I most appreciated the anthropological definition of culture as a vessel of shared meaning. I think it is beautiful to view culture as the thing that brings communities together, but more importantly, that gives meaning to our daily tasks and lifestyles. The notion that culture and developed symbols give purpose to the things we do is an incredible and hopeful definition for culture as opposed to the globalization definition that, while very important, can focus on the commodification of culture.
In looking at the cultural studies definition of culture, culture gets its meaning through the contestation and negotiation between cultures to assign meaning to different things. As a part of a majority racial group with a “dominant culture”, engaging with other students and exploring the meaning I have assigned to certain tasks or values will aid me in unearthing a majority culture I have often neglected to see. Furthermore, discovering symbols of other cultures will push me to think twice about where my own actions come from and ultimately will help me to be thoughtful about how I have created my own life importances.
The Intercultural Praxis Model not only teaches us to be observant of oneself and their geography, it also urges us to analyze how every factor of social, political, economical, geographical, etc. influence our actions and the actions of others. This is the pinnacle of intercultural communication and while I think that the “Action” pillar of this model might be the most challenging, it is certainly the most rewarding. I also believe that the “Positioning” step is crucial in this model as it can often be overlooked. Being cognizant of whose stories are told and whose voices are lost is so massively important in understanding if we have a well-rounded image of one another’s cultures. Ultimately, this ties in with the idea of “The Danger of a Single Story”. How does our geography and community affect which stories we have heard? Even when making an effort to be as open minded and self-aware as possible within our community, we will never be able to understand the full picture of another group if their stories are not being told in a language we understand or are not available through media and literature.
I absolutely believe that there are universal human values; however, I believe that most of these universal values are derived from human instinct. Attributes such as compassion and collaboration should be universal and somewhat biological; but, there are many variations of universal human values. I do believe that there is always a common ground to be discovered between different cultural practices.
