Cultural Communication & Education » Western Culture

Is our Culture Failing Us?

Admin — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 15:19:37 +0000

“We live in a culture that barely acknowledges and rarely celebrates the arts or artists.”

Dana Gioia, Chair for the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts.

How many writers, artists, scientists can the average American name? In a speech delivered to the graduating class of Stanford University , Dana Gioia decried the lack of interest in cultural figures (other than pop culture) in America today. He claims that the cultural entities of today are all for the sake of entertainment. And so ultimately it follows that everything today comes with a price tag. When celebrities appear on radio or TV talk shows, their main, and often only, purpose is to push their book, movie, new TV show, or a new vote.

What has happened to American culture?

Fifty years ago, Gioia says, Americans could rattle off a laundry list of names, names prominent throughout the country. Carl Sandburg, Rachel Carson, Georgia O’Keeffe, these names were familiar to Americans outside the university or literary circles. “I don’t think Americans were smarter then, but American culture was,” he says. “Even the mass media placed a greater emphasis on presenting a broad range of human achievement.”

According to the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, the average American knows less about current events today than they did in 1989. That is, unless written about in People or flashed on Entertainment Tonight. An exception, one might claim, is those who watch the Daily Show; those watchers can identify figures in the news far more ably than those who watch Fox News, which purports to being “fair and balanced.”

Our American culture today is a world of popular icons which we spread throughout the world, dispersing our brand of entertainment widely and cheaply to others who desire Western culture. So that other countries can be part of pop culture, many countries end up with a double culture: their own indigenous one, plus our pop culture: tennis shoes and tee-shirts; Mickey Mouse and Britney Spears.

With the onset of instant information at our fingertips, via Google, Wikipedia and other Internet sources, we no longer need to study to access facts and/or ideas. The need to know is quickly rewarded by a click of the mouse. Without accessing other available resources for research (the “old-fashioned” kind, like the library, encyclopedia, dictionary) the fact seeker is rewarded with just that one fact they were seeking. No off chance of running into unsought information, extra facts gleaned from in-depth research on a subject, as you might experience in the library stacks or while poring over a reference book. No. Just that one fact, then…..next click.

Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Blink, about intuition and cognition, tells a story about a group of art experts studying a piece of Greek sculpture. Because of decades of training and bone-deep knowledge, they quickly evaluated the sculpture and pronounce it a fake. This knowledge did not come by typing in “Greek sculpture” on the Yahoo search box or spending five minutes scanning a Wikipedia page on the subject. It came from years of training, research and learning, not from instant fact gleaning.

In today’s world, it seems that ideas, not knowledge, reign in our culture. Instead of learning, retaining and knowing information, today’s internet sources — Google, Wikipedia, etc. — make the need to know information less critical than the ability to know WHERE to find good, reliable information and which site to look at for “creative” ideas.

But in the end, a broader understanding of a culture is valuable. Facts alone aren’t enough. Ideas alone aren’t enough. They need to connect. Where do the facts and ideas on the internet come from anyway? Undoubtedly from minds which have studied and learned and so possess a broad understanding of a culture, whether it’s about Greek sculpture, theater or the problems facing business.

In business, communication is key. And wouldn’t it be great if you tossed out a worthwhile name or a cultural figure (not pop culture) or a valued book and your audience knew what you were talking about. A shared cultural experience would hold great value if we could elevate it beyond Entertainment Tonight. If we learn only this fact, that fact, and the name of the newest slasher film, how will we be able to communicate with each other in a deeper sense?

By: Terry Gault

A Maasai Wedding Soon: the Most Spectacular Event of African Culture

Admin — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 21:12:36 +0000

The Masai are among the forty-two tribes of Kenya. Unique about the Masai community is that while the majority of the other tribes of Kenya have embraced the western culture in terms of religion, clothing and their way of living, the Masai have stuck to there culture. Another unique factor about the Masai is that they live among the wildlife national reserves and game parks in Kenya. Due to their unique way of dressing they have become an attraction in themselves. The wildlife of Kenya is the biggest tourist attraction in Kenya. The second are the Masai.

The Masai have form time been exploited by a various tour operators, for example Tourists always want to photograph the Masai when they come across them and as it is always polite to request someone before taking their photo. As many of the requests are communicated in English, a language that most Masais do not understand then, the tour driver becomes the translator and in the process grabs and opportunity to make a quick buck by tripling the quote to taking a photo of a Masai. While the Masai would communicate to the tour driver as to how much in Kenya shillings he would wish paid to have his photo taken, the tour driver would communicate to the tourist in form of dollars. Since there are no exchange bureaus in the bush the driver once more offers to convert the foreign currency to shillings hence making as much as three times what he would pay the Masai.

The Masai people are the only ones allowed to carry weapons such as machetes and their famous rungu (a short wooden stick carved in ball like finish at one end and can be very lethal when one is hit with especially on the forehead). Being one of the warrior tribes of Kenya, it is part of their culture. Other tribes of Kenya are afraid of the Masai but that does not stop then taking advantage of their illiteracy and more so when it comes to the tourism industry.

During the late 80s and early 90s, the tour drivers started noticing the interest that tourists were showing in the Masai community by the kind of question they were asking. Despite tourist being warned that the Masai are a fierce tribe and that their young man are known to kill lions as a passage to manhood, this did not scare some tourist and they wanted to visit this community and learn more. This was therefore arranged privately between the tour driver and the tourist but at the tourist’s own risk. Visit to the Masai village therefore become a commercial venture but in a disorganized way. Tourist are mobbed up by the villagers as every one wants a cut of the pie and this really scares some tourists that upon going back to the safety of their country, they narrate this nasty experience to the travel agent who had organized their tour. The driver at the other end losses his job but this has not stopped the practice.

Woni

Safaris, an indigenous tour operator in Kenya decided to take the initiative of putting some order in one Masai village in Ambsoli national park and included a visit to the Masai village in all their programmes. To avoid a sudden crowding around tourists, all members of the community are given a role to play in ensuring tourists feels welcomed in their village without exploitation or extortion. The young warriors perform their dances to welcome the tourist in their village. After the welcome dance, all kneel down and pray in the Masai language, which is an experience in itself, and then the tourist is allowed to get in the enclosure where the mayattas (huts) are. Inside the enclosures, elderly Masai women would display their wares of beaded work and tourist may make their selection in a very orderly manner. They are then given a tour of the village and the tourist is then allowed back and negotiates the prices of the wares they have picked. The children stand in corners of the huts and are not allowed to mob the tourist. Photos are taken at no extra charges, as a visit to the Masai village is inclusive in the tour package apart from the gifts the tourists buy.

This kind of arrangement has become very popular and was duplicated to other Masai villages in Kenya. Due this initiatives, Woni

Safaris is very popular with this particular village and this year an invitation for the company to attend a traditional Masai wedding has been extended to them and their clients who will be taking a safari during this time. The wedding will take place at Amboseli National Park on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, the largest and highest mountain in Africa.

By: Magdalene Ngina

Fly Fishing In Popular Culture

Admin — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:55:46 +0000

Fly fishing is an ancient style of fishing that has become an important part of popular culture. Images of it gear often evoke powerful emotions in the viewer.

It was practiced at least as early as the 2nd century by Macedonian anglers; however, some argue that fly fishing may have originated even earlier with the Chinese.

Little is known of the development of it from the 2nd century through the end of the 15th century. The English publication of a book in 1496 detailing dozens of artificial fly designs suggests that the sport was kept active during this period though. It continued to grow in popularity for some time in England, Scotland, Scandinavia and the United States. However, the sport eventually came to be viewed as an elitist sport, in part due to the high cost of fly fishing gear. Early fly rods were crafted from a tropical wood and later from bamboo. Both types of rods were expensive. By the 1920s interest in fly fishing in the United States had peaked.

Following World War II, fly fishing interest increased in the United States again. The introduction of fiberglass fishing rods, mono filament leaders, and synthetic line all served to lower the cost of fishing gear. Fly fishing interest in the United States was once again on the rise. Many of our fathers and grandfathers were fly fishermen of this era, and the overall respect that is given that generation in American culture may be reason enough to explain the enduring strength of it in popular culture.

Over the years Western it has emerged with its own cultural image. This may be due to several factors, including the American romanticizing of Western culture in general along with some brilliant marketing by early Western fly fishing entrepreneurs. The Western American cultural image of fly fishing is inextricably linked with horses, wide-brimmed hats, and leather apparatus. Western-clad fly fishers wading a rocky river while horses graze nearby on the aspen-lined shore is a powerful picture that transports most of us to a place we want to be. Whether the image is completely rooted in reality is not important.

Consider how many images designed to communicate masculinity feature fishing gear. Artists and graphic designers know that images are a powerful way to communicate masculinity – whether attempting to speak to men or to speak about men.

Even those who have not held a fly rod in years are powerfully impacted by the image of a fly rod or a fly fishing scene. The picture instantly transports people back in time. Fly fishing is so deeply embedded in the American culture that a single picture can take us back to childhood or transport us to a far away place. In this place the world seems right again; everything is once again as it should be.

It’s an important part of popular American culture. Images of fly fishing abound in movies, magazines, books and homes. Even an image of it apparatus communicates powerfully to many Americans. It’s an important part of American popular culture and history.

By: Bob Bastian