Analysing Culture

What actually IS culure? One of the first things you encounter when you interact with people from another country is something that you can’t really see, but which, if you do not understand what it is and how it works, affects every interaction you have... This "thing" is CULTURE.

Culture is a concept or term that is not easily defined, and when it is done, it becomes a fairly academic concept that does not help you deal with the cultural difference that made you notice it in the first place.

By following this training and using the models introduced throughout Culture Class, you will learn to understand and work with the British culture in a practical manner.

Getting Started

We will initially define culture as "The accumulated habits, attitudes, and beliefs of a group of people that define for them their general behaviour and way of life".

In other words, culture is something that a group of people develop and share through upbringing, geography, religion, values, history, economic and political environment, etc. It manifests itself as an often clear set of rules and conducts that defines the membership of that particular group which, in turn, differentiates them from other groups.

A very simple example of cultural boundaries is to think about how different the culture of your neighbour country is from yours. Quite a bit? Now, the interesting thing is that whilst the cultural differences may be clear to you, do you think a person from the other side of the world, or even just a few hundred miles away, would think your countries are all that different? Probably not. So assuming there in reality are no serious cultural differences, would you be happy to adopt the culture of your neighbour country and start doing everything the same way as it is done there? For most people, this answer is probably also a no!