The Purposes Of Cross Cultural Study

Cross cultural studies is designed to develop and build the awareness subtle
area of culture. It also encourages students to discuss and compare aspects of
foreign (American), a mainstream of western culture where English is spoken. This
subject can be enrich and widen the student’s horizon and knowledge of foreign
language and culture so that they can communicate and behave properly and
correctly with people from different country and culture.

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 THE CONCEPT OF CULTURE

What is culture?

The study of culture is a challenging and undertaking because its primary focus is on the
broadest component of social behavior. In contrast to psychology which is concerned with the
study of groups, and the anthropology is primarily interested in identifying of society itself.

In a board and nature of culture, it is clear that it’s study generally requires a global
examination of the character of the total society. It refers to all aspects of life of society such as
language, knowledge, laws, religion, custom, music, art, technology, work pattern, and other
artifacts that give the society its distinctive flavor. In a sense, the culture is society’s personality.

So, What is culture?

Many experts seems to have different opinion, and definition about the world culture. These
different point of views, of course depend on how they viewpoint the culture itself but its
substance is alike.

Spreadly (1977) defines that the culture was the total system of knowledge by which people
designed their own actions and interpreted the behaviors of others. This means that the
importance of the culture is the system of knowledge because whenever people or society
exist, this manage what people should do and what shouldn’t do. In other word, system of
knowledge or way of thinking of the people or frame work of reference holds the very basic
characteristic of culture. Parrilo (1985) remarks that culture was the social cement that bound a
society together and consisted of the values, attitudes, customs, beliefs, and habits that are
shared by members of society.

As we know that culture also refers to the pattern of behavior and belief common to the
members of the society. It is the rule for understanding and generating customary behavior. In
addition, Spreadly states that culture included beliefs, norms, values, assumptions,
expectations, and plans for actions. Culture is the frame of reference within which people see
the world around them, interprete events and behaviors, and react to their perceived reality.

Take for example, the widespread of raising one’s eyebrows. To most Americans, this means
surprise; to a person from the Marshall island in the Pacific, it signals an affirmative answer,
and for Greek people, it is a sign of disagreement. And do you know what it means in
Indonesian culture?

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In a deeper sense, David Popenoe (1989) defines culture is made up of three main elements 1)
the symbols, meaning and values that define reality and determine standards of good and bad,
right and wrong:; 2) the norms or expectations of how people should think, feel, and behave in
a given society; and 3) the material culture- the practical and aesthetic human made objects
which reflect non-material cultural meaning. In short, culture basically has three main aspects,
first way of thinking or mazeway aspect, second behavior aspect, and physical aspect. In this
case, mazeway system is the top list characteristic of culture. Furthermore, Koentjaraningrat
states that the culture aspects consisted of idea or mazeway, behavior, and artifact.

As we know that we also have the term of implicit culture. It can be defined as the model of
ideas or way of thinking, cognitions, wants, interpersonal response trait and attitudes in a
society. In this case, we try to discuss about the term of cultural beliefs, cultural values and
cultural norms.

Cultural beliefs : each society has a set of cultural beliefs which governs the society. The belief
system of society my include all the cognitions- ideas, knowledge, lore, superstitions, myths and
legends. The cultural belief is a determinant.

Cultural values : value is very important class of beliefs shared by the members of the society.
Value is concerning to what is “good” or what “ought to be”. Every society has different
parameter. For example, the value success in American society is measured based on in
American society if he or she can collect money or material things. if he can not collect money,
he is not regarded sinful or is bad. In other society, success is measured by how people can
control themselves psychologically. It is important to note that value are both positive and
negative; the positive is the desirable and the negative is the undesirable. In value system,
there is no reward nor punishment.

Cultural norms : behavior in a standard behavior events is also regulated by cultural norms.
There are the rules by standards, accepted by the members of a society. Norms are divided into
folkway and mores. Norms are called folkways when conformity to them is not considered vital
to the welfare of the group and when the means of enforcing conformity not very clearly
defined. In American culture a folkways specifies that a man should wear a tie on a formal
occasion. If he does not wear, he may be considered a boor. The punishment for his
nonconformity is that he may be flowned upon, talked about or perhaps socially rebuffed.
Mores are norms which specify behavior of vital importance to the society and which embody
its basic moral values. The prohibition against bigamy is one of the mores in American culture .
in the norms, there is the term of punishment who is an outlaw and reaward for whom obey
the norms.

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Characteristics of Culture

There are many characteristics of culture, but some common features of culture will be
described here. First, culture is learned. It is not an innate characteristic of the individual. For
example, we learn to divide the color spectrum into red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo,
and violet. We also have to learn, to preserve, to develop the culture which is inherited by our
descendents (Spreadly, 1977). Actually we are at early age, beginning to acquire from our social
environment a set of beliefs, values, customs, norms, and so forth that make up our culture.

How culture is learned

Anthropologists have identified three distinct forms of cultural learning-first formal learning in
which adults and older teach young family members “how to think, how to behave, and how to
behave, and how to make something.” Second informal learning, in which a child, children
acquire cultural pattern through informal activities. For example, children learn to imitate
behavior of selected others-family, friends, tv heroes, etc; and technical learning, in which
teachers instruct the children, students in educational environment about what should be
done, how it should be done, and why it should be done (Leslie L.Kanuk, 1994).

Conlusion

The study of culture is a challenging and undertaking because its primary focus is on the
broadest component of social behavior. Spreadly (1977) defines that the culture was the total
system of knowledge by which people designed their own actions and interpreted the
behaviors of others. This means that the importance of the culture is the system of knowledge
because whenever people or society exist, this manage what people should do and what
shouldn’t do. In other word, system of knowledge or way of thinking of the people or frame
work of reference holds the very basic characteristic of culture. Parrilo (1985) remarks that
culture was the social cement that bound a society together and consisted of the values,
attitudes, customs, beliefs, and habits that are shared by members of society. Finally, every
country in the world has each culture which is adopted by their family or region. So, what are
you? What is your culture in your society?