The Power of Culture

Angela Carroll
COM 360
Dr. Wilson
8-27-11

When I was a freshman, before taking a single Sociology course, culture was found in things one did and something only a large society could have. I thought of culture and associated the concept with celebrations like Christmas or the Cuban cooking of uncle James’ family. I wasn't wrong, but I was just scratching the surface.

I can look at a picture of a person, as I did in our second class and guess at a person's culture from the clothes and jewelry they wear, and even the way they smile (or don't). Culture, however, encompasses more than this. It's more than our annual celebrations or frying plantains and it can be found anywhere, even among small groups.

Now that I'm in my fourth year of college and having taken several different classes for my Cultural Diversity concentration, my understanding of culture has expanded to grasp the full concept.

Culture, using the working definition in the Miller textbook for our Intercultural Communication class, is “learned and shared behavior and beliefs” (14). Further, culture is described as:

1) A human creation which...
2) interacts and changes, is...
3) based in on symbols, like languages, is...
4) learned and which is...
5) integrated deeply throughout a society (18).

Again, culture is fluid. It is, as I learned in my Intro to Sociology class, like water we fishy people swim in.

Today, the idea of culture follows the definition above. I know now that it's what you wear, what and how you eat and drink, the language you use, the car you drive, it’s the stuff you buy, how you buy that stuff and so much more. Culture can be found in something as small as the way you greet your mother but culture also determines the technology your country chooses to research.

I've learned much about culture in sociology classes, but my Intercultural Communications class really has me thinking of the various cultures I belong too and how they interact.

I, for example, belong to the American culture, the female culture, the Doctor Who culture, the culture of video games, I dabble in the amine culture (which leads one into expressions of various Japanese cultures) just to name a few. Even further, these are all layered on top of my 'core' culture.

It's quite mind blowing to think that people are made up of numerous cultures and that these cultures sometimes clash.

But, an idea that really blew my mind, one that I became exposed to just last year in Contemporary Sociological theory, was that my various cultures shape my very reality.

Our cultures 'frame' our perceptions.

For a small scale example, I think of the first day of my Research and Development class. My professor asked me, “Where's your TARDIS?”

Now, that question made perfect sense to me, I recognized the language from our shared Doctor Who culture. For me, TARDIS refers to the vehicle used by the Doctor in the television show Doctor Who to travel. Other students, who are outside of this culture, however, heard only a weird word or may have, and more importantly, heard TARDIS as another word altogether (“Taurus? A car?”).






TARDIS, a symbol in the Doctor Who culture

Our culture influences how everyday people conceive reality but even those who study cultures are affected and, they, in turn, affect how others see the culture.

The field of cultural anthropology, like almost every field of study, was dominated (and still largely is) by white, European and American, middle-class men. There is always a danger of ethnocentrism, believing your culture is the best, when researching another culture, however, a scientist's culture can have other ways of affecting how he or she conducts research.

For example, in 1961, Bronislaw Malinowski, a very influential researcher, published his ethnography (a detailed study of a culture) Argonauts of the Western Pacific. The study detailed the status system of men found in the Trobriand Islands but neglected the very real system used by the women of the society, a system which was later uncovered by a female researcher named Annette Weiner (32).

The very fact that Barbara Miller made sure to include this particular example further emphasizes culture. She thought Weiner's contribution was important enough to include it in our textbook. Could it be the mircoculture of gender which affected this decision?

Malinowski's research was affected by his own cultures and this research then became apart of the culture of the field of anthropology which created a partial understanding (another reality) about another culture for other scientists.

You don't have to be a nerd like me to find the concept of your culture being the frames for your reality fascinating. Think for a moment, how are other fields of science affected by the cultures of the researchers? How have they affected your view of reality?

My own perception of the concept of culture was limited before college but after exposure to the cultures of sociology, anthropology, and other subjects taken in college, my reality of not only culture changed but also my view of everything else was expanded. Coming from where I came, questioning possible bias within authority was not something which was encouraged and the acceptance of research that 'felt good' or was in line with what I believed to be true came easy.

I see the world, now four years of Reinhardt, as more complex and vast than before.

Citations


Miller, Barbara D. 2010. Cultural Anthropology in a Globalizing World ( 2nd ed.) . Prentice Hall:New York