Running head: THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE

The Complexity of the Term Culture Bridget Schuberg Colorado State University

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE Abstract The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how and why defining culture is such a complicated process, and why the term culture may be waning in usefulness. Although I do concede that I find Holliday's (1999) conceptions of small and large cultures to be worthwhile, I also propose that his definitions are so similar to concept of identity that the discontinuation of the use of the term culture altogether could be both possible and beneficial. I conclude with the impact my research about culture has had on my teaching philosophy. Keywords: culture, context, identity, received, small cultures, large cultures, other

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE The Complexity of the Term Culture Ulla Connor (2011) defines intercultural rhetoric as the study of written discourse between and among individuals with different cultural backgrounds (p. 2). Therefore, as the field of intercultural rhetoric cannot be divorced from the concept of culture (indeed, the term intercultural rhetoric even contains the word cultural), it is necessary that scholars agree on the exact meaning of culture to ensure that their research and analyses are both comparable and valid. Those with a superficial grasp of culture may conceptualize it as simply the patterns of values, beliefs, and behaviors that typify a group of people from the same society (Holliday, 1999, p. 239). Because it is likely that many teachers who have contact with international students have not had to study the notion of culture at length may envisage culture in this static way, it is especially crucial that empirical research in this field does not reinforce such a misinformed perception. In somewhat broader terms, culture has been defined as the lifestyle of a group of people: values, beliefs, artifacts and behavior, and communication patterns (Connor, 2011, p. 25). This definition is undoubtedly an improvement upon the aforementioned simplistic

received view many have of culture (Atkinson, 2004, p. 280) as a ethnic, national, and static (Connor, 2011, p. 29). However, because so-called culture is arguably the most important factor that drives research in this field, it is clear that this definition is quite problematic. First of all, as this way of thinking tends to drive people to define themselves in terms of what they are not, this definition has been criticized as dangerous due to its potential to instigate the othering of unfamiliar groups (Connor, 2011, p. 25). As one of the goals of the study of intercultural rhetoric is to increase understanding between and among cultural groups (Connor, 2011, p. 2), this

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE traditional definition is counterproductive. Secondly, this definition gives the impression that conventions are unitary and homogeneous, an idea which Ryuko Kubota (1997) proves is completely false by examining the wide variations regarding Japanese rhetorical style. While cultures of societies have never historically been clearly delineated, they are even less so now

as the world becomes increasingly globalized (Holliday, 1999, p. 244), making generalizability of cultural norms increasingly difficult (Ramanathan & Atkinson, 1999). Furthermore, in recent years, international rhetoric has begun to emphasize the importance of considering the specific contexts in play behind each written work; this conventional definition is not specific enough to encapsulate all that must be considered when determining the multitude of forces behind a particular writer's rhetorical tendencies. In other words, texts are not just a product of any one perceived culture, but rather are a product of the specific circumstances surrounding the writing of the text (Kaplan, 2001, p. xi). While recent examinations of the concept of culture do not universally agree upon one definition of culture, they all highlight its complexity (Connor, 2011, p. 26; Atkinson, 1999; Holliday, 1999). If we are to ensure anything, we must ensure that our definition is not overly simplistic. Indeed, Ingold (1994) asserts that when studying cultures, we never find neatly bound and mutually exclusive bodies of thought and custom, perfectly shared by all who subscribe to them, and in which their lives and works are fully encapsulated (p. 330) due to the interconnectedness of the world's peoples. Because the definition of culture is such a slippery one, some scholars have gone so far as to conclude that it is not a worthwhile term whatsoever (Abu-Lughod, 1991; Michaels, 1995; Fox & King, 2002, as cited in Atkinson, 1999, p. 279). However, one conception of culture which I believe accurately accounts for the many possible

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE variations that may occur even among people from the same societal background is Holliday's (1999) distinction between large and small cultures. According to Holliday, large culture refers to behavior-defining similarities among groups of people on a similar ethnic, national, or international level, while small culture denotes subcultures and cohesive social groupings, a dynamic, ongoing group process which operates in changing circumstances to enable group members to make sense of and operate meaningfully within the circumstances (p. 248). While large culture seems to have a negative connotation in this article, as it is described as essentializing (Connor, 2002) and susceptible to power structures (Holliday, 1999, pp. 243244), the individual components of small and large culture may interact with each other to influence a person's actions. To further complicate the issue, both large and small cultural attributes may combine with various socializing agents (e.g. school church, workplace, technology, etc.) to create various experiences and upbringings (Holliday, 1999, p. 249). From a pedagogical perspective, one of the greatest advantages of to be gained from research in the field of intercultural rhetoric is the knowledge which potentially allows teachers to predict the complications that may arise in the writing classroom with writers of various backgrounds, and to understand why these problems may occur (Kaplan, 2001, p. viii; Connor, 2011, p. 8. However, the only results of any worth in this field (i.e. those that are valid, reliable,

and truly representative of a group of people) will have to control for a great amount of variation between/among writers of the same language. Researchers may wish to consider factors such as gender, age, level of education, socioeconomic background, religion, geographic region, and race when choosing test subjects. The more similar these subjects are in these areas, the more quantifiable and useful the results will be. The subjects must then be given similar contexts of

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE writing (persuasive vs. informative; directed toward an authority figure vs. written for a student) to further establish reliability and validity. The results of such a study must clearly define that these patterns will likely only be observable in this very particular context, as emphasized in Moreno (2008). If too much variation among backgrounds is present, and if the context of the

discourse is not firmly established, the study does not measure what it is intended to and will not produce similar results should the test be conducted again, rendering the findings useless. Indeed, Atkinson (2004) points out that we cannot compare or contrast rhetorics and genres across cultures and languages if we [do] not have good baseline descriptions of those rhetorics themselves within cultures and languages (p. 278). Regarding the context of the TEFL/TESL classroom, I fall somewhere between hesitation and culture as not a useful concept on Atkinson's (1999) scale of attitudes toward the term culture (p. 629). I am reluctant to decree that the term culture should be dropped from all use, as much of TEFL/TESL education is based around the idea of making cross-cultural connections, of which I have always considered myself a strong supporter; I believe that promoting awareness and tolerance for other lifestyles is extremely important. However, it is easy for me to see the pitfalls associated with overuse of this word; therefore, it might be better to avoid this term altogether in favor of more constructive and productive ideas (Atkinson, 1999). If the term culture is to be kept in discussions of varying rhetorical styles, scholars of the field of intercultural rhetoric must come to an agreement on what exactly it means. Personally, I believe that, as Holliday's idea of small cultures seems to be synonymous with the idea of identity, I think perhaps it is possible that the term could and should eventually be replaced, at

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE least in the field of intercultural rhetoric. Because the term culture tends to be associated with sweeping generalizations and stereotypes, I think replacing the word altogether in the context of IR could not only eliminate disagreement among scholars in the field, but could be beneficial in drawing attention to the dynamic nature of individuals, regardless of any small culture they may be a part of. While I have always been aware of the need to avoid overgeneralization of people based on their cultural backgrounds, I never considered in-depth the inherent problems with the buzzword culture itself. Analyzing culture in greater detail has allowed me to enhance my teaching philosophy as well. Zamel (1997) has brought to my attention the danger in paying too much attention to the idea of culture in the classroom; if I see students as bound by their cultures, I run the risk of reducing, categorizing, and/or generalizing them (p. 342).

Furthermore, individuals are so variant and inconsistent in themselves (Atkinson, 1999, p. 633) that broad statements of any sort that I may have intended to elicit from them, however wellintentioned, are likely to be false. In my language classrooms, I want to strive to be a teacher who does not force students to oversimplify their identities; I will attempt to refrain from questions framed with, In your culture... Rather, I will view each student as an individual whose behaviors are not merely products that have been governed by their society of upbringing. I will endeavor to see each student on an ever-changing journey of identity composition, based upon the individual choices they have made and the lifestyles they have espoused up to that point. By taking this approach with my students, I hope to focus on similarities between and among students, to deemphasize any previously constructed rigid boundary or dichotomy between backgrounds (Atkinson, 1999, p. 630) and to foster mutual understanding and pan-

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE background connections.

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE TERM CULTURE References Atkinson, D. (1999). TESOL and culture. TESOL Quarterly, 33(4), 625-653.

Atkinson, D. (2004). Contrasting rhetorics/contrasting cultures: Why contrastive rhetoric needs a better conceptualization of culture. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 3(4), 277-289. Connor, U. (2011). Intercultural rhetoric in the writing classroom. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Holliday, A. (1999). Small cultures. Applied Linguistics, 20(2), 237-264. Ingold, T. (1994). Introduction to culture. In T. Ingold (Ed.), Companion encyclopedia of anthropology: Humanity, culture, and social life (pp. 329-349). London: Routledge. Kaplan, R. (2001). Foreword: What in the world is contrastive rhetoric . In C.G. Panetta (Ed.), Contrastive rhetoric revisited and redefined (pp. vii-xx). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. Kubota, R. (1997). A reevaluation of the uniqueness of Japanese written discourse: Implications for contrastive rhetoric. Written Communication, 14(4), 460-480. Moreno, A. (2008). The importance of comparable corpora in cross-cultural studies. In U. Connor, E. Nagelhout, & W.V. Rozycki (Eds.), Contrastive rhetoric: Reaching to intercultural rhetoric (pp. 25-41). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Zamel, V. (1997). Toward a model of transculturation. TESOL Quarterly, 31, 341-352.