Culture In the Larger Social Context

What happens when people have grown into adulthood in their own cultures outside of the US then later migrate here? Can they hold onto their culture of their homeland? Before we answer this let’s dispel one very entrenched myth that the US has a melting pot of cultures. The Melting Pot Theory is an ideology which suggested that all the diverse people coming to the U.S. as immigrants would blend biologically and culturally in order to form a new unique breed of "Americans." The US has never had a melting pot. Those who’ve migrated here (numbering 10s of millions) have found themselves pressured to accept the Anglo-Saxon (British) version of the main stream culture. Acculturation is the process by which immigrant people adjust and adapt their way of life to the host culture. The map below shows the major migratory routes of many immigrants to the US over the course of US history.

Figure 1. How Do Immigrants Experience the Mainstream Culture Once Here?

© 2009 UVU & Ron J. Hammond, Ph.D.

Once in the US they realize that they have to make some adjustments in order to experience success in their daily interactions with members of the mainstream society. Assimilation is the process by which people from different cultures are acculturated and ultimately absorbed into the mainstream culture. In much of the US history of immigration throughout the 18th, 19th, and early 20th Centuries assimilation was more or less forced toward the deeply British-influenced mainstream culture.

Forced Assimilation is where those in power in the mainstream refuse to allow immigrants to maintain their various cultures. Since the US immigration policy switched in favor of more non-European immigrants being allowed to migrate here, much of the assimilation is voluntary and considered permissible. Permissible Assimilation permits newcomers to adapt to the mainstream culture naturally.

It is fascinating to observe the assimilation and acculturation of adult migrants to the US who have children born here and who have children enrolled in public school systems. Many adult immigrants hold dear their homeland cultures and adapt as little as possible to the main-stream US cultural norms. Because of this they experience marginalization. Marginalizationis the tendency for adult immigrants to be rendered powerless in comparison to native-born adults because they live as a half citizen not fully capable of realizing the individual opportunities often found available to average native-born adults.

Their US born children find themselves living in a culturally transitioning family structure. Their parents are more like permanent tourists here while they become fully “Americanized” (for better or for worse) because public schools are tremendous socialization agencies which effectively acculturate most children into the main-stream. These children often serve as cultural liaisons to their parents and the main-stream culture.

There are three other levels of consideration for assimilation for adults who immigrate to the US: Cultural (acculturation into the host culture); Marital (vast intermarriage between mainstream members and newcomers); and Structural (large scale entrance into the various parts of the social structure including clubs, religions, workplace, schools, etc...).

Regardless of which culture a person grows up in, there are cultural universals which are for the most part common to all cultures. Cultural Universals are certain aspects of cultures which are found among peoples of all cultures throughout the world. All societies have universal social tasks which include the meeting of basic human needs such as breathing, eating, sleeping, drinking, having sex, and remaining safe. These universals include: adapting to and coping with physical environment; assigning of roles; controlling reproduction and relations between the sexes; communicating; maintaining some form of authorized government; and socializing Children .

In the history of sociology, there were early scientists who applied evolutionary thought to the evaluation of cultures. Sociobiology claims that human behavior is the result of natural selection. Suffice it to say here that most studies do not support this approach—specifically, human agency proves to be much more potent than genetic determinism. Also, genes are not grouped neatly with the various cultures in such a way as to biologically distinguish one culture’s members from another.

One final issue for discussion is the fact that technology moves and advances so quickly that often our values, norms, folkways, and morés evolve at a much slower pace. Cultural Lag is the process whereby one part of culture changes faster than another part to which it is related. Thus we find ourselves collectively having the scientifically-developed: euthanasia, congenital birth defect detection, and other scientific procedures that were available to us before the ethics and values of how we place importance upon the many complex issues surrounding these and other procedures.

What might happen if in our day and age a small group of people lived isolated from the rest of the world? Seems impossible, huh? It’s not. Today there are an estimated 100 “uncontacted tribes” of people living in various remote corners of the world (see http://survival-international.org/home ). They have no cell phones, TV’s, Internet, cars, sinks, toilets, or beds as we know them. And they have no idea that such technologies even exist. An Uncontacted Tribe is a native tribe, typically a small group of people, living in a remote and isolated place who have not yet had contact with members of a technologically advanced society.

On 30th May, 2008 CNN News reported that an uncontacted tribe of Brazilian Indians were photographed from a small airplane and the news story spread quickly around the world (see http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/05/30/brazil.tribes/index.html ). The Website, “Survival: The Movement of Tribal People” reported that these tribal people had to be photographed in order to deter illegal loggers from Peru and Brazil from coming into contact with them and chasing them away in armed conflict (which always ends with modern guns winning out over traditional spears and arrows; See http://www.survival-international.org/ ).

Brazil constantly monitors its 200 tribal communities and keeps track of all their tribal people via their governmental agency FUNAI. The government has to make efforts to protect them from opportunists looking to obtain immense national resources located near their villages (see http://www.brazilsf.org/culture_indian_eng.htm ). Previous encounters between tribal people and main stream civilization has left vast numbers of tribal people dead or exploited from diseases, slave labor, prostitution, racism and discrimination, or lost armed conflicts.

The irony about the news story mentioned above is that the men of this tribe shot arrows at the plane and threatened the plane with spears…they now have been exposed to contact with more civilized societies and therefore not technically uncontacted anymore. One of my students wondered what they must have thought about the small airplane that threatened their safety. It must have looked like a dragon, evil spirit, or omen of some sort. Yet, had the photos not been taken and the loggers allowed to run these people off, the results certainly would have ended in lost lives.

Date: 2015-01-12; view: 956