Sibo Yang
Basic Writing 3
Mrs. Schroeder
Culture Differences
In the essay “Mirror of Men,” Clyde Kluckhohn introduces the differences in peoples in the entire world. According to Kluckhohn, different cultures, which make people have diverse actions among the same situation, account the differences in peoples throughout the world. With the developing of humans, culture exists within the people that have the exact equivalent psychological progress in the same environment. For example, women in America cannot share the same husband with other female, while people in Siberia cannot understand “how a woman could be so selfish and so undesirous of feminine companionship in the home as to wish to restrict her husband to one mate.” Different peoples who live in different countries or different area have different psychological progress, for they have different education, different society and different jobs. That is why i exist distinctive cultures in the whole world.
With the differences between Western culture and Eastern culture, people have different action with the same situation, for example, food, which is one of the most important parts of people’s life. In China, food is perhaps the most important in the past 5000 years. In China, foods have to have good colors, good smell, good taste, good shapes, and even good meanings. Those five main characters sometimes are more important than the meaning of nutrition; one good dish needs to be good looking and tasty, but do not have to be nutritional, which Americans could not understand. In the Western world, foods are basically the materiel that keeps a person to process, and making a dish is like to finish an experiment. For instance, to make one kind of dish has to put 2 spoons of salt...
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Humans who live in different places that have different geographical conditions create culture, and people in different geographical conditions have different lifestyle, different demand, and different daily activities. Humans’ basic requirement of life was fulfilled with the development of human societies, then the new demand and problems occurred. As time went on, human started to analyze orthodox things, and that was the “prototype” of culture. Cultures in the current human’s society have many disparities due to their unique living environment, but people cannot make the judgment of different cultures. The existence of culture led the developing of human’s society; any country in the world cannot survive without its traditional culture. People should work on the interchange and communication on diverse cultures, but not look down on some other cultures.
As the author in Chapter 9: Culture and Education mentioned, “culture is not a given, but a human creation”. Culture can change over time through human activities. People interact with people from other cultural groups to share their own languages, skills. Therefore, we, as a value, have the ability to be producers of culture. However, Nieto considered culture can be influenced by social and political elements.
As individual thinks the world to be diverse, often we take for granted unknown cultures. At times, most minority cultures is view as one thing whereas the ethnicity is multifaceted. Historically we used assumptions, not evidence, to equate cultures with social identities (Handwreker, 2002, p107. Society usually dismissed individuality of cultural and tend to put everyone with similar background in the same category. Recognition cos ethnic group has to rely on each other to voice out opinion on the matter and educated the history of personal culture.
Culture often means an appreciation of the finer things in life; however, culture brings members of a society together. We have a sense of belonging because we share similar beliefs, values, and attitudes about what’s right and wrong. As a result, culture changes as people adapt to their surroundings. According to Bishop Donald, “let it begin with me and my children and grandchildren” (211). Among other things, culture influences what you eat; how you were raised and will raise your own children? If, when, and whom you will marry; how you make and spend money. Truth is culture is adaptive and always changing over time because
Ruth Benedict’s anthropological book, Patterns of Culture explores the dualism of culture and personality. Benedict studies different cultures such as the Zuni tribe and the Dobu Indians. Each culture she finds is so different and distinctive in relation to the norm of our society. Each difference is what makes it unique. Benedict compares the likenesses of culture and individuality, “A culture, like an individual, is a more or less consistent pattern of thought or action” (46), but note, they are not the same by use of the word, “like.” Benedict is saying that figuratively, cultures are like personalities. Culture and individuality are intertwined and dependent upon each other for survival.
In conclusion, culture can shape one’s identity but also confuse people. The perfect balance of mixed culture can be found with just some guidance of an adult, song, or even a girlfriend. Culture is a very important and individual aspect of everyone’s
With this paper I wanted to focus on psychological aspects that had to do with a different side of the culture. There are three key aspect of information from the c...
In his essay, “What is Culture?”, Kluckhohn explains the differences and similarities amongst world’s peoples. To support his explanation of the differences and similarities he provides the concept of culture. It is difficult to give this concept a precise definition because the word “culture” is a broad term. Kluckhohn allows the reader to understand the concept of culture by providing examples of cultural differences along with some anthropological evidence to support his views.
The thoughts expressed in this article can be related to a lot of events throughout history. The thesis of this article is that Western culture in itself is a unique and diverse culture, but it is not, nor will it ever be, the culture of the rest of the world. Two theories are introduced, the Coca-colonization theory and the modernization theory. However, the Coca-colonization theory is disreputated as the true meaning of culture revolves around religion, language, societal customs, and moral values.
China has an area of 9.6 million square kilometers and a coastline of 18,000 kilometers (Network Center of MOFCOM, 2004). It has a population of 1,401,586,609 people as of 2015 (Worldometers, 2015). In China they tend to eat a lot of the same foods. Some of the local food consists of rice, noodles, fish, vegetables and meats (Parkinson, 2011). “China is described as a collectivist country because it “emphasizes the needs and goals of the group as a whole over the needs and wishes of each individual ().” “Upholding a stable and harmonious society has been viewed as the most important role of ethics (Werth, 2013).”
We live in a world society that is changing rapidly. It is causing people of various cultures likely to interact with each other. This interaction can be positive or negative depending on respect people have for other cultural groups and the level of sensitivity. These behaviors are directly related to the two very important concept in sociology, which are known as Ethnocentrism and Culture relativism. Negative attitudes toward other ethnic group or cultures can be result of ethnocentrism. On the other hand, positive attitude can be the result of the culture relativism approach. The purpose of the paper is to show why people need to move from ethnocentrism mindset to culture relativism .As America is becoming more and more diversit,we need
I was born in one of the countries in Asia, and our staple food is rice. Rice is always at the center of the table, and the rest of the viand surrounds it. Here in the United States, my household still eat rice every day, accompanied by cooked vegetables and meat. My food choices are influenced by culture and family. Vegetables and fruits of my choice are abundant at the International Market and other Asian grocery stores. Vegetables are also available for a cheaper price at the farmers market. I myself buy these foods to ensure its freshness, prepare and cook them for my entire family. Inspired by Asian and American cuisine, our food is prepared with variety of cooking styles; such as dry like barbecues, baked and fried, with sauce
To conclude, cultures are a major part of our lives and they constitute the image we see the world in. cultures can sometimes influence us, even in ways we don’t expect. Sometimes we find ourselves forced in cultures with negative stereotypes but that does not mean we should be ashamed of those cultural groups but rather embrace our culture and stray from the negative characteristics of that
In Clyde Kluckhohn's passage, adapted from his book, Mirror for Man, we are given an illumination of anthropology on the concept of culture. He explains that culture is not only derived by "the way we are brought up," but also personal past experiences and the biological properties of the people concerned. As humans we have learned to adapt to our own personal surroundings and have conditioned ourselves and our life styles to revolve around such surroundings by the most comfortable means possible.
In the end, what we learn from this article is very realistic and logical. Furthermore, it is supported with real-life examples. Culture is ordinary, each individual has it, and it is both individual and common. It’s a result of both traditional values and an individual effort. Therefore, trying to fit it into certain sharp-edged models would be wrong.
Everyone has struggled through difficult situations, but eventually we learn from our mistakes and try to overcome them. The theory explains how Lawrence Grossberg discusses the theory of the cultural studies and how it affects the present and future, the struggles people have to go through for example, economics, culture, media and politics. Therefore, in today’s society we all have encountered cultural differences in our everyday life experiences and have changed the way we look at life for the better or worse. Cultural diversity is in our workplace and schools; we may encounter stereotypes while communicating with others, even though we have different opinions about their cultures, values and beliefs.