CONCEPTS OF CULTURE

The common problem in the world even though our minds are different, is the confrontations
between people, groups, and nations who thing, feel, and act differently. (Hofstede, 2010:4).
These differences always came as a result of lack of understanding each other or another
culture. For one to understand how cultures are, and operate on different levels of life, is very
vital in tackling cultural differences and working with different people from different
background. Cultural differences also entails that there is no one way of doing things
(Trompenaars, 1998:2). Because:

Every person carries within him- or herself patterns of thinking, feeling, and potential
acting that were learned throughout the person’s lifetime. Much of it was acquired in
early childhood, because at that time a person is most susceptible to learning and
assimilating. As soon as certain patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting have established
themselves within a person’s mind, he or she must unlearn these patterns before being
able to learn something different, and unlearning is more difficult than learning for the
first time. (Hofstede, 2010:4-5).

In socio-cultural anthropology, Culture says Hofstede is a catchword for all those patterns of
thinking, feeling, and acting. (2010:5). Therefore, the essence of culture is not what is visible
on the surface. It is the shared ways groups of people understand and interpret the world.
(Trompenaars, 1998:3).

This shared ways groups of people understand and interpret the world, consists of the
unwritten rules of the social game … because, culture is learned, not innate. It derives form
one’s social environment rather than from one’s genes. (Hofstede 2010:6).

The below diagram shows the Three levels of uniqueness in mental programming

Specific to individual Inherited and learned

PERSONALITY

Specific to group or CULTURE Learned

Category

HUMAN NATURE Inherited

Universal
The “Onion”: Manifestations of Culture at Different Levels of Depth.

Symbol

Heroes

Ritual

Values

Practices

Culture: “It is the concrete, observable things like language, food or dress. Culture comes in
layers, like an onion. To understand it you have to unpeel it layer by layer.” (Trompenaars,
1998:06).

“The layers of values and norms are deeper within the “onion”, and are more difficult to
identify.”

“Culture is the way in which a group of people solves problems and reconciles dilemmas.”
(Trompenaars, 1998:06).

“A fish only discovers its need for water when it is no longer in it. Our own culture is like water
to a fish. It sustains us. We live and breathe through it. What one culture may regard as
essential, a certain level of material wealth for example, may not be so vital to other cultures.”
(Trompenaars, 1998:20).

“Culture is beneath awareness in the sense that no one bothers to verbalize it, yet it forms the
roots of action. This made one anthropologist liken it to an iceberg, with its largest implicit part
beneath the water.” (1998: 24).
Culture is like gravity: you do not experience it until you jump six feet into the air.
(Trompenaars, 1998:5).