs. affective scale! And our students do the same with us, with claims like “Americans are cold and inexpressive,” or conversely, “American talk too loud,” depending on the speaker’s home culture.

Students from neutral cultures find us overbearing, while students from affective cultures find us flat. With no awareness that this is a dimension along which cultures vary, we tend to judge others, but once we are aware of it, we can more readily accept that people tend to be embodiments of their culture. One of my Japanese students once told me that his teacher, my colleague, had told him that he should “smile more”. I apologized to him; this teacher would do well to understand that there is no need for the student to change his behavior to be more American; rather she should understand his values with regard to expressing emotions.

Egalitarian vs. Hierarchical

EGALITARIAN }  All humans are equal }  Outward displays of vertical distance are distasteful/ mistrusted      }  Questioning authority is a duty

HIERARCHICAL }  There is a pecking order }  Outward displays of vertical distance are expected }  Questioning authority is subversive

This is conceptually an easy dimension, yet one that manifests itself in multiple ways. It is not about whether a given culture has a hierarchy; all cultures do. The question is how comfortable we are with showing that hierarchy or conversely how comfortable we feel thumbing our noses at it. My favorite way of getting my students, who usually claim that everyone is equal in their culture, to discern whether their culture is more egalitarian or hierarchical, is to ask them what they call me. My gripe is: “I’d really like my students to call me by my first name, but they insist on addressing me formally.” I always tell my students to call me Mary, yet their automatic show of respect for a teacher is so ingrained that it simply feels wrong, and if they feel close to me they might call me Ms. Mary, but never just Mary. This clear-cut sense of vertical distance, also called power distance, is a clear sign of a more hierarchical culture.

My favorite illustration of the egalitarian ideal of the U.S. (ideal because in reality there are scores of exceptions) was supplied by an Afghan student of mine. He explained how on his visit to Afghanistan, Barack Obama went through a cafeteria line and sat with the troops to eat. The Afghanis were flabbergasted: He’s the President! But this sort of “regular-guy” behavior is almost expected of a leader in American culture, and any signs of superiority are met with rabid rejection. In a more hierarchical society, however, it is natural and fitting to show and respect rank. Therefore, my students often say to me something along the lines that “American children/students don’t respect their parents/teachers” because they see children arguing with parents and students calling teachers by their first name. This casual behavior, which epitomizes an egalitarian culture, would be interpreted as disrespectful of the parents’ or teachers’ authority in their culture. Likewise, the pomp and circumstance associated with more hierarchical cultures seem ridiculous to a more informal, egalitarian society. Differences in this dimension lead to many misinterpretations of other cultures as, paradoxically, either disrespectful because some people are regarded as visibly superior to others, or disrespectful because inferiors are not deferential enough to their superiors.

Universal vs. Particular

UNIVERSAL }  Rules }  No exceptions }  Blanket application to all people/situations }  Objectivity is fair

PARTICULAR }  Rules, but… }  Flexibility, exceptions are expected }  Every person/situation is unique }  Subjectivity is fair

            This dimension – which mainly describes how “fair” is defined – is fascinating in the context of an English language program, where both students and programs have so much at stake. Most of our students are eager to get admitted into the university, and the English program is just a required way station. Many of them will beg and cajole to get through the program, and teacher complaints tend to sound like, “Our students expect us to break the rules just for them.” From a culture closer to the universal end of the spectrum, we believe that systems can only remain coherent and functional through strict observance of the rules. That does not mean that there are no exceptions; it means that the exceptions are few and far between and clearly justified. We think this is fair.

Yet a person from a particularlist culture believes that taking into account each individual’s circumstances is fair. Students may come with a late homework assignment and beg off with personal reasons, which fall onto the somewhat unsympathetic ears of many American teachers. We, in turn, often refuse to be flexible as a way of “training” students to work within our system, which is what they will encounter at the university. Our students then complain that “American teachers are unfeeling because they are inflexible about assignment deadlines,” viewing this as draconian strictness and a greater concern with rules than with individuals. Who ever knew that the concept of fairness was cultural, yet it is! A univeralist will think that a particularist is trying curry favor or get around the rules, and in the worst case scenario is corrupt, while a particularist views universalists as cold and uncaring. As such fertile ground for misunderstanding, this particular dimension has serious implications for smooth interpersonal relations among people from different cultures.

Specific vs. Diffuse

SPECIFIC }  Relationships based on objectives (“my soccer friend”) }  Relationships easily entered and broken }  Compartmentalized lives

DIFFUSE }  Relationships permeate all realms of life }  Relationship are forever }  Hard to access, but once you’re in, you’re in

This particular dimension tends to have repercussions mainly in students’ social lives, yet the one place I have found it is in the confluence of the two: the social relationships I develop with my students. I often socialize with my students, but I consider this part of my job, and rarely do I admit a student into my truly private sphere. If I do, it is usually when they are no longer my student.

The incident related to this dimension comes when students send me friend requests on Facebook. My Facebook page is for me and my friends and family members. There, I am “me”, not the “work me” or the “professional me”, but the real, authentic, uncensored me, a distinction that someone from a diffuse culture would find baffling. I am reluctant to accept my students’ friend requests because that means letting them into the personal side of my life, which might include political or social beliefs that I do not necessarily want to share with them. Yet in many cultures, the idea of slicing our lives into difference pieces is quite foreign and even absurd. If you are my friend, you are my friend, and I put no boundaries on this friendship. In the past I seriously offended many students, who said, “My teacher doesn’t really care about me because she doesn’t want to be my Facebook friend.” And yet my response would be, “Our students don’t understand that we are not there to be their friends, but that doesn’t mean we don’t care about them.” Caring in some aspects but not in all parts of our lives is a foreign concept to someone from a diffuse culture, and one that often leads international students to be sorely disappointed in their friendships with Americans, which they often perceive as lifelong, although within months of leaving the country the American often loses touch.

Sequential vs. Synchronous

SEQUENTIAL }  Time is a tangible commodity }  One thing at a time }  The task counts; I’ll deal with you when I’m finished with my task }  Time is linear

SYNCHRONOUS }  Time is intangible }  Multitasking }  Relationships count; I’ll finish my task after I deal with you }  Time is overlapping, looping

            It is quite astonishing how much a sequential, or Western, conception of time can lead to serious cultural misunderstandings. Since ours is a sequential culture, time seems to loom heavily over us. The illustrious anthropologist Edward T. Hall wrote how the Native American groups whom he studied actually believed that the European-Americans had a “devil inside who seemed to drive them unmercifully. This devil was time” (Hall 1992; p. 218). In fact, the idea that time is a commodity that you can “save,” “spend”, or “waste” is downright laughable (and not a little pathetic) to people from synchronous cultures. We sequentialists are jealous of our time; it may seem even more important than the people in front of us. My classic example of this is when I lived in Spain. I was the director of a language institute, and whenever I was working on my computer and an American teacher came to my office door, I knew I could just tell them that I’d come find them when I finished what I was doing and they would leave, perfectly happy, knowing I would hear them out as soon as I could. However, if I did that to the Spanish support staff the reaction was insult: I was putting some abstract task on the computer above this living, breathing person requesting my attention here and now.

Our students, like Spaniards, tend to be more synchronous than we are; in fact almost every culture – perhaps with the exception of Germany and Japan – is more synchronous than we are, and this leads to misunderstandings. In our program, teachers have office hours when they must be available to students, yet they work many more hours, some of which, in the interest of productivity – grading, planning, committee work, etc. – simply is off-limits to students. Yet our students are often not familiar with strict hours when they are welcome (or not) and may come at any time. When the teacher rebuffs them, as they sometimes do, and tells them to come back during office hours, the students may think, “When I go to my teacher’s office, sometimes she won’t meet with me even though she’s there,” which is interpreted as a slap in the face and proof perhaps of the teacher’s lack of interest and even professionalism. One former student of mine from a hierarchical culture even interpreted this as the teacher pulling rank and showing her superiority over the student, yet another example of how our interpretations of a culture are often more a reflection of our own. Our teachers, in turn, complain that “Our students expect us to be endlessly available.” We do more than teach, although it is the core of our profession, and there are times when we simply must devote our attention to our other duties. Yet because of this different cultural perception of time, our students may view us as rude, uncaring, and inflexible, while we see them as pushy and disrespectful of our time.

            This has been a brief survey of just six dimensions of cultural variation, and I have necessarily simplified them for the sake of space. Yet there are many more, and each of them affects our relationships with our students. Other dimensions include direct vs. indirect (which has huge implications on both verbal and written communication); high context vs. low context (which also affects interpersonal communication and behavior); external vs. internal control (who or what determines the course of our lives and to what extent); and ascription vs. achievement (how we are accorded status, by our own merits or by birthright, which is closely related to “leaders” that often develop among student groups from the same culture).

            The value of the dimensions lies in the fact that they can provide us with a systematic scaffolding on which to hang our cultural experiences and incidents. Without this scaffolding, we simply accumulate random experiences and have difficulty making sense of them, since culture on this level – the underwater level in the iceberg metaphor, in which the tip or visible culture is readily visible – is rarely discussed or taught. However, with the scaffolding of the cultural dimensions, we can not only organize our cultural experiences and incidents, we can also make sense of them, and understand that our own culture’s place on that continuum is just one of many and that whenever someone acts differently, it is most likely a symptom of a different cultural mapping along one of these continua. It is in this sense that cross-cultural awareness becomes a tool of peace. Instead of judging others’ behavior as wrong, and likewise labeling them negatively – as rude, disrespectful, cold, unfeeling, obnoxious, corrupt, etc. – we understand that they are simply playing by different rules and operating from different coordinates. We learn that our way of being is not natural; it is cultural. We learn that our assessments of other cultures are not necessarily accurate and usually say more about our own culture than the culture of the person with whom we are dealing. We learn not to judge others based on our own culture, and instead we learn to observe, analyze, and understand, not to react viscerally.

As I always caution my students, this does not mean that anyone should adopt anyone else’s rules or culture; rather all it means is that we begin to grasp that there are different possible rules governing a culture, and so instead of reacting negatively or viscerally (with irritation, frustration, condemnation) at others’ behavior, we can react more as cultural investigators, with the thrill of trying to decipher what dimension might be at play and filing away that knowledge away for future reference. We learn that every culture has its logic, even though we may not share it. So we learn to understand and therefore respect (and not fear!) different cultures. Anger, misunderstanding, and even hatred morph into a fascinating game of cultural diversity, one that leads to understanding – mutual understanding in the best of cases – which is the antecedent to any peace in this world.