Chapter 3

Defining Culture 

“Culture is the evolving way of life of a group of persons, consisting of a shared set of practices, associated with a shared set of products, based upon a shared set of perspectives of the world, and set within specific social contexts”

Approaching "Culture": concepts and components

Culture is a complex term to define, in addition it has a dynamic evolving nature, which makes the task even harder to accomplish. There is not a single definition because there are many pieces that make up the cultural puzzle, some of them include psychological, cognitive, social, symbolic, linguistic and artistic aspects, just to mention a few.  In fact, culture is all that humankind creates. Cultural anthropology is the science that is dedicated to the study of culture.

Some scholars have identified three components of culture: products (artifacts), practices (actions) and perspectives (meanings). They also have taken into account semiotics, which is the study of signs: syntax, semantics and pragmatics. Nevertheless, the author provides another view, which includes the active role of people inside a culture, because products, practices and perspectives cannot exist separated from them.

The 5 dimensions of culture

Some examples of each of the 5 dimensions of culture are mentioned below.

• Products: plants and animals, tools, clothing, written documents, buildings, written and spoken language, music, institutions such as family, education, economy, politics and religion.

• Practices: language and other forms of communication, self-expression as well as actions associated with social groups and use of products. Interpretation of time, space, and the context of communication in social situations. Notions of appropriateness and innappropiateness including taboos.

• Perspectives: worldview perceptions, beliefs, values and attitudes.

• Communities: national culture, language, gender, race, religion, socioeconomic class or generation. Political party, social club, sports team, charity organization, coworkers, family.  They relate to one another through separation, cooperation, collaboration or conflict.

• Persons: individuals that are part of a culture and their backgrounds.

Cultural phenomena

It is a term used to define a cultural topic. It involves tangible forms of structures that individual members of the culture use in various interactions, in specific social circumstances and groups, in ways that reflect their values, attitudes and beliefs.

In the box below, there are several examples of daily life situations that are described by using the five dimensions of culture. They can help portray different cultural phenomena such as the way of  "grabbing a bite", story-telling and family.

Drive through restaurants	Products	Straws, paper napkins, worker uniforms, signs, premises.
	Practices	Car driving skills, currency manipulation, selecting food items, order the desired meal, interact with drive through personnel, being able to drive and eat simultaneously.
	Perspectives	Attitudes towards meals and foods, perceptions of time, mobility and values associated with cars, time as a commodity, opposition to the fast food practices and perspectives.
	Communities	Car drivers (customers), employees, managers, owners, groups that support or dislike these restaurants, food suppliers and distributors.
	Persons	Manager, owner, stockholders, clients.
The Dried Fish Award (Wen-Cheng’s Story)	Products	Fishing apparel and gear, boat, the sea
	Practices	Fishing, sailing, praying to the appropriate goddess.
	Perspectives	Relying in divine intervention and not on yourself, Wen-Cheng´s positive attitude aside from being lost, feeling of self-punishment for not being specific.
	Communities	Fishermen, the gods, Taoists.
	Persons	Wen-Cheng, Matsu.
Taiwanese teacher’s relatives	Products	Mammoth temple, Taoism, food, incense, ghost money, Tiger balm, altars,
	Practices	Being religious, money and food donations, attending classes and retreats, meditating, praying, laying out fruits for the dead, burning ghost money, bowing to the gods
	Perspectives	Religion as a fundamental part of life, persevering in faith even against physical pain, people can connect or reach gods and ancestors by performing certain acts
	Communities	Taoists, her family,
	Persons	Aunts, uncles, herself,

Culture as an iceberg

Culture can be described comparing it with an iceberg. In this analogy, explicit culture (communities, products, practices persons and some perspectives) represents the tip of the iceberg, while the implicit (other perspectives) one, is all that lies underwater and out of sight. When language is added, teachers and learners have a mean for working with cultural content through participation, description, interpretation or personal responses.

It is also said that in order to get a real taste of culture, and to entirely understand it, and outsider needs an informant who is aware of its values and is able to articulate them. One can also conduct a research and draw from experience with the culture, in order to make connections between the five components previously described.

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Culture in "Real Life": Love, Live & Learn

Love

My Big Fat Greek Wedding

A few days ago I saw a movie called My Big Fat Greek Wedding. This movie is about a young greek women that still lives with her family because she hasn’t got married. But things change after she decides, against her father’s will, to go to college and study computer science. After she finishes, she starts working for her aunt’s travel agency and there, she gets noticed by a very handsome man… the only problem is that he is not greek! In the end, her family accepts him, and after going through Greek Orthodox religious rituals, they get married, and it seems that they live happily forever after…

It’s a really interesting film that depicts many cultural aspects of the greeks (the Portokalos family), and it also contrasts them with the traditions of a “typical” American family (The Millers). Those are the main communities in the film, and the cultural persons are each of the characters: Toula (the bride), Ian (the groom), Mr and Mrs Portokalos, the Portokalos family, The Millers.

Many of the cultural products that are shown during the movie are greek. They include greek sculptures, music, dances, traditional costumes, food, the religious items involved in the wedding ceremony, the greek language.

There is a lot of contrast in the cultural practices and perspectives depicted. For example, greek girls go to “greek school” instead of going to “brownie baking lessons” as the American girls do. It also seems that in the greek culture it is a common practice that the fathers show their love for their siblings by kissing them on the cheek even if they are grownup men; and that it is “acceptable” to bear-hug someone to greet them affectionately, even if you are being introduced for the first time. For Americans, a handshake is more than enough for greeting, and I hardly believe that a dad would feel comfortable hugging and kissing his grownup son in public.

This video shows the moment when the Millers and Portokalos families meet for the first time, in it you can see the way they introduce themselves and some other funny details...

The role women play on Greek society is subordinate. They are supposed to get married to Greek men, have many Greek babies and cook and feed everyone all day long. They don’t usually study, because they take care of the house duties. In contrast, American women generally go to school and have their own jobs outside the house.

The way families behave and their size is also very different. While the American family is small (mom, dad and son), the Greek one has at least 3 siblings, and Toula (the main character) says that she has more than twenty first cousins! When the Greek ones get together for dinner it is a huge party, because they invite the whole family. They serve tons of food (mainly lamb), they are very loud and they dance happily during the whole time. Meanwhile, when the Americans (vegetarian in this movie) dine, the only ones in the room are themselves, and there is not a lot of food on the table, it is also very quiet and formal.

"Mrs Portokalos didn't now that bundt cakes are supposed to have a hole in the middle... so she gave a use to it"

Language also plays a very important role in the greek culture. Because they are immigrants in the United States, kids go to greek school to learn the language and traditions. Mr. Portokalos, the bride’s father mentions at least 6 or 7 times during the movie that “every word has a Greek root, tell me any word and I’ll show you” They also argue in Greek and use this language when they want to talk about something and they don´t want outsiders to understand.

“My Big Fat Greek Wedding” might not be an Oscar winning film, but it definitely shows many interesting Greek cultural phenomena, and the 5 components of culture mentioned in the book can easily be identified.

  

Live

Cultural Phenomena in Costa Rican Society and the 5 components of culture

When I was a little girl, I remember that my parents used to take me and my brother to the park. We went there at least one afternoon a week, to play, to ride our bikes or just to hang around while we enjoyed an icecream. But now, many things have changed... 

...Here in Costa Rica (costa ricans as a community) some public parks and playgrounds(products) are not used anymore because people don´t have time to visit them, or because they have found new ways to entertain themselves such as television, video games and other technological devices in general (practices and perspectives).

As a consequence, we have lost these public spaces, that were meant to be used for recreational purposes. Now, they are used as garbage deposits or places to commit crimes (practices). Additionally, the tradition of “going to the playground” and spending quality time with the young ones has been left aside(practice and perspective). That  maybe has happened, because the parents (people) have to work for longer shifts, or because they don´t believe it´s necesary to spend time with their children, for they see the little ones (people) “having  fun” without them.  

I hope things could go back to the way they were before. It´s up to us to recover public spaces!

Learn

Impressions from the text...

I think that the five components of culture described in the text are really useful tools that become handy when you are interested in learning, and trying to submerge yourself into an unknown culture. Those five areas, pretty much include the majority of the aspects that are necessary to understand the values, traditions and perspectives of the individuals that are part of a group, and why they behave in a certain way, in a particular context.

I believe, as the author does, that you cannot exclude people from the culture, because they are the ones that keep it alive. In this sense, when a group of people stop using a certain product of culture, or never participate in a particular cultural practice anymore, the perspectives that used to guide their behavior disappear, and so do the practices and products.