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| Hattie |
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| Mari |
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| Bayer |
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| Ponijao |
Monday, April 21, 2014
Conclusion
As you can see culture is very important in the "Babies" film and in our society today. Something we can do is keep passing down our cultures to future generations.This film was great and I highly recommend it. Please consider what has been written in your personal life and pass on what you have learned. Once I saw this film and started this assignment, I started to dissect and realize how culture is important and how my culture works. I hope you enjoyed this journey through four cultures. Thank you so much for reading this World of Cultures blog.
Cultural Universals, Cultural Relativism, and What should we avoid when studying and observing cultures?
What are cultural universals? A cultural universal are "an element, pattern, trait, or institution that is common to all human cultures worldwide." For example, each and every baby from the film and in our world eat, sleep, need comfort and safety, play, cleaned some how, grow teeth, grow, walk, talk and pay outside. A cultural universal can be anything that is common to all humans anywhere in the world. Below is a picture of Ponijao playing with another child. Playing is a cultural universal.
What is cultural relativism? A cultural relativism is "judging cultures on their own terms: the principle that people should not judge the behavior of others using the standards of their own culture, and that each culture must be analyzed on its own terms." Each culture is unique and important for our society and world to function. Even though someone may look different or go about life differently doesn't give you an excuse to judge or mistreat them. Every single person in our world is different and special in their own way. Just like every single snowflake is unique so is each human being. I remember always hearing "treat others the way you would want to be treated." This saying doesn't just have to be about treating people with respect and nicely. It could also be like "don't judge a book by its cover." Personally I don't think that saying is just about physically appearances. I think it could also reflect on cultures. For example, after the 911 hit the twin towers in NYC people began to judge that all Muslim people are terrorists. Yes some of them are but I am positive some Christians, Atheists etc... do some terrible things as well. Once something bad happens, people tend to think the worst about people and cultures. That is why we need to not judge and use cultural relativism. We should judge ourselves before judging others. Nobody is perfect and we need to respect and honor different cultures.
What we should avoid when studying and observing cultures There are a few things we should be aware of when looking at other cultures. The first is background information on the culture. Even though you may want to put away all of your biases before studying the culture you should see what is respectful and what isn't. In some cultures eye contact is very disrespectful. If you were to study that culture and didn't do background information on that culture you would be disrespecting a lot of people. The second is being aware of cultural relativism, universals and components. Third, observe and compare many different cultures and avoid saying which one you like best. I personally think there are only a few things we should be aware of when looking at different cultures. I think the biggest one is respect and responsibility when reporting your findings. Always remember that everyone and every culture makes up our world. Culture is very important in the development and growth of our future generations and world. "People without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots" (Marcus Garvey).
What is cultural relativism? A cultural relativism is "judging cultures on their own terms: the principle that people should not judge the behavior of others using the standards of their own culture, and that each culture must be analyzed on its own terms." Each culture is unique and important for our society and world to function. Even though someone may look different or go about life differently doesn't give you an excuse to judge or mistreat them. Every single person in our world is different and special in their own way. Just like every single snowflake is unique so is each human being. I remember always hearing "treat others the way you would want to be treated." This saying doesn't just have to be about treating people with respect and nicely. It could also be like "don't judge a book by its cover." Personally I don't think that saying is just about physically appearances. I think it could also reflect on cultures. For example, after the 911 hit the twin towers in NYC people began to judge that all Muslim people are terrorists. Yes some of them are but I am positive some Christians, Atheists etc... do some terrible things as well. Once something bad happens, people tend to think the worst about people and cultures. That is why we need to not judge and use cultural relativism. We should judge ourselves before judging others. Nobody is perfect and we need to respect and honor different cultures. What we should avoid when studying and observing cultures There are a few things we should be aware of when looking at other cultures. The first is background information on the culture. Even though you may want to put away all of your biases before studying the culture you should see what is respectful and what isn't. In some cultures eye contact is very disrespectful. If you were to study that culture and didn't do background information on that culture you would be disrespecting a lot of people. The second is being aware of cultural relativism, universals and components. Third, observe and compare many different cultures and avoid saying which one you like best. I personally think there are only a few things we should be aware of when looking at different cultures. I think the biggest one is respect and responsibility when reporting your findings. Always remember that everyone and every culture makes up our world. Culture is very important in the development and growth of our future generations and world. "People without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots" (Marcus Garvey).
Similarities in Culture and Distinctive Cultures
Hattie and Mari live in industrialized areas. Japan and The United States of America are two of the most technologically advanced and "richer" countries. Both babies had easy access to many toys, books and even technology at a young age. The pictures below shows Hattie playing with a cell phone at a young age. Both girls have both parents taking care of them and wear "middle class" clothing. One similarity I found very interesting was the mommy groups. These mothers would get together and do specific activities together. A few examples of these are exercise (polities or dancing), play dates, walks in the park. The other picture attached is Hattie doing polities at a couple of months old. I found this kind of funny because it shows that we always need to be in groups and need help parenting and or socializing.
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Components of Culture
You may be thinking... what is culture? Culture can be defined as "a learned and shared pattern of behaviours, knowledge, beliefs, values, laws and languages that is passed on to members through enculturation." In this blog, I will focus on two components of culture for each of the babies. The first component is mores, and the second is folkways.
What is a mores? First of all mores is pronounced mor-rays. A mores is "strongly held norms that reflect the values and morals of a culture; violation of these cause strong reactions." In Ponijao's culture, the way you raise children is very different than Hattie's culture. He has many different families living around him, siblings and people taking care of the children and teaching them how to do specific things. They have poor access to "the easy way out" of things. He will learn that in order to live you must work for it. The females stay at home and take care of the children, relax and do house work, while the males’ work hard hunting and providing for their families. In Bayer's culture, the females do house work such as cooking and cleaning, some of the farm work, take care of the children and relax. The film shows Bayer alone most of the time either on the bed or tied to the floor. In this culture that is one of the "normal ways" to raise their children. Mari and Hattie come from very similar cultures. The females often are the ones raising the children and the fathers work. I personally liked how the film showed that the stereotype of women always stay at home with the children while the males work isn't always the case or the right way to go. Both Mari and Hattie had the presence of both parents. As you can imagine, different cultures believe and physically do raise their children differently or the same as their parents parented them. Being a parent and raising a child should be done in love. The picture below is Ponijao and his mother. She is showing love and gentleness with her baby.
What is folkway? Folkways are "informal norms common in society; change with time and circumstances; refusal to follow may cause suspicion and bring about social disapproval." Every baby has some kind of clothing, ways of eating, personal hygiene and use of language. It may very base on culture. In California, you are clothed with nice looking clothes, and every form of clothing. Hygiene is a big deal!! If you are not clean then you are seen as being poor or disgusting. Sitting at the table and using your words to express what you mean in key in this culture. These include a shirt, pants, socks, and shoes. In the American culture it is a law and a folkway to wear clothes when out in public. If you compare that to the Mongolian culture, people wear clothing just like the American or Japanese cultures. One main thing that is different is the level of hygiene. Bayer lives on a farm-like environment. He is surrounded by cows, goats, roosters and chickens. His playing area isn't very sanitary. The picture below shows Bayer bathing with a goat directly behind him trying to drink the water. For the North American culture that is a huge problem. I personally think that our bodies need to be exposed to bacteria and germs in order to build up the immune system. Something I found very interesting in the film is when Ponijao was walking with his other hand in hand. He showed he was hungry. She then bent down and he breast fed in the middle of the desert like area. In the North American culture, women tend to put a blanket over the child and her breast. If Ponijao's mother did that in North America she would have been seen as abnormal, disturbing.
A Friendly Introduction
Hello, my name is Rachel Dozois. I am doing a SAP (Sociology Anthropology and Psychology) assignment on the film "Babies". It is a 2010 French documentary by Thomas Blamès, that follows four humans through their first year of life. It shows and compares the differences between four different cultures. I would like you to meet the four babies. Ponijao and his family live in Opuwo, Namibia. Mari and her family live in Tokyo, Japan. Bayar (pronounced Bear) and his family live in Banyanchandmani, Mongolia. Finally, Hattie and her family live in San Francisco, California. Below is a picture of all four of the children and an idea of where they are from.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N009QUWUy7I
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