Photo Credit: A Mother’s Heart Photography

The autumn season is upon us here in Virginia – the leaves have turned bright yellow, orange, red, and cover our yard and front walk in a multicolored carpet.

All I can think is that I’m so glad I don’t live in Germany anymore.

Germans, you see, are expected by their neighbors to clear the fallen leaves from the sidewalk in front of their house. And the gutters. And the front yard. The driveway, if there is one. Daily. Or, at least, that was the expectation in the hamlet I lived at in Northern Germany for the year I was working as an au pair. During that fall, though, I thought of my title as less “Au Pair Extraordinaire” and more as “Girl Chasing After Leaves Every. Freaking. Day. (Extraordinaire)”. I swept up a lot of leaves,  secretly thinking the social rule doof (stupid or daft). Still, it was the custom of the land. The neighbors would have thought it incredibly rude if the family I was working for didn’t keep the area in the front of their house clean of leaves as much as possible – nearly as rude as running the loud lawnmower or vacuum on a Sunday, when neighbors nearby are meant to be relaxing together in quiet harmony, like all German families. The shops close on Sundays, in fact, to enforce this family bonding time (or so I was told).

Social customs regarding what is and isn’t polite behavior is such an odd thing – especially when they aren’t your culture’s customs, eh? Learning about other cultures’ understanding of “correct” social interaction makes one realize just how constructed – and arbitrary – many social rules are.

Photo Credit: wili_hybrid

Most of my American friends live in horror of being that American tourist when traveling abroad. We’ve all heard the horror stories of the rude American traveler who behaved in a completely culturally insensitive way while traveling, working, or living abroad. The person who tromps into a Japanese house wearing his shoes. Or complains loudly about the stupidity of grocery stores being closed in Germany on a Sunday.  No one wants to be that person, right? In an effort to not be that person, friends have told me they try their darnedest to follow that age old maxim: when in Rome, do as the Romans do – i.e. follow the customs of the land and culture that you find yourself in, even if they aren’t your customs. Nothing wrong with trying to be respectful in all ways possible of other cultures, right?

Well, no – there are some things wrong with that old rule about following other culture’s customs as much as possible. My main complaint with the “when in Rome” adage is that it simplifies a topic that defies simplification. Tossing the rule out in a conversation as a simple, true fact (as happened recently in the comments section at another blog that inspired this post) strikes me as similar to slapping a bandage on what is, in fact, a thorny issue. Sometimes it’s a good idea to follow the customs and traditions of another society while you’re visiting (or living in) it. But sometimes it can be a really bad idea…

The Three Key Considerations of Cultural Customs

When you’re faced with a differing tradition, custom, or habit of a culture you’re interacting with or a country that you’re traveling through/living in, the main decision you have, of course, is whether you want to follow this different custom, stick to your own ways, or try to chart some sort of middle path. In making this decision, I think there are three main considerations to take into account:

1. Manners - Is this a simple rule of behavior that the people of this country find polite? Will behaving in my normal manner seem rude? Is this just one of those intercultural quirks that I should just follow without bothering my head about it?
2. Practical – What will happen to me if I don’t follow this custom? What about if I do? Will my life or the life of others around be easier? Better?
3. Ethics – Is this custom ethical according to my beliefs? Would I be violating my ethics to follow the custom – or would it be wrong of me to not follow it, given the particular facts of the culture/country I find myself in?

Let’s tackle those one at a time, hmmm?

Etiquette Considerations – or, did you just accidentally insult someone?

Every country has those little rules that you just gotta learn before traveling there – at least if you don’t want to be unintentionally impolite. In Germany you’re suppose to keep both hands on the table -or otherwise in sight – to be polite. Why? Because that’s the rule. End of story. In the US pointing at something with your middle finger alone is likely to be taken as an insult – in other countries pointing at all is rude.

These little rules – while occasionally difficult to remember – are easy enough to follow. If a cultural custom falls simply into this category, there’s really not much to say: just try to remember the custom, and follow the traditions of the land while you’re there. Often times these customs are the intercultural quirks I’ve blogged about previously – things that really aren’t worth worrying about. In this case, I’m all for the “go with the flow” and “when in Rome” rules of thumb. If it’s a behavior that you need to perform, just do it and roll on with your life. If it’s a cultural custom you observe others doing, smile, remember that that’s half of the fun of seeing a new place, and roll on.

Unfortunately, often you’ll be told or read that a certain behavior is “polite”, but there’s more to the story than just that. Very few people want to see you chew your food – that’s why many cultures have a rule about politely shutting your mouth while you chew.  It just doesn’t look attractive. However, many cultures also have rules about what is acceptable or “polite” dress – especially for women – and somehow, I don’t think “it just doesn’t look attractive” is the reasoning going into that rule.

Generally speaking, customs which require different behavior from different sorts of people – men vs. women, young vs. old, rich vs. poor, low caste vs. high caste – are not just your simple old rules of etiquette. There’s something deeper – often something related to status or power – going on there, and this will have practical and ethical considerations.

A good example of this is the cultural tradition throughout much of South Asia (not all, certainly!) where men and women are expected to socialize separately – women in the kitchen, typically, and men in living room or elsewhere. Often, this is presented just as the “typical” thing – and it’d just be weird or rude to behave otherwise. While I’ve never seen this behavior (and would not follow it, whether in India or elsewhere), a blogger friend of mine, Gori Wife, has two posts here and here about her experiences dealing with it. Another example which came up in the original blog post I read is the drinking of alcohol by women in mixed company, particularly when there are older generations around.

Practical Considerations – or what’s the fallout of your behavior?

In choosing whether to follow a particular custom, it’s always important to think about what the effects will be whichever way you choose. Those of us in intercultural relationships run across this by the simple fact of being in an intercultural relationship – if you don’t think your intercultural relationship affects others, you’re hiding your head in the sand.

The “fallout” can be big or small – depending on the custom you’re choosing to follow or flout and the expectations of those around you. Suppose you try to follow the South Asian custom of eating with your hands – the fallout might simply be a small grin of pleasure from your dining partners and a few drops of curry on your lap. Failing to follow the custom might only mean a short moment of embarrassment when you ask for a fork.

To return to our example of the sexes socializing separately, it’s clear that, if you’re a woman (or man) in this situation, either the choice to follow the custom or not will have significant practical impacts. Either way, your social experience – who you talk with, what you do, when you eat, even – will be different. If you choose to follow the custom, despite being from another country, you may gain social “credit” if your behavior is unexpected, but welcome. If you don’t follow the custom, you may make others uncomfortable with your rudeness, and generate gossip or ill-will. Harsh, perhaps, but it’s silly to pretend otherwise. Or it may be that, while it is expected that natives adhere to the custom, foreigners get a free pass to behave as they’re used to – it all depends on the particular group of people you’re socializing with.

How much you care about these other people think of you, of course, is also a variable to consider when thinking of the practical aspects of following a cultural custom. As I’ve said several times before, I truly believe that those who would judge you harshly for infractions of unfamiliar traditions are not worth your concern. Of course, plenty of people think differently on this matter – this is something you’ve got to decide for yourself and your particular lifestyle.

Another example of the practical considerations that foreign females (and men, to a lesser extent) in India must consider is how modestly to dress in public. You may not give two hoots about what a stranger on a street in a foreign country thinks of you – but your experience and the attention you get from those strangers will most certainly be different depending on what you wear.

Ethical Considerations – Or, is this universally wrong?

This should be straightforward, right? Don’t follow or otherwise support other countries’ customs if you find them ethically wrong. When in (ancient) Rome, don’t have slaves like the Romans did. Or, for a more modern example, don’t eat that delicacy of dog meat you were offered if you think it’s immoral to eat man’s best friend. Yes, refusing the delicacy might be rude, and it might have practical considerations when your hosts get upset at your impoliteness, but it’s better to behave ethically. After all, it’s not like any of us are cultural relativists here. (Right? Right?)

Unfortunately, most cases aren’t that clear cut. Most Americans would consider it extremely unethical for children to work in factories instead of staying in school – but what other choices do an absolutely poor family (pdf) have in a developing country with limited social services? Do you refuse to do business with a company that employees child labor on that basis while visiting a developing country, as you might in your home country? I wouldn’t think that the ethical choice in India, while I absolutely would consider it the correct choice for a U.S.-based factory.

Or, consider the socializing example again: are there moral implications for going along with a custom of gender separation in socializing that you wouldn’t follow in your own country? As a someone who strongly believes in parity between men and women, I do not believe that the people should, in any way, be required to separate on the basis of gender if they don’t want to. (If all the gals want to chit chat in the kitchen, that’s a different thing). Generally, I believe that it’s important to push for a culture in every country that tolerates human variation and individuality. In other words, I’m a cultural libertarian.  Because of my personal ethical beliefs, I don’t believe it’s generally right to follow cultural customs that require separate behavior from men and women. So I socialize with everyone at parties, and I drink alcohol when it’s available and sounds like a good idea – in any country or culture. (And I’ll gladly argue with anyone on these issues at said parties.)

Of course, practical considerations – and even etiquette – still must be balanced with ethical concerns. For instance, I still dress modestly in public in India, even though I would occasionally prefer to dress more along the standards I’m accustomed to here in the U.S. Why? Because, frankly, it’s simply not worth the hassle for me, especially given the tiny possible marginal effect I might have in changing cultural mores that require women to dress more modestly than men. Sometimes, it just ain’t worth it to try to fight the “good fight” at all times, in all places – especially when you’re experiencing a new culture.  Just as you need to balance cultures within an intercultural relationship, you need to balance the various considerations of cultural customs in a broader intercultural context.

Good Manners Across Cultures

“When in Rome, Do As the Romans Do” is a poor phrase to follow when operating in a foreign country or culture. It may help in smoothing over the simpler cultural rules of etiquette, but it fails on the bigger, deeper, and broader facets of cultural traditions or customs. So what is a good rule? I like Emily Page’s advice here:

Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter which fork you use.

It’s inevitable that you’ll make a mistake when experiencing a new culture, and do something considered rude or impolite. Indeed, even many months or years after you first become familiar with a rule of etiquette, it’s likely that you’ll be making a mistake or two. (I still blush remembering the time I used an excessively formal version of “you” eight months into my stay in German.) And if you chose to flout a cultural custom because of ethical or practical concerns, you may end up looking incredibly rude.  It’s okay.

As Emily Post reminds us, manners are, first and foremost, about consideration of others’ feelings. If you’re trying your best to be polite, to take into consideration the feelings of those around you, while also sticking to your ethical principles, then no one who has manners themselves should fault you. (And if they do, well, you’ve already heard my opinion on how much you should care.)

The biggest failing of that American tourist is not that he didn’t bother to read up on the customs of the country, nor that he doesn’t consider the practical effects of his actions, nor even that he goes around, demanding that the ethical realities of another country meet his simplistic, black & white view of right and wrong – it’s just an unwillingness to recognize the simple truth that Post points out.

(Little do they know that if I am stymied in blogging about their dastardly actions of cleaning our house & cooking delicious meals I have no problem in getting irrationally upset about some other minor issue. For example: the fridge has been reorganized without my express permission, and the dishwasher was inefficiently loaded, resulting in one less cup being washed than if I had loaded it. I’m still reeling!)

Since I haven’t had a chance to sit down and think through a post lately, I thought I’d share with you the transcript I’ve typed up in spare minutes from an NPR segment called Intercultural Relationships: Can They Work?. I’m not a professional transcriber, so there may be errors – but I figured something was better than nothing for those of you who can’t (or don’t like to) listen to podcasts. The segment (and my post title) was developed from an article in East West Magazine. The article, which you can find here, is quite complimentary to the NPR segment, and I encourage you to read it as well as the transcript below. I’ve bolded the parts I find particularly interesting, and will post my thoughts on it tomorrow in the comments section.

[Begin transcript]

NPR: It’s time for a regular visit with one of our cultural coaches. Today: “You’re marrying him?” Wedding season is around the corner; brides and grooms will be blushing their way down aisles across America. So what better time to ask an expert about what you might need to know if you’re heading to commitment with a person with a different racial or ethnic background? We got this idea from our friends at East West Magazine; the April/May issue has a feature called “To hug or not to hug” about how to handle that all-important meeting with the parents.

And joining us now from Phoenix is Anita Malik. She is editor of East West Magazine. And from her office in Poughkeepsie, New York, we’re pleased to be joined by Lubna Somjee, a psychologist; she’s quoted in the article. Thanks for being here ladies!

Anita, why did you commission this article? You must have been hearing about this from readers or perhaps from personal experience?

Anita: A little bit of both. Actually, simply put, interracial marriages and couplings are growing at a very increasing rate and we tend to focus with that a lot with the magazine, but had never done anything where – how do you deal with this within your own family and with your parents? And that was something we were hearing from readers, that, you know, it’s great to know that the statistics are there, and that this is happening, but how do we deal with it in our own lives, with our own unique circumstances?

NPR: And Dr. Somjee, you are offering tips – or you offered some tips in the magazine – but in the years in which you’ve been practicing, and you’ve worked with couples around these issues, are there some classic cultural clashes that you’ve seen?

Dr. Somjee: Yes, I mean, I’ve definitely seen some classic cultural clashes. Although many times, people have been able to sort of work through them. One of the classic issues is when neither parties have sort of prepped themselves for what to expect when they meet the parents. They think they have, but they really haven’t. Although most of the time those meetings have gone fairly well, in spite of.

NPR: Is that really the case? I just wonder whether, over the course of your practice, do most of the couples that come to you, do they eventually stay together, or do you see couples breaking up because of these differences?

Dr. Somjee: Most of the couples I see do stay together, but I would not say that it was very rare that some couples would break up. For example, a young couple I worked with had an interracial union and met each other’s families, and it wasn’t until they met each other’s families that it sort of punctuated for them how different their backgrounds were. And they came home, and for the first time had a much more serious, in-depth discussion of how their culture impacts their every day lives and realized how different their views were on a lot of things. And unfortunately, for that couple, their differences were irreconcilable.

NPR: Anita, you mention in the article, I’m sorry, which I know you didn’t write, but, you know, you edited it, that in every culture meeting the parents can be kind of fraught with anxiety, but in the Asian culture, in couples where there may be an Asian or Asian-American partner, it can be particularly stressful. Why is that?

Anita: Asian immigrant parents typically have a very set view of who their children should marry. It’s a different type of relationship, but every family has their own traditions, and sometimes a lot of that becomes very, very specific to what the parents want. It’s just a very different child-parent relationship. It gets a little bit more tricky, and so it can be difficult.

NPR: What were some of the scenarios that were described in the article? I thought it was hilarious, actually…

Anita: There’s a lot of humor to this too, and I think that’s the important lesson: that you need to be able to actually laugh at yourself when you make – you’re going to make faux pas when you meet the parents. But the title of the piece actually comes from one scenario where both parts of the couple were Asian, from two different countries. And one family was very warm… the parents wanted to hug everybody, and the other family couldn’t really handle the hugs. And so that became an issue between the couple, and they finally came to a point where they said, “Well, this is how my family is going to be, and this is how your family is going to be, and they’re going to have to work it out.”

NPR: So, Dr. Somjee, help us here. In a situation like that, where the parents are meeting for the first time, what advice do you offer to make it go smoothly? Or maybe, maybe making it go smoothly isn’t the whole point of the thing, just to be honest. I don’t know – tell us.

Dr. Somjee: When you’re meeting someone’s family, knowing what their ethnic background is, or their racial background or religion obviously is important, but it’s only a first basic step. And really, the most important thing to understand is, what is that family’s relationship to each of its cultural variables. Otherwise you kinda get on a slippery slope in terms of making assumptions to stereotyping.

NPR: So how would that information best be acquired? Do you try to be very explicit with the partner and say, “Alright, are your parents huggers or not? Will they expect me to bring a present? If so, what kind?”

Dr. Somjee: There’s a couple ways to do that. One is, you know, get a sense of what the expectations of the meeting are from your significant other. Is it going to be a casual or formal get together? But the other piece of it is, your significant other is often steeped in their own culture so things that may be commonplace to them, they may not even think to tell you. And I think one of the best ways to get information from your significant other is through storytelling. Try to have your significant other tell you stories that illustrate different occasions in your family, or different traditions in the family.

NPR: I have an email that I wanted to share with both of you, ladies. And it says:

“This might be a good question for your coach. I just had a second date with a lovely professional woman who was born in and raised in Sapporo, Japan. She now works in the same East Coast city that I do. Our third date is this weekend. I’m a professional African-American man. What should I know about the Asian approach to dating? Is there such a thing? The first date ended in her bowing, when in Rome, I thought, so I bowed too. The second date ended with a hug & a smile, so I hugged her and smiled back. So far, so good I’m thinking. We’re able to talk for hours… but what do I need to keep in mind?”

So, who wants to start, Anita, is this a common scenario among readers?

Anita: Yeah, I think so. Apparently she’s a little more traditional. It sounds like she actually has immigrated from Japan and not necessarily born here and in that case, I think he just really needs to ask her. But I would say, speak to her about how her family would feel… ahead of time.

NPR: Interesting. Dr. Somjee, what do you think?

Dr. Somjee: Part of it depends on, are you dating to date, or are you dating to marry? Because if someone is asked that question & is scared off by it, at least you know where they are in terms of their dating and what they want from it.

NPR: So what I’m hearing you say is, “ask the questions sooner rather than later”.

Dr. Somjee: Absolutely.

NPR: I’m so glad I’m married.

Anita: Hard, isn’t it, this dating thing.

NPR: It is hard! You all have my respect. Dr. Somjee, I understand you are also interculturally married. If it’s not too personal, can you offer any guidelines from your personal experience?

Dr. Somjee: Yes, I’ve been married and in a relationship with my husband for about ten years. He is white and I am South Asian and I actually come from a community where arranged marriages are absolutely still the norm. So when my husband was to meet my parents, I prepped myself… and I prepped my parents.

NPR: What about persons who perhaps weren’t welcomed so warmly into the fold? How would you advise them to move beyond that?

Dr. Somjee: One thing is, you know, you may have an opportunity to meet the family again and again. And if so, take advantage of those opportunities by getting to know them better. You know, unfortunately, there may be some families who ultimately say, “You know what, we cannot do this. No matter how nice you may be, no matter how much we like you in general, this is not something we can accept in our family.” And at this point you as a couple have to decide whether you’re willing to take the risk, and those are hard questions you’ll have to ask yourself before you even start this process.

NPR: But, hard questions that have to be asked.

Dr. Somjee: Yeah.

[End Transcript]

I’d love to hear everyone thoughts on this NPR piece, and the accompying article from East West Magazine. Good advice, bad advice? Is “ask questions sooner rather than later” a good policy to follow? Anyone tried storytelling as a way to learn about family customs?

Me? Oh, well, I don’t have a faith. And, no, I’m not interested in getting one either.

That was my  polite non-answer when asked about my religious beliefs by two Christians who stopped by Aditya’s and my doorstop to proselytize last weekend. And it was as true, as far as it goes – I’m not one much for simple faith in any context. When discussing my religious beliefs with friends & family, I’m most likely to to describe myself simply as an atheist. But when I’m feeling a little mischievous – or argumentative – I’ll sometimes put in that I’m an atheist – and a Hindu.

Yeah, it’s a bit of a complicated situation; I blame Aditya for it completely.  Like many other things in my life, religion is something that has become more complicated since we set off on our intercultural marriage adventure.

My religious past

Growing up, I’d describe my family as nominal Christians, like so many other Americans. We’d occasionally go to church, we’d celebrate Christmas and Easter with both secular and religious iconography & stories, and one summer I went to a day Bible camp at the urging of my (more religious) grandparents.

I never really “got” religion. When I went to church while my grandparents were visiting it was because after Sunday School they served doughnuts! And juice! At five I was junk-food deprived. I did try to understand & believe in what I heard in church and from family members – I distinctly remember trying to fit the Christian story of creation together with my understanding of evolution when I was six:

Maybe the kids of Adam and Eve interbred with the evolved humans, and people who are particularly stupid or do bad things like murder and steal are that way because they have more monkey genes!

Moral theory, eugenics and faith-based science in one sentence from a six year old! (There are family members who are surprised that I’ve managed to grow up into a reasonably sane adult.) To compound things further, when I was ten I stumbled onto both Dostoevsky and philosophy, and, well, early exposure to that sort of thing is bound to screw a kid up. In my case, Ivan Karamazov’s presentation of the problem of the evil rocked my world view, and ultimately led me to disbelieve in an omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent god:

Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature- that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance- and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions?

Since then I’ve read significantly on religion, ethics, and the philosophy of religion, but nothing I’ve read has given me  such a strong punch to the gut – and nothing has changed my mind on the nonexistence of the Abrahamic God. That, along with strong leanings towards secular Humanism and a scientific mindset were all of my “religious” beliefs when I met Aditya.

Hinduism & Aditya

Aditya is very up front about his religious beliefs. While I wouldn’t call my husband a “spiritual person”, many of his actions and thoughts seem to flow from his religious background and beliefs – like many Hindus I know.

He’ll be writing his own post on the topic of religion and our relationship, so I won’t attempt to explain his religious beliefs myself – suffice it to say, he calls himself an atheistic Hindu – although pantheistic Hindu might be more accurate.  Prior to meeting him, I had very little knowledge of Hinduism, besides the fact that it talked about reincarnation. I did know it had something to do with reincarnation, and lots of gods. Speaking of, here’s a Fun Reincarnation Anecdote: as a barbaric, bloodthirsty child I used to go out after it rained to get rid of the snails in our garden. My mom initially objected to my use of a salt shaker as the weapon of choice, but desisted when I appealed to her vague hippie leanings that the snails were probably just people who had been very bad in past lives, and were getting what was coming to ‘em. That Russian literature, it screws a person up, I’m telling you.

Anyways, when Aditya and I first became a serious couple one of my first actions was to audit a Hinduism course, as described in this post – although I admit part of my motivation  was to end the association I had between Hinduism and evil snails. Each new aspect of Hinduism that I discovered through the class led to hours of discussion with Aditya as I learned about the specific practices he and his family followed (none of it included snails).

After these discussions I never worried that religion would be a source of friction in our relationship because our belief sets, while somewhat different, are mutually respectable and give us similar Weltanschauungs (worldviews). I think both of these – respect of the other’s beliefs, and similar mindsets, if not similar beliefs – are key to a successful relationship. I know that I could never have a serious romantic relationship with a Christian or moral relativist simply because those beliefs are antithetic to mine – and given my fascination with philosophy of religion and metaethics we’d never quit arguing about it. And as Aditya will attest, I am a classically-trained s.o.b. in a philosophical argument.

It also helped that I find many of the religious texts of Hinduism – particularly the Gita and the Upanishads – incredibly meaningful as philosophy, albeit not presented in the analytical framework I’m most familiar with. And while I don’t hold with the superstitions of any religion, including Hinduism, I certainly don’t think that the rituals and traditions of Hinduism are bunk, as I discussed in this blog post on intercultural acceptance. Rather, for me, ritual and tradition are the containers within which substance is stored – they create meaning in the same way as performative speech.

Becoming a Hindu?

While I incorporated some Hindu beliefs and rituals in my daily life and thoughts since studying the religion  in college, I have only been somewhat comfortable calling myself a Hindu since having an Arya Samaj wedding a year & a half ago. Until that point I would have said that I agree with some Hindu philosophy (I use “some” as a modifier since the heterogeneity of Hinduism means that no one can coherently accept all parts of Hindu philosophy). So why the change?

Well, as a wife of a Hindu man, a daughter in a Hindu family, and a eventual mother of Hindu kids, I am now not just a believer in some Hindu thought , but also a participant in Hindu culture and family life. And for me, personally, that makes the difference between being a Hindu and believing in some parts of Hinduism. It’s an odd distinction to many Westerners, I think, who are use to the straightforward conversion processes in Abrahamic religions, which have relatively clearer doctrines of faith than most religions developed in Asia, which can often be atheistic in nature.

Hinduism’s mark can be seen in our household – if you look closely – but day-to-day life isn’t much different than what you would expect in your typical nonreligious Western home.  There’s a shelf of religious texts above my shelf of ethics & philosophy books. One flat surface in the house plays host to a Nataraja, a Buddha, incense, and a growing collection of Ganishas – but also has Indian knicknacks and the occasional tea mug. Setting up a better puja area is on the long to-do list…

But, really, that’s about it. We don’t go to Hindu temple regularly, despite the fact that there’s two temples within ten miles (I wasn’t joking when I wrote that we now live in the Desi suburbs of DC). We don’t follow many common rituals – and there’s certainly no daily household pujas happening here! Right or wrong, I do sometimes feel that this lack of outwardly trappings of Hinduism makes my claim on Hinduism less “real”, at least to others. This is a relatively recent phenomenon – when I was simply a humanist atheist I never questioned whether my identity in that group was real or not. I suspect part of the issue is simply the way Aditya and I are settling into life and looking for a community; I’ve even been considering hitting up the local Unitarian Universalists to see if we’d fit in there, with our atheistic notions and statues of gods. The two, after all, are an odd combination to most people.

In the end though, I feel extremely comfortable with my philosophical and religious beliefs. Hinduism was an unexpected addition to my philosophy, but I have no doubt that I’m much richer for it  (Aditya was unexpected too – so help me, as a preteen I had a grand plan of studying math at CalTech, getting an MBA in Switzerland, and marrying an Austrian). And while it’d be pure hubris to say I’ve got this whole religion thing figured out by my mid-twenties, I do think I’ve developed a good structure on which to grow my understanding in the future. And, hey, I’ve always got my Russian literature to fall back on.

(Not Leo Tolstoy though – he’s a religious fruitcake.)

Anyway, I’m informed that most people don’t think about romantic relationships in terms of intertwined, interdependent utility functions. But I do. And I think you should consider the idea too. Think of it as practice in learning how a subculture (a geeky, mathematically-inclined subculture) thinks about love and romance.

Economics – quick & dirty

Economics isn’t an inherently sexy subject. Most people, in fact, think that economists only study things like banking and capital flows and, well, money-stuff (and that we’re incompetent at it, too, what with the whole financial crises “thing”). However, at its roots economics is all about happiness – except that economists call happiness “utility” to keep you common folk clueless. How do people, given all of the constraints of mortal life – time, energy, physical resources, limited attention spans – best make themselves happy? And when you have a bunch of people engaged in trying to be happy, how do they interact as a group – as an economy? When you go back to this basic view of economics, you (or, at least, I) realize that it should have a heck of a lot to say about personal relationships and marriage – after all, that’s one of the key things that most people need to live a happy life.

So how does the economic approach to happiness differ from, say, psychology or sociology? Well, economists do it with models. (Heh.) That is, economists try to sketch out the underlying key features of a situation  in much the same way a map tries to sketch out the key features of an area. And just like you could have several different maps (topological, major roads, sites of interest, etc) of the same region, you can several different economic models of the same sort of situation, with each emphasizing a different facet of human behavior. For example, a model describing how you and your spouse decide which restaurant to eat out at tomorrow could focus on the process of bargaining between spouses to be that night’s “restaurant decider”, or it could focus on how the emphasis on the price of the meal changes compared to how you two would decide to weigh costs if you were dining individually, or it could focus on the strategy each person uses in suggesting restaurants to reach a solution satisfactory to both parties (with Aditya, my strategy is to say ‘sushi’ if I’m in a sushi mood, and otherwise chant “channa, channa, channa” until he gives in and we go get kabobs and chickpeas).  Most of these economic models are written out in a mathematical manner in order to make clear exactly what the model is assuming and what its predictions are. Which leads us to…

Fun, exciting utility functions!

Utility functions are the way economists describe what makes an individual happy – remember how utility means happiness in economic nerd speak? And, as you may have guessed, utility functions are often pretty mathematical in nature. However, I’ll be keeping the discussion light & easy for the less math-inclined amongst you.

A very basic, general utility function looks like this:

U = (a, b, c, d, e, …)

where U stands for the total utility (happiness) a person has, and the letters stand for various things you can have and experience that bring you joy. So, for example, “a” could be the experience of watching the sun set on the beach, and “b” could be the experience of watching the sun set from the top of the Eiffel Tower (and “c” could be the experience of sitting in Kabob Palace at sunset & would very likely be combined with “d” – eating channa).  You’ll note that in the utility function I didn’t spell out exactly how much happiness each one of these items could bring me. That’s because I, like most economists, am lazy.

Paired with every utility function is a cost function, describing how much of various resources it’ll cost me to get each item that might bring me happiness. So, for instance, sitting on a beach is free, but it’ll still take gas money to get there, and, of course, that precious resource of time. Flying to Paris, obviously, takes even more money and time – perhaps enough that I prefer the trip to the beach, at least right now. Sitting in Kabob Palace at sunset might not bring me much happiness – but it does make the cost of achieving “channa eating” a lot lower, since I’m already right there in the restaurant. No travel time at all!

Intertwined utility functions

So what does this all have to do with relationships and intercultural marriages and such? Well, like I said at the start, lots!

Economics gets a bad rap as only considering selfish efforts to maximize one’s own happiness as “rational” You have a utility function, and you try to choose all your stuff so that your end result is a really big number for your utility. And, yes, there are a lot of simple models of relationships and marriage that take this approach. But nuanced economics is none of that. Instead, we have an interdependent utility function, where your partner’s happiness is incorporated into your own. And that’s what partnership is really about, right? So my utility function might look something like this:

Gori Girl’s Utility = [a, b, c, d, e, ... , Aditya's Utility (a, b, c, d, e, ...)]

Now, for me, this is a really romantic notion – this is what love is all about (remember, we established that I might be insane at the top of this post).

It’s not a matter of “well, if he’s happy, my life is easier and less stressful, and thus I’m happier”. It’s not a matter of simply adding together his happiness and my happiness and coming up with a value for our family’s happiness. And it’s certainly not a matter of wanting to please him just because we’re partners or because he’s another human being deserving of happiness. Please – I’m not that good a person to be able to incorporate every one’s utility function into my own. No human is. Instead, it’s just love, plain and simple. A world where Aditya’s happiness is 253 oodles of joy is a better one than where he only has 252 oodles of joy (yes, joy is counted in units of oodles. Because oodles is a happy word.)

And it gets better! Imagine if Aditya’s utility function looks like this:

Aditya’s Utility = [a, b, c, d, e, ... , Gori Girl's Utility (a, b, c, d, e, ... , Aditya's Utility)]

Well, now we have a recurrsive function, where his utility is based off in part my utility, which is based off in part of his utility, which is… This is the absolute brillance of human relationships – our joy is compounded by the joy of those around us, forming a gestalt of happiness where the sum of the whole is greater than each individual piece broken out. And all this just from a couple of simple formulas!

Of course, this economic framework to not just made to be awesome – it’s also a very good way in my mind to frame relationship issues. There’s still tradeoffs to be made (and as we all know from the stand-up economist, this is not a good thing), since the things that make Aditya and I happy aren’t identical. But when we choose to do something he really wants – like get a pingpong table rather than an, ahem, way more useful outdoor table for the deck – I can remind myself in moments of frustration that, hey, Aditya’s utility matters quite a bit too. This reframing of the issue is particularly important for me, because, frankly, by nature I’m a pretty independent self-centered person.

I suspect that this framework can also give one insights into the extended family of Indian and other “Eastern” cultures as well. To grossly simplify a complex matter (remember, models are about simplifying to key components, even if that leaves out some important details & exceptions), we’re taught in the US that, ultimately, your life is yours to lead – and you should make your decisions based on your own desires and happiness. Basically, it’s okay for your utility function to not include other individuals, beyond the  basic respect you should give all people. On the other hand, in cultures where your family members’ utility functions are considered a key component of your utility function, it’s simply not rational to ignore their desires and happiness, or to try to place those on an order below your own – after all, their happiness is a core component of your own happiness. You can’t separate the two.

Obviously, like all simplifications – or all models overall – intertwined, interdependent utility functions aren’t a perfect representation of our relationships. They’re simply one way of looking at the world, and considering certain aspects of it, just like a poet might look at it another way. Of course, as a trained economist, this is the way I’m most comfortable thinking about the world – all math and analytics and no conventional romanatic leanings to speak of. But, then Aditya knew it when he married me – and in our cross-cultural marriage, I have it worse: he’s studied (and liked) post-modernism.

I tripped, stepping on a few books strewn along the “path” to the couch.

“Hey!” Aditya exclaimed. “Don’t step on the books! You’re never  step on books. It’s disrespectful.”

“Well, if you don’t want them stepped on you shouldn’t leave them on the ground. They’re just books – it’s not like I cracked the spine or anything. Wait… did you just mumble a prayer to the book?”

Cultural and religious differences

When I first started dating Aditya, I knew only a little about either Hinduism or general Indian culture. I certainly didn’t know about any prohibitions about stepping on books – at most, I had a vague notion that feet were considered unclean beyond just, you know, germs and dirt from walking around barefoot.

Learning about my husband’s culture and religious traditions has been a slow, albeit rewarding, experience. I’ve struggled with many of the concepts he considered completely normal – so normal, in fact, that the differences between our two expectations about proper behavior would only surface when one of us committed a faux pas in the other’s eyes.  This struggle goes beyond just memorizing what’s cool and what’s not – at times it has been difficult to understand the reasoning behind the rules, or to take the next step and accept the differences. Some of his cultural concepts I’ve been able to embrace as my own – but others not so much.

Today I’d like to discuss three good ways of dealing with differing cultural and religious traditions – understanding them, accepting them, or embracing them – and why it’s perfectly okay to not embrace – or even accept – any tradition you find difficult or troubling, as long as that works for your particular relationship.

Understanding differences – strive for it

“Everyone is necessarily the hero of his own life story”. – John Barth

There are very few people in this world who believe that their actions are without reason or justification. Certainly no culture or religion develops a custom just for the hell of it – there’s always a purpose. When you come across a cultural or religious difference, your first goal should always be to understand the reasoning behind,  the purpose to it.

Understanding the differing custom or behavior or attitude is not the same thing as accepting it as the right thing for you to do, or even the morally correct thing for anyone. I can understand the purpose behind a suicide bomber’s efforts to kill innocents, or the reasoning that leads to the barbaric custom of female infanticide without condoning either evil practice. Understanding a cultural difference isn’t the same as okaying it – it’s just a way to open up a dialogue with a person from a different background by acknowledging the humanness of their  actions and beliefs. If you can’t get beyond a “that’s nonsensical” reaction to a cultural difference that represents a failure on your part to stretch your mind fully. Of course, that doesn’t mean that it’s easy to understand the actions and traditions of cultures foreign to us. Stretching your mind is hard work!

I was completely baffled by Aditya’s reaction to my accidental stumble over his books. After all, they were just books – things, objects, items. Even after he explained that it was a matter of respect – respect over the knowledge the books contained, the wisdom we gain from the written word – I still didn’t find the whole scenario logical. Sure, respect learning, I got that – but why did he offer what looked like a prayer to an inanimate object? It wasn’t like the book cared it was stepped on! It was only after I  was told by Aditya that it was a pranam (respectful salutation), not a prayer that I realized – duh – it was a salutation to what the book symbolized, not the physical object itself. All right, I thought, I get it. By stepping on the book, you disrespected learning, and then you offer a pranam, and show that you actually do respect learning. Sounded a bit superstitious to me, but I understood the basic reasoning behind Aditya’s actions. And because I understood the basics it was something that I could tolerate, even if I didn’t think it worthwhile or logical.

Accepting differences – try for it

Accepting a cultural or religious difference goes beyond understanding the reasoning at play. Acceptance  means that you recognize that this cultural or religious difference is worthwhile and good  for the people who practice it.

Not all traditions are worthy of acceptance, of course – I’m not suggesting that you accept traditions that are obviously morally wrong, like honor killings, just because some culture  says that it’s a good thing. Even with more mundane cultural differences, though, it’s not always a simple jump from understanding the reasoning behind a cultural custom to accepting the cultural custom as a good thing for others. You could think it’s just a waste of time (my feelings on  most superstitions). Or that it’s a tradition that doesn’t solve the problem that is actually at hand – it just distracts from it (my feelings on most faith-based healing shticks you see on late-night tv).

While I believe that we should all strive to understand the cultural differences we come across in our intercultural relationships, I don’t think it’s necessary – or even possible – to accept all cultural differences. What’s important is that the level of acceptance of each others’ differences works for your relationship. This means that you’re both comfortable with each other’s differences, and neither person feels pressured to accept that which that which they find troubling, morally or otherwise.

Over time I did move from simply understanding Aditya’s tradition of not stepping on books to accepting it as a worthwhile endeavor.  As he explained the tradition more – and as I learned more about Hinduism in a class I was taking – I learned what Aditya got out of the pranams to “offended” books. For him, at least, the short practice wasn’t about superstition or righting some cosmic tally against him. Instead, it was a occasional reminder of why learning was valuable. A moment to pause and reflect.

I don’t think this particular tradition of his was one that I had to understand and accept in order for our relationship to succeed. Perhaps he wouldn’t have appreciated the eye-rolling I inevitably do when I think someone is being silly, but our relationship would survive. It’s a bit hypothetical, though, as I have come to accept this tradition. However, other cultural differences were deal-breakers. For example, it’s very important to Aditya that his parents be able and welcome to visit us for months at a time, or even move in with us, as is common in his culture.If I could not have accepted this value of his, than I doubt we’d be together today – it’s just too important to him. He communicated this to me very early in our relationship, and I learned to accept this foreign tradition.

How does one go about accepting alien customs, traditions, and beliefs as worthwhile and good – and a part of your life now? Well, for me, it’s taken mostly time and thought.  I’ve had to radically retool my understanding of what a good child-parent relationship is to get to the point of being comfortable with the idea & reality of long visits from Maa and Baba.  With the book thing, well, I’ve thought a fair bit on what it means to respect an abstract concept, and how one shows those sorts of values in everyday life.  (Yes, I was raised a heathen child without religion or much spirituality.) I’ve come to realize the value of these small, symbolic gestures of Aditya’s, how it allows for a redirection of one’s mind to the more important things of life, a little reminder of what matters. In fact, not only do I accept the idea of pranam to knowledge in Aditya’s life, I’ve come to desire it in my own. Which brings us to the final section…

Embracing differences, ending differences

The third and final way you can deal with cultural and religious differences is not just understand, not just accept, but embrace the differences and make them part of your own personal culture or religion. I think you see this most often when one half an interfaith partnership converts to his significant other’s religion – thus ending the interfaithiness. In some ways I’ve done that by embracing parts of Aditya’s Hindu practices and faith – I too now avoid stepping on books out of a respect for the knowledge they contain.

However, embracing all – or even most – of your partner’s cultural or religious beliefs should not be your main goal in dealing with differences. I mean, if you both completely embrace the other’s traditions, you just end up flipping sides! Nor should one person try to give up their culture entirely and embrace the other’s – you don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of pulling it off, and if you somehow did, I suspect you’d find you’d lost a large part of the core part of yourself in the process.

No, I firmly believe that you should embrace the parts of another culture that strongly call out to you, and just try to understand and accept the other cultural differences. Think of whole-heartedly embracing some of your partner’s traditions as a bonus, but not a goal. Be open-minded enough to understand the purposes of different customs, and try to see and accept the good in these cultural and religious differences. But remember: it’s okay to not love, or even like, all parts of your partner’s culture. After all, it’s the differences between the two of you, in part, that brought you together.

“The intercultural learner moves amongst cultures, in a process of continual negotiation, learning to cope with the inevitable changes, in a manner that is ultimately empowering and enriching. The home culture is never denied nor demeaned,  yet the intercultural learner will find his or her attitudes and beliefs challenged by contact with others and the process of interaction will lead to the kind of personal growth characterized by ‘progressive’ curricula.” (J. Corbett 2003)

Corbett writes this within the context of explaining good intercultural education, which he describes as neohumanist, for it “places respect for individuals and their many cultures at the heart of its enterprise”.

Thoughts?

My husband and I don’t speak a common language. Never have, never will. Sure, I’m a native English-speaker, born & raised in America, and Aditya grew up speaking English both in the home and at school – and he even majored in English Literature at the Midwestern university we both attended. Nonetheless, we will always be shouting to each other across a ravine – a gap created by our different cultures.

Those of your who are in an intercultural relationship – or who interact regularly with people from a different culture, as I discussed last post – know that this gap goes far beyond the ones created by so-called gender wars, “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” talk, the accents or incomplete vocabularies of non-fluent speakers , or even the basic idea from philosophy of language that no person can know exactly what you’re thinking in your head. The culture we grew up with inevitably affects the framework of the world we perceive – and thus the world we communicate to and with. Lest I end up sounding too pessimistic, however, let me hasten to add that that the difference in world views created by dissimilar cultures isn’t insurmountable. Sure, you’re never going to completely conquer the gap between two cultures – but every little bit helps!

Today’s post is on one of those little bits that help. Or maybe it’s a big bit – I’ll let you decide.Before we get going too far, I admit that my dear husband would probably laugh his socks off if he thought I was claiming expertise in the arena of communication. So, to spare his socks, let’s be clear: I’m no professional communicator. What I am, however, is a reliably trained research monkey whose idea of fun is skimming through academic journals and books on all manner of things. And today I’m writing about something I found in one of those books – a framework put forth by Dr. Michael Bryam that has helped me tremendously in thinking about – and doing – intercultural communication. This framework organizes the six interrelated skills, attitudes, and knowledge sets – each a savoir – which together make up intercultural communicative competence. The first three are preconditions for any true cross-cultural communication – without them you’re lost. The last three are necessary for the successful development of intercultural competence. Let’s dig in!

Savoirs: knowledge, plain and simple

Savoir - without the plural ‘s’ – means “to be aware” or “to know” in French. Savoirs - with the ‘s’ – is the knowledge dimension of our framework of intercultural communication. This is the background information about a culture or nation  you need to know in order to have a snowball’s chance of understanding subtle references or remarks. In the US, for example, you often hear the phrase “he hit that one out of the park” when someone answers a question particularly eloquently, or otherwise performs well. If your foreign friend didn’t know the first thing about baseball and home runs, that idiom would make little to no sense to him – and communication stops when you use it. And thus you fail savoirs in not one, but two ways – not knowing what his culture consists of, and failing to realize the unique facets of your own. There’s two cultures being represented in the conversation, and you need to know about both.

However, savoirs is more than just that. Beyond knowing the nitty gritty about a culture – the gestures, symbols, values, “high” culture,”low” culture and so forth of the person you’re trying to communicate interculturally with, savoirs also requires you to understand meta-culture. What are the things that make up any culture? Where are the areas you’re most likely to misstep with the particular person you’re talking to? What are the things you don’t know about this person’s culture? Or, as Bryam defines it,  savoirs is “knowledge about social groups and their cultures in one’s own country, and similar knowledge of the interlocutor’s country on one hand, and similar knowledge of the processes and interaction at the individual and societal levels, on the other hand.”

Savoir s’engager: critical engagement

Critical engagement – or savoir s’engager - is the second of the requirements for any sort of true intercultural communication. It’s defined as “a critical engagement with the foreign culture under consideration and one’s own” by Bryam, but I like to think of it as being willing to jump off the high dive – and hope you stick the landing. Basically, it’s holding the general disposition that you’re going into a discussion with a person from another culture with eyes wide open and ready to critically think about whatever gets tossed up to you.  Generally, I think this attitude is one that everyone should make an effort to have everyday – but it’s especially important in a cross-cultural setting where closing your eyes to the true differences – and similarities – in cultures will mean inevitable confusion and failure to understand one another.

Savoir être: critical openness

Bryam defines savoir être as “the capacity and willingness to abandon ethnocentric attitudes and perceptions and the ability to establish and maintain a relationship between one’s own and the foreign culture”. Quite the mouthful, eh? I initially had some difficulty understanding – and accepting – this savoir, as I very much believe in a concrete right & wrong, independent of culture. I thought that Bryam’s definition was calling for me to give up this view. But then I realized that savoir être is really just the other side of the coin from savoir s’engager – where one calls for you to be critically engaged in the idea of culture while communicating interculturally, the other calls for you to be open to the ideas of the other culture. Savoir s’engager says to look about yourself sharply, but savoir être requires you to not look about so sharply that all you see is things to criticize.  That doesn’t mean that there might not be some things worthy of criticism in a foreign culture (there’s no such thing as a perfect culture, just like there’s no such thing as a perfect human) – but you should also open to the good things that every culture holds. If all you can express is criticism, the problem lies  with you and your lack of savoir être, not the culture. And you can expect that your unwillingness to budge away from your ethnocentrism will stop members of that culture from even attempting to communicate with you.

Savoir apprendre: skill of discovery

Apprendre is better translated as “learn” or “learning”, I believe, but discovery better fits the flavor of the idea that Bryam is trying to get across. He defines savoir apprendre as “the capacity to learn cultures and assign meaning to cultural phenomena in an independent way.” In other words, kicking yourself in the butt to explore a culture actively, rather than wanting things spoon-fed to you. Of course, if you somehow manage to get some basic knowledge, and you have the critical attitudes I discussed above, you don’t have to independently explore a new culture to hold a reasonable discourse. But you aren’t going to improve your communications skills by sitting like a stick in the mud either. If your goal is to be a truly competent intercultural communicator, you have to be able – and willing – to explore foreign terrain on your own, to engage others through interaction. Your significant other, friend, or teacher won’t always be there to translate new-to-you cultural phenomena.

Savoir comprendre: skill of understanding

This is likely the simplest of the savoirs in definition – “the capacity to interpret and relate cultures” – but one of the hardest to master. Luckily, it’s also what you’re taught to do in your formal education – take information, and then interpret it, analyze it, and place it within a larger context. Basically, it’s a research paper, but applied to the culture you’re interacting with, not your English lit text. Of course, in order to have material to ponder, you’ll first need to discover it through savoir apprendre. But the payoff of learning to learn in a new setting is always worth it – as you understand a culture and then incorporate your understanding of a culture into your communications, they discussion you have will grow much, much richer.

Savoir faire: knowing what to do

Finally, we’re left with the one that wraps it all up: savior faire, which is “the overall ability to act in an interculturally competent way in intercultural contact situations.” Other possible translations are “don’t put your foot in your mouth”, “don’t freeze” and above else, “be cool.” If you’ve developed the five other savoirs in your quest to be a good intercultural communicator, savoir faire is applying them to an actual, real-time interaction with others from another culture, and succeding beautifully.

So there we all are – the six components. Going through these, step-by-step, has helped me realize what areas I need to work on in order to improve my interactions with both my Indian husband, Aditya, and all my crazy non-American coworkers (I’m totally a freezer! Also not big on going out into the wilds to discover new stuff!). I hope it’s helped you a bit too. And I’d love to hear what others think of this framework – it’s not the only one the intercultural academics have come up with, but it’s certainly the most detailed one. So, valid? Not valid? Missing a key part of the way you think of intercultural communication? Too theoretical?

Most of the blame for this “situation”, so to speak, could simply be laid at the feet of circumstance or chance – we happen to live in a very multicultural area, participate in activities that naturally bring a diverse crowd, and my choice of careers was more due to, you know, the job I would be doing than the diversity of people at my office. But I don’t think it’s as simple as chance – the choices Aditya and I have made both individually and as a couple, as well as our prior experiences, have made an outcome like this probable.

So.  This past week I’ve been thinking more about cross-cultural connections outside of my intercultural marriage with Aditya. How do these two spheres of life – home & husband and outside work & community – interact with each other? There’s no doubt that my relationship with Aditya has given me a fair bit of traction with the South Asians I run into – but how has it affected my relationships with people from other cultures? And how has working with an office full of immigrants and different cultures changed my marriage?

Obviously, the answers to these questions will be complex – which is why I’ll be discussing my thoughts on this subject in a series of posts. But the keystone to my ideas lies in the lovely concept of intercultural communicative competence. This term was developed as part of an effort by theorists of foreign language instruction a decade ago, and has slowly been evolving in the intercultural studies academic community. The initial discussions of this topic related to how instructors could teach their language learners how to communicate in a foreign language with real, live foreign people – not just speak a bunch of funny-sounding words. Mostly it involved learning the specifics of the culture associated with the language – things like “Germans are überpunctual – if you’re on time, you’re actually late.” Since then, though, the idea has expanded to incorporate both the specific knowledge and the skill set that all people who interact cross-culturally – i.e. intercultural learners – need to have to be successful, whether they’re speaking a foreign tongue or not.

This skill set is what I believe translates back and forth between my relationship with Aditya and my cross-cultural relationships out in the community – and each one is strengthened by the other. Next I’ll start delving into the specifics of what constitutes competent intercultural learning, but before then I’d love to hear what everyone’s initial thoughts on this matter are. Do you have many cross-cultural connections out in your community or workplace? Do you think it’s affected your closer personal relationship with a friend or significant other from another culture? Anyone else feel like they work for the U.N.?

Of course, they are here for two months, so it’s not as if we won’t end up having plenty of family time together – but I do wish they didn’t have to spend so much time at our house by themselves. I worry about them getting bored; even Kajol, the energizer puppy, can only go for so many walks. I fret about all the interesting monuments and historic sites we aren’t seeing in the evenings for lack of energy and sunlight. And I’m genuinely distraught that, at some point, they might break The System while we’re away at the office.

The System, you see, is the underlying, um, order that controls the chaos of our lives. It’s the three piles of letters and bills ,discordantly stacked on the counter top, which cannot be mixed. It’s the pile of clothes on the closet floor that magically rotates, allowing for the least wrinkled and least pungent item to float to the top when needed. It’s the random junk strewn all over the living room by my inner Feng Shui master that lets me find the scissors, postage stamps, or a hair band right when I need it. Move one thing, and it’s quite possible that my entire life will be ruined. Or I won’t be able to find my favorite lip balm. Basically the same thing.

Aditya and I have developed The System through many years of practice, and Maa and Baba just can’t hope to learn the dance in only a couple of months. The System is breaking under the weight of four adults in the same space doing their own thing.

First, there were all the delicious Indian leftovers in the fridge – where did my aging vegetables go? Where’s the moldy cheese? Who hid the frozen meals behind all these rotis?
Then there were the piles of clean clothes appearing in our bedroom - I can’t find my sweater; it’s not on the floor or the ironing board, or draped over a chair, or wedged under a couch cushion… oh, the dresser!
Finally, we hit rock bottom when I walked in the door after work one day, and found the Kajol fur dust balls had disappeared, and the wood floors seemed distinctly… shiny.

I enquired about the radically changed appearance of my home, and Baba told me he had cleaned it. Having been raised to be polite, I thanked him profusely, and told him that there was no need to do so much housework during the day. Frankly, I was a little embarrassed at the state that Aditya and I had allowed the house to descend to – especially with guests visiting. Baba replied, saying, in effect, that “No, no, you should not thank me. I consider this my house too, and I have a responsibility to keep it clean.”

I’ll admit that this statement… pricked me a bit. “No,” I thought, “this is my house, and I’ll decide however clean it ought to be. And I can darn well thank you if I want to.” There may have even been a mental image of a tongue sticking out somewhere along the line. Before I could voice these fleeting thoughts, however, the slightly more rational and mature part of my brain asserted itself.

“Wait a second, Gori. You get home tired from work, walk in the door, and are upset that someone cleaned up the house for you? And, hey, did you notice that delicious smelling curry on the stove? You know, an Indian curry, cooked by someone from India, where the whole extended family home is a common thing? And where duties – particularly familial duties – are considered things you just do, not things you’re thanked for? Remember how you and Aditya always use to have arguments over his lack of please & thank you? Yeah… let’s connect those dots now.”

So, yes, some papers were moved out of their traditional place. And it took me two days to hunt down my favorite blue scissors, which Maa absconded with to use while knitting an all green outfit for a grandson on the way (no, not mine, and yes, I suspect he’ll look like a little, but awesome leprechaun). The System is shot, and that can be a little frustrating, even if there are new benefits to this short-term extended family lifestyle that I signed myself up for. But there are benefits – awesome ones in terms of household chores, and even better ones in terms of family time: mornings and nights spent playing cards, watching movies, and discussing Indian and American culture and news.

Could I handle this extend family thing in the long-term? I don’t know. I can be prickly when things don’t meet my expectations, especially at home. I need my alone time, with the door closed, as much as I need air – like any other true introvert. I miss knowing exactly what the statuses of the fridge and pantry are, day and night. Right now it’s working, though, and that’s all that really matters.

I ended up thanking Baba again for cleaning up the house, and told him how much I appreciated his efforts. I do the same thing with Maa when she cooks a lovely dinner for us, or gives me a hand with clearing the table, or even passes me something out of my reach. Growing up, I was taught to thank family members for efforts made, large or small, and to always make requests with a “please”. Maa and Baba are accepting of this strange American quirk of mine.

We plan, and God laughs. I think it was when the third firetruck passed me, sirens blaring, and traffic ground to a complete standstill that I realized I would not be reaching IKEA at 1300 hours. There I sat, stalled on the highway, surveying the baking asphalt meadows around. To pass the time, I started observing the cooperation of the other drivers in responding to the emergency vehicles and the on-going traffic jam, and thinking about how other car cultures I’m familiar with cooperate in their own ways.

Americans: when the going gets tough, we get out of the way

I’ve driven in pretty much every area of the US – West Coast, Midwest, South, East – and one thing that never fails to amaze me is how good American drivers are at clearing a path for emergency vehicles to get through. The highway I was traveling on yesterday had what looked like a 3 or 4 car pileup – all the lanes but one were completely blocked. Traffic was already moving slow prior to the accident, and the road had more than its fair share of idiots zigzagging to gain a few car-lengths advantage, or refusing to alternate when lanes were merging. Idiots on the road always worry me, but particularly so when I’m driving an unfamiliar van with massive blind spots.

Yet, when the first fire truck came by on the left shoulder the entire left lane cleared out to make room for it – and all the other lanes made room for them. And the same thing happened when the second truck came, the two ambulances, and then the final firetruck. Drivers who wouldn’t allow others an inch in their lanes prior to the alarms did whatever they could to make space. I’m not sure how this norm to get out of the way gets hammered into the admittedly thick heads of American drivers (road rage, anyone?), but somehow it does. In fact, I didn’t even notice it enough to remark upon until I’d traveled to a few developing countries where road rules and norms haven’t quite been established yet – people don’t want to block emergency vehicles, but there’s no agreed upon response to sirens in the distance. But that’s not to say that drivers in developing countries don’t have their own ways of cooperating with each other.

Indians: always aware of where everyone is

Traveling on roads in India can be a worrying – perhaps even terrifying – experience to those who aren’t used to it. I was certainly shocked, even though I intellectually knew what to expect. For those of you who haven’t had the chance to fear for your lives in India, think of the bumper car ride at your county fair except at the last second there’s no bump. Or, try checking out the video below, that perfectly reflects my experiences in Bombay & Calcutta (except with 1/3 as many cars):

Yes, that’s really what it’s like. Except more cars, rickshaws, trucks, and motorcycles & scooters, and occasionally animals.

However, did you notice how aware the drivers were of where the other vehicles were – at least the ones in front of them? I wouldn’t last a day driving in an Indian city without getting into at least one accident! That’s not because I’m a bad driver – really – but because I’m just not used to needing to be on top of the situation like that at every moment. I bet most Americans would have trouble surviving on India’s roads – they aren’t used to the give and take of Indian traffic patterns. Or the lack of, you know, people following lanes and traffic lights and stuff. Despite these things, Indians have a system of cooperation on their roads that works for them. I don’t think it’s the most efficient system – did you see how slow all of the vehicles were traveling in the video? – so I think it’d be a good idea for India to eventually adopt road rules & norms that are more similar to the Western world’s to ease congestion.

Of course, sometimes the complete disregard Indians show towards rules, such as lane lines in the cities is a good thing, given Indian road design. A few blocks away from the house of Didi, my sister-in-law, was this gem – possibly my favorite road scene in Bombay:

Yes, yes, I know, I can work wonders in Microsoft Paint. If you write me very nicely I might be willing to send you a signed copy of my masterpiece, Bombay Road. In case you can’t get the details from the impressionistic work (inspired by the blurry photos I took), the blobs with four black dots are cars, three are rickshaws, and two are scooters/motorcycles. Vehicle volume suggests a mid-afternoon setting. There’s a divider in the middle, which had some lovely bushes and a massive tree (the green blob dead center). The lane lines, which were quite fresh, didn’t account for the tree. Let’s hope the red rickshaw and green car don’t care too much about sticking in their current lane.

Surprisingly, the other major culture I know about is occacsionally willing to disregard lanes…

Germans: the best drivers I’ve seen

Of the nine months I lived in the country, I can’t recall one time I saw what I would characterize as “bad driving.” Now, that could just be a selection bias – I spent most of my time in a small town and rural area, where the traffic was light. But I imagine that the strict requirements for getting a license in Germany – long hours behind the wheel with a professional instructor, difficult written exam, stringent driving exam, heavy fees – results in better-than-the-American-average drivers. Maybe not by a lot, but probably some.

These requirements, I think, end up producing drivers that are a good combination of American & Indian drivers – they’re good at following the rules of the road (in my experience much better than Americans), but have the awareness of their surroundings similar to the Indian drivers I’ve seen. This combination, though, leads to some driving behaviors that I think would be suicide in other countries. Witness the next amazing Gori masterpiece, inspired by the classic arcade game Frogger: German Road.

If there exists a straight stretch of a road with only one lane in each direction – and decent shoulders – German drivers will spontaneously work together to create a middle lane for either side to use as a passing lane. The first time I was in a car & saw this behavior – on a highway traveling at 90 km, no less – I freaked. With both sides on the shoulder as far as they could go, there were still only inches between them and the cars passing in the middle. If the drivers in the middle weren’t careful, of course, they could have a head-on collision when two cars traveling in opposite directions tried to pass simultaneous. One mistake by any of the cars, and an accident was almost certain.

And yet, I lived to tell the tale. And Germans continue to cooperate to create dangerous situations just so they can pass each other and go a bit faster. As do Americans, with their weaving in and out of traffic. And Indians with their “whatever works” rules. *grin* I suppose the lesson we can all draw from this is that, really, people, the world over, like to get where they’re going.

I eventually got where I was going too, and pulled up to IKEA only a couple of hours behind schedule. And we finally have our bed. (And another bed for the guest room. And a dining table. And chairs. And other stuff. Let’s not discuss my IKEA addiction, please.)

Then I thought about it a bit more, and realized that if I couldn’t come up with six intercultural-type quirks about myself, then all those people who’ve talked about having me committed to an insane asylum for being crazy (I prefer “quirky,” thank you) would be proven wrong. And I’d hate to make so many friends, relatives, and coworkers look bad, so I guess it’s time to roll up my sleeves and show just how quirky in a interculturally-relevant-but-not-culturally-insensitive way I can be. Of course, the qualifier of “unspectacular” means you all will be be missing the good stuff… Anyways, the rules of the meme are as follows:

1. Link the person who tagged you.
2. Mention the rules in your blog.
3. Tell us about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours.
4. Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them.
5. Leave a comment on each of the tagged blogger’s blogs letting them know they’ve been tagged.

Now, without further ado, let’s get on with goats in sweaters, and five other quirky things.

1. For me, India = a goat wearing a sweater
   This isn’t meant as a big metaphor, where the goat stands for stubborn, hardy folk with sweet sides, and the sweater is the many religions and traditions of the people, all woven together to protect them in their lives, or anything inane like that. No, for me India will always be mentally associated with a goat wearing a sweater because that’s the first scene I saw there that really struck me as, well, different. Or at least the first thing that I saw while not nearly dead from jet lag. At the time I was zooming down a road in Calcutta, the day of our wedding, serenely watching the morning activities on the street, trying to ignore the fact that I’d soon be dead from a fiery explosion when our driver misjudged his margins by a few centimeters. Then, well, a goat caught my eye. But it wasn’t just any goat. It was a goat in a sweater.* My world flipped.
2. If I find an excellent ethnic restaurant, I’ll return again. And again and again and again…
   I guess I’m just a little OCD when it comes to my food. Or, at least, my ethnic food. If I find a good ethnic place (bonus points if they’re take-out), I’m perfectly happy eating there every night of the week, and order the exact same favorite dish. I would, too, if Aditya didn’t stop me. When we were living 1000 miles apart during my final year of college I took advantage of his absence to order over 100 pounds of TastyBite. I feasted on precooked Indian food every day for over a semester. Now that we’re married, though, he doesn’t let me get away with such stunts – meals at my favorite places (Kabob Palace!!! and the taco!!! place) are carefully rationed.
3. I get a bit of evil pleasure when people try to connect my last name to my skin tone. Actually, a lot of evil pleasure.
   When we got married, I took on Aditya’s last name (my nice, short, Germanic last name got pushed into the middle spot). And, while Aditya’s family name is not one that shouts “Indian!” to all that see it, it’s certainly one that shouts “brown!” (it also apparently shouts “mangle me as best you can!” to everyone). I always get a kick out of watching people when they find out my last name, and try to understand how this seemingly white girl could have a brown last name. The best is with other South Asians – they know my name is Indian, but it’s not a regional- or language-specific name, so they can’t just casually bring up a city or area during conversation. And there are Anglo-Indians out there with as fair as skin as I. One of my Indian doctors this past week during the hospital visit was so curious that he came back to my room just to hesitantly inquire “… about your last name? It’s…?” He was a cool dude, so I just told him the truth, rather than playing dumb to continue my fun.
4. I enjoy watching cricket.
   “What?” you might be saying, “Watching cricket is not a quirk! Over a billion people enjoy watching cricket.” This is true. With its diehard support in India, and lessor support in all of the other former pieces of the British empire, cricket is not a sport which lacks fans. But, Mr. (or Ms.) Smartypants, tell me how many American women who didn’t grow up watching cricket -or even knew anything about the game until they were adults – enjoy watching cricket. Pretty rare, eh? At first I just tolerated the hooting and hollering at three in the morning as India got a 6 (it’s like a super home run). But then I started watching the games… And now I’d say that cricket is now one of my favorite sports, in a three-way tie with football & football.
5. My favorite outfit to lounge around the house in is the cheap inexpensive salwar kameez I got at Big Bazaar
   Big Bazaar is like the Indian version of Walmart – cheap prices, huge selection of about whatever you need. Although they’re a bit classier than Walmart, so maybe Big Bazaar is the Indian version of Target. Anyways, the salwar kameez is a beautiful deep blue-green color with gold embellishments, and totally looks like it cost more than the $2.50 I paid for it. It’s also magically both loose and comfy AND nicely form-fitting so I don’t look like I’m wearing a big green sack. It’s like wearing classy pajamas!
6. I love drinking in rural German bars, but dislike most American ones
   As some of you might remember, I spent the better part of a year in between high school and college working in Germany. Before I went, I had done some drinking, but mostly around my parents, and never that much. Well… In Germany, you can start drinking pretty much as soon as you hit puberty, and no one bats an eye. Of course, you can’t drive until you’re 18, and by that time most teenagers have gotten past the “let’s drink until we make bad decisions” stage**. On the whole, I find it a much more civilized system. Anyways, once I arrived in Germany, the local teenagers (& adults) took me under their wing and taught me a bit about alcohol. (And I’ve been ruined for American beers since.) My favorite part about the whole experience was going to the local bar, where we’d spend the evening playing cards, slowly drinking good beer, and just chatting until no one was sober enough to remember who had won the last hand. It was a very warm, gemütlich atmosphere, and one I’ve been unable to reproduce here in the US.

So there you have it. Six somewhat intercultural unspectacular quirks of mine. Oh, and I tag cagey, Mallika, Mirchi, NeoKalypso, Quirkybook, Quizman, as the last six people who commented here with a public blog (that I know of). Have fun, guys!
* I actually think it’s really sweet that the owner of this goat had put it in this sweater. While I’m not a fan of animals in clothes in general, the balmy 70 degree winter weather was cold to Calcuttans, and I’m sure the owner was just trying to keep his goat warm. Still it was one of those things I had just never imagined before, then boom, there it was in front of me.

**I really do think that the Germans have a much better system with regards to alcohol than American do. Children grow up with the idea of drinking socially (they even get their own little malt “beers”), typically start drinking when their parents are around to supervise, and never feel like they need to sneak around or hide their beer or anything. It’s not a way to rebel, so you don’t see the dangerous binge drinking nearly as often as you see in the US. While it takes awhile for teenagers to learn their limits, they’re typically doing this in a safe environment, where there are older people around who can recognize when to cut someone off. And by the time you’re 18, you’ve already had the experience falling off your bike onto sharp cobblestones once or twice to drive home the message of no drinking & driving. So there are very, very few drunk drivers in Germany (also helps that if you’re caught driving drunk, your license is stripped, never to be returned).

]]> http://gorigirl.com/why-is-the-goat-wearing-a-sweater-six-unspectacular-quirks-meme/feed 24 http://gorigirl.com/categories-generalizations-and-stereotypes-talking-about-cultural-differences http://gorigirl.com/categories-generalizations-and-stereotypes-talking-about-cultural-differences#comments Tue, 27 May 2008 07:50:42 +0000 Gori Girl http://gorigirl.com/categories-generalizations-and-stereotypes-talking-about-cultural-differences We talk about cultural differences a lot on this blog: "Indian parents tend to worry about X, Y, and Z when their children are getting married." "My husband grew up in a culture where it wasn't okay to do A, B, or C." "Lego people of South Pacific descent enjoy conga lines and grass miniskirts." This is a pretty sensitive topic. In talking about cultural differences, I'm careful to not make too strict generalizations - I'll hedge what I say by emphasizing I'm talking about my own, personal experiences, or suggest that a group seems to act in a certain way, or that some (but not all!) people from a particular culture do a particular thing. But it's impossible to avoid making any generalizations at all about cultures or to keep from categorizing people - and silly to even try.]]>
We talk about cultural differences a lot on this blog: “Indian parents tend to worry about X, Y, and Z when their children are getting married.” “My husband grew up in a culture where it wasn’t okay to do A, B, or C.” “Lego people of South Pacific descent enjoy conga lines and grass miniskirts.”

This is a pretty sensitive topic. In talking about cultural differences, I’m careful to not make too strict generalizations – I’ll hedge what I say by emphasizing I’m talking about my own, personal experiences, or suggest that a group seems to act in a certain way, or that some (but not all!) people from a particular culture do a particular thing. But it’s impossible to avoid making any generalizations at all about cultures or to keep from categorizing people – and silly to even try.

Human beings thrive on making categories and developing generalizations. Evolution equipped us with these abilities for our own good. Any caveman hunter who couldn’t figure out that the grazing animals & the sharp-toothed animals belonged in different categories, one labeled hunt and the other avoid wouldn’t last very long. And the gatherer who used his experience with the different categories of plants to generalize about what was tasty and what was poisonous tended to survive a bit longer. This is a good thing! We’re talking about the beginning of science!

So we can’t avoid making generalizations, and, anyways, they seem pretty darn helpful. However, when we move onto categorizing and generalizing people & cultures, we run into a bit more of a problem. People are just so… complicated. And there’s so many of ‘em! Do you really think that any of us can easily make a generalization that will, for example, apply to all one billion Indians in the world? Really? Even Indians have major trouble with it – most anthologies about the subcontinent have at least one or two essays devoted to just trying to describe what, besides birthplace, connects this vast, diverse group of people. (My money’s on cricket, but I’m just guessing from my personal experience.)

The rest of this post is on how we can use our little analytical minds for the forces of good generalizations, rather than for the evils of stereotypes. How can we create useful categories for the different people we meet? And then how can we accurately and fairly generalize about these groups, given that we’re going to generalize some anyways? And finally, how can we avoid from moving from a generalization to an unfair stereotype?

Creating categories – blonds & brunettes should suffice, right?

When my Indian husband, Aditya, first came to the US, he had difficulty identifying differences in white faces, particularly with girls. To solve this problem, he ended up lumping all the young women on his dorm room floor first semester into one of two categories: “blond” or “brunette”, and leaving it at that. I’m not sure if there weren’t any redheads on his floor, or if there were so few that he could manage to tell them apart without the need for another category. Either way, he was definitely missing out on, oh, about 95% of the “subtle” differences that any American who’d lived through high school could see in his floormates – that one dresses preppy, this one is the classic girl-next-door, here’s a girl jock. Forget about noticing the “tells” of each type – Aditya didn’t know half these social categories existed!

Of course, he can pick out a North Indian from a South Indian with ease. And he’s very good about guessing which caste an Indian belongs to, just off of a person’s name, language, clothing, and the like. See, these are the categories that often matter in India, so these are the ones he learned about. We all make categories based off of our needs in the society we live in. Or, to put it another way, the sociologist Joel Charon*** says

… we isolate a chunk out of our environment, distinguish that chunk from all other parts of the environment, give it a name, and associate certain ideas with it. Our chunks — or categories — arise in interaction; they are socially created… Much of our learning is simply aimed at understanding what various categories mean, and this involves understanding the qualities that make up those categories and the ideas associated with them.

So what does this mean for those of us who discuss cultural differences?

1. We should be aware of the limitations – and strengths – of our personal categories. When I first started dating Aditya I didn’t realize just how diverse Indian culture is – Indians, Nepalis, Pakistanis, and Bangladeshis were all pretty much the same group of people in my mind. And it’s not just me: consider the use of the pejorative Paki used in Great Britain for all South Asians.
2. Categories are not absolute things; instead they develop as our social needs change. Since meeting Aditya, I don’t group all South Asians together. Instead, I have many different categories for Indians – Calcuttans, Bengalis, Mumbaiers, urban folk, village folk, the different castes, and so forth. I’m not saying that I know all about these groups, or that I can even distinguish between one and another, but I do know enough to recognize that they’re different enough to need separate mental categories.
3. A category is a tool for understanding & organizing knowledge, and nothing more. You shouldn’t judge a person based on which category he does or does not fit into. Duh! Categorizing is only a good thing if you use it to understand why people have different qualities. Knowing that Aditya was an Army brat who moved around a lot, for instance, helps me understand both his need for travel, and his desire to put down roots somewhere.
4. Categories are unlikely to all-important for understanding any individual. This is basic statistics – even if you develop good categories, and accurate generalizations about that category, that information will likely be of only some help in understanding any particular individual. Sure, most people who grow up moving from place to place (like Army brats) tend to enjoy travel – but I’m sure there’s a decent number who hate it. And, when dealing with any one specific individual, how are you to know which type you’ve got on your hands? Everyone belongs to multiple categories, and even the sum of all those categories doesn’t tell you everything about a person. (I suspect there’s a whole post just in this point.)

Generalizing about generalizations – the good, the bad, and the ugly

We’re all individuals, right? So isn’t generalizing about people always a bad thing, since it denies people’s individuality?

Well, yes and no.

Bad generalizations - aka stereotypes – are worse than plain ignorance. Accurate, nonjudgmental generalizations can be a useful tool in understanding others.

The problem with generalizations based on categories is that it is very, very difficult to do them right. As I pointed out above, humans are so complicated, and humanity is so diverse that it will never be possible to make an absolute claim about any group of people. And it’s difficult for individuals to even make a fairly accurate generalizations, given their limited personal experiences with any particular group. I think Dr. Charon goes to the heart of the matter when he defines what, exactly, a generalization is:

A generalization describes the category. It is a statement that characterizes objects within the category and defines similarities and differences with other categories. “This is what an educated person is!” (in contrast to an uneducated person)… When it comes to people, generalization is very difficult to do well. The principle reason for this is that we are judgmental, and too often it is much easier for us to generalize for the purpose of evaluating (condemning or praising) others than for the purpose of understanding them.

So how should you deal with cultural generalizations?

1. Never, never, never use them to judge, only to understand. The moment you start to view a cultural generalization as a good or bad thing is the moment you fall into stereotyping. This doesn’t mean you can’t judge actions that other cultures sometimes take: I have no problem taking a firm stance against female infanticide (a fairly major problem in some Indian states), and I’ll condemn any Indian that does such a horrible act. However, it’s a big jump from saying “Indians who commit infanticide are horrible” to saying “Since Indian culture in some circles encourages female infanticide, Indian culture is horrible and all Indians are horrible.” Doing so would be ignoring the numerous Indians who speaks out against this social problem.
2. Try not to base your generalizations on personal experience alone. There are a million and one reasons why you shouldn’t try to make cultural generalizations from personal experiences, but they mostly boil down to the fact that people are biased. You’re biased, I’m biased, all the children of the world are biased. As I point out in my About Page, I’ve had significant contact with exactly one extended Indian family of one ethnicity from one region (and I have a few good Indian friends, but still…). I’m lucky if I can predict what Aditya will be doing tomorrow – I’ve got a snowball’s chance in heck of making any accurate sweeping pronouncements about Indian culture in general. I do have some mental generalizations, of course – as I pointed out above, it’s impossible not to. But, whenever possible, I try to base my generalizations on things other than just personal experience…
3. Look to the social sciences for accurate generalizations. There’s a whole army of sociologists, anthropologists, economists, and the like who make it their lives’ work to scientifically study different nations and cultures. While they don’t always get it right, as an insider I can tell you that most of ‘em try awfully hard to develop theories based off of accurate, unbiased data. I don’t expect you to read academic journals to understand everything the world, but if you’re really interested in a subject, try, say, reading blogs by the experts in those fields to make sure your generalizations have at least a passing familiarity with the real world.
4. Recognize that any generalization is tentative and subject to reevaluation as new evidence comes in. There’s an economist at Harvard, Emily Oster, who made her career a few years back by showing that some of the “missing girls” in Asian countries – suspected of being the victims of female infanticide – were actually “missing” because of the effect of Hepatitis B on the reproduction system. It was suggested that the virus changed the expected gender balance of fetuses, although the exact biological connection was unknown. Well, the big story in economic circles this week is Dr. Oster’s newest paper, where she shows that Hep B actually can’t be a major factor in the “missing girls” problem. I say major kudos to Emily Oster for admitting her error, and changing her stance in light of the new evidence. Try to emulate her, and accept that all generalizations are subject to change with new data.

Stereotypes – how to recognize them

I think that you all are smart enough (and I’ve harped on it long enough) that I don’t need to tell you why stereotyping is a bad thing. But because I’m really the type to harp on these things – and I want everyone to be absolutely clear on this matter, I’ll give it one more go, by once again using the clear prose of Joel Charon:

Stereotypes are highly oversimplified, exaggerated views of reality. They are especially attractive to people who are judgmental of others and who are quick to condemn people who are different from them. They have been used to justify ethnic discrimination, war, and systematic murder of whole categories of people. Far from arising out of careful and systematic analysis, stereotypes arise out of hearsay and culture, and instead of aiding our understanding of the human being, they always stand in the way of accurate understanding.

Okay, that’s the last time I talk about why stereotypes are bad (in this post, at least!). But now that we all know exactly why they’re so horrible, let’s discuss exactly what is a stereotype. As Charon points out, a stereotype is a specific kind of generalization, one that is likely to lead to bad & inaccurate beliefs about the category being generalized. The things that separate out the s-word from regular generalizations include the following:

1. A stereotype is judgmental. The person who holds a stereotype about a category believes that people belonging to that category are somehow better or worse than others because of certain characteristics they hold. If I said “Asians are generally shorter than other ethnicities” I’m not indulging in a stereotype unless I’m somehow attaching a badness or goodness to this fact.
2. A stereotype tends to be an absolute category. By this what I (and Charon) mean is that people who hold stereotypes rarely recognize that there are exceptions – perhaps many exceptions – to the rule. Rather than using a generalization as a tool to understanding, they use a stereotype as an ultimate statement.
3. The stereotype tends to be a category that overshadows all others in the mind of the observer. That is, the sterotyper fails to recognize that we all belong to many categories, some of which are more important to our personal identity than others.
4. A stereotype doesn’t change with new evidence. This goes back to bullet point number 2 – even when you point out many counterexamples to the stereotype, the person holding it will still believe that the stereotype is generally true & useful. It’s like arguing with a wall.
5. The stereotype wasn’t created carefully in the first place. Most people who hold stereotypes base them off of limited personal experience, or what they’ve learned from others who aren’t informed by data either.
6. The stereotype doesn’t encourage a search for understanding why human beings are different from each other. Stereotypes focus on increasing the chasms between people, rather than making bridging the differences through understanding. Obviously, this sort of attitude does not bode well for intercultural communication and relationships.

The bottom line

You can’t help generalizing about cultural differences, as it’s the main way humans organize knowledge. What you can do is recognize how and when you’re generalizing, and take steps to make them as accurate and useful as possible.

Think about the way you categorize different groups of people. Are there big swaths of populations that you group under one heading? Why? You can’t break every population down into tiny categories, but recognize where you have good, distinct categories, and where they’re a bit fuzzier. Be open to developing more categories as you learn that what you thought was one large group is actually a number of small, interrelated groups. And be aware that others have different categories from you – so they’re understanding the world in a fundamentally different way from you.

Think about the way you form generalizations. Always question them. If you don’t know much about a group, consider doing a little scientific research, rather than relying on what you heard a few years ago from some dude at a party. Emulate Emily Oster, and be open to reevaluation as new data & experiences come in. Remember that your generalizations are only one small tool when dealing with individuals.

And, finally, always challenge stereotypes. That’s the only way progress happens in intercultural understanding.

*** A great deal of the theory behind this post should be credited to Dr. Charon, and his excellent essay Should We Generalize about People? from his introductory sociology textbook Ten Questions (1995).

I need your advice so here goes…my boyfriend recently told his parents about me (he is in India right now so of course he sent me this by email). I am a white American girl and he is a South Indian man. Are their comments normal? What can I do at this point to begin the process of “Slow Acclimation”? I want them to eventually accept me but I have no idea where to begin or what I should do at this point! Any advice would be great!!

Travelergal included her boyfriend’s email, which I’ve put below the fold, along with my responses (in red). I’m sure she’d appreciate all of you chiming in with suggestions, advice, or sympathy as well.

Note: this letter has been edited to remove names at the request of Travelergal

R-’s email to Travelergal

As expected my family was having a set of NO’s to the relationship. I mentioned about it yesterday evening. Everyone was surprised and they were making fun of me.

First off, let me say that there’s never a good – or easy – way to tell your family about something you expect them to be upset about. I do think that it was a good idea for R- to wait until a visit to India to tell his family, if only because that way he was able to evaluate his family’s body language and facial expressions, which can tell you a lot beyond what simple words & tones convey. It’s unfortunate that they teased him, though perhaps not as unfortunate that the family was so surprised. If at all possible, I think it’s a good idea to get parents & other family used to the idea that you’re the type who might do something so “crazy” as getting involved in an intercultural romance. Most people don’t like change, and they especially don’t like unexpected, surprising changes in their close friends & family. Obviously that ship has sailed for R- & Travelergal, but for anyone else in the same situation, I’d suggest dropping general hints very early on in your relationship that you hang around people of other cultures & races, etc. A “we’re not pleased, but we kinda expected it” response is most likely preferable to a “you’re dating who?!?” response.

Mum:- She was having a totally against it. She had the opinion of American people not sticking to a relationship like Indians do, she said that u would leave me and if that happens then i shall be all alone in my life coz there is lot of disrespect for a second marriage or relationship in India. She said its all a feeling that passes away with time. I was trying to please her that it was not gonna happen like that i wud say it but she would not listen she would stick to her thought of u being white is ending up in divorce. She mentioned about the cultural aspect I tried to explain how u were learning to cook and talk in Telugu. She says that it would put us as “cheap” in society. She has a big NO in her mind

Sadly, as R- points out later in the email, Americans are known worldwide for the nation’s high divorce rate. If you’re an American dating someone from a family-oriented, traditional-type country, expect for this issue to be raised at least once by a family member. It happened in my relationship too! And if you have no other information about a person, other than their nationality, it makes perfect statistical sense to bet that the American is going to divorce before the Indian will. However, R-’s mother has more information about Travelergal than just her nationality – for one thing, R- chose to date her instead of any of the other pretty fishes in the sea. If R- can convince his mother that Travelergal is not your typical American it’d probably help. Repetition, time, and continuous examples is the key here. The other concerns that R’s mother raises all strike me as being very typical “traditional” concerns: the low possibility of a second marriages, dating/being in a “love match” as just a feeling that would pass, and how an intercultural relationship/future divorce is frowned upon in (Indian) society.

Sister:- She was also in the same way she started saying that it was all infatuation i was surprised to her response. She said u can’t do this to your family who raised u 25yrs. She was totally doubting about me being a serious guy in this relationship which I’m i told her that I was sure it was not infatuation. She tells me that i had to lose 90% of my life where as u will lose 10% of ur life in this relationship. It was rather surprising to see a youngster not able to dissolve intercultural relationship.

R-’s sister’s response also strikes me as somewhat typical. And, sadly, it is completely true that, by being in an intercultural relationship with an American, R-’s family could lose face in their community in India. This is part of what I was talking about in my post on how others are affected by your intercultural relationship. I’m not sure exactly what the 90%/10% comment is about – perhaps R-’s sister fears that he’ll lose his Indian culture by living in the US & dating an American? Or she might be referring tot the costs that could occur to each person should the relationship fail.

Dad:- Dad was the most understanding. He believes in love he believes in “Love is blind” but he would say that it would disrupt everything. The ripple effect that our relationship has is going to be pain. I tried to tell him that u were really understanding and it would be a sin to just break up or end the relationship due to the fact that “U were american”. He has lot of respect for me and he understands what life is. It is me now thinking about him.

I’m glad R- & Travelergal have one family member sticking up for them. The dad seems like a good dude – aware of the real problems that will likely result for the family from the intercultural marriage, but somewhat accepting of the relationship nevertheless. I suggest that R & Travelergal address his father’s concerns about the “ripple effect” as much as possible, and try to keep the line of communication open to him.

After saying all this i also feel if there is only one person in my family who tried at least to understand me and u how many people in the society and relative would respect u and treat us as the same way as Indian couple.

One quick note here: R- & Travelergal aren’t an Indian couple, so I don’ think they should either expect or want to be treated just like an Indian couple in his family’s society. Certainly, they should be treated just as respectfully, but allowances & compromises will need to be made by all parties for the real differences in the relationship. When Travelergal eventually meets the family, they need to ready for the fact that she won’t be as adapt in their world, and she’ll have to work hard to fit into R-’s family.

They all had “DIVORCE” as their main weapon they would constantly say this and put me to calm as they know i don’t have any answer for that and unfortunately we are victims of divorce rate in US

I waited for this moment and now that it happened i think its a long process for them to accept u. I think we need to work on this. I do not want to leave u but let us be sure from both the sides to avoid any mishaps in future.

It will be a long process to get to acceptance, and I’m glad that R- realizes this. My husband’s family took a little while to warm up to the idea of a white daughter-in-law too. I think it’s very important to understand that his family wasn’t expecting this to happen, and they’re probably flailing around blindly. It’ll take some time for them to process the idea, and incorporate it into their “vision of reality”, if you will. I think you can speed this along a bit by showing & telling them ways that they can relate to you. It seems like R- has already stared that by explaining how you’re studying Telugu & Indian cooking, but only your actions over time will show his words to be true.

I’m happy that i have a family who worry about me and see what is there in our relationship for me but it also saddens me when they say it would not work …there r lot of misconceptions/beliefs to be broken and lot of acceptance and approval to be achieved.

ARE U READY?
for all the cultural lessons…all the disrespect with me…all the petty things that u should learn …all norms and conditions that get applied to u when u are around the family … this list is big ..I’m not asking for u to change but i feel there is lot of things u should learn and feel before committing coz i do not want u to be a complete stranger till u meet my parents(if it comes)

This is absolutely wonderful – I really applaud R-’s perspective here. It’s important for both people to be on the same page, and aware of the difficulties that will come from two cultures in one relationship.

I’M READY… to face the problems but i need lot of help from u….hope u will think and reply.

Yours lovingly
R-

My general take on R-’s family’s reactions

Frankly, I’m not surprised by any of the comments of R-’s family. These concerns are very “typical” for an Indian family, but they’re valid concerns, and ones you need to address.

First, consider what knowledge base they’re starting from. How much do they know about American culture? How much do they know about you? Aditya’s parents had never been to the US when he announced that he was dating me, so most of what they knew about American culture came from Hollywood and other media. I’ve written a bit about how Aditya and I did to address his parent’s concerns here, but obviously not every strategy is going to work for every family.

Second, start addressing their concerns about you, one by one. Obviously, you can’t change the fact that divorce rates are high in the US, but you can show how you’re committed to R-, and to family generally. Since their biggest concern seems to be that the relationship will eventually break up, leaving R- stranded, the best medicine is just time, as hard as that sounds. I also think a lot of concerns family can have stems from the “otherness” of intercultural relationships – you’re not what they’re used to, and they aren’t sure how to relate to you, or what to expect from you. What they’ve heard about Americans tells them to expect for you to not be serious about your relationship. Counter that! Steady communication from R-, and eventually from you, about the strength of your relationship and how you can “fit” into the family is very important. If you keep repeating the message, via phone calls, emails, & letters, at least they won’t be able to ignore the issue – and eventually they might start believing what you say.

I think you two have started off very well with the “slow acclimation” by having R- tell his family straight-up while he was visiting India. I also think it’s great that you’re making an effort to learn about his culture via the Telugu lessons and the Indian cooking. I’d suggest continuing with that, and adding in other bits of Indian culture as time & comfort level (on your part!) allow. I’m not at all suggesting you change who you are to try to become the perfect Indian daughter, but rather that you try to find subjects where you can meet R-’s family on a common ground. Since it seems that they’re quite uncomfortable with the entire situation, it means that you’ll have to make the effort.

Finally, learning more about R-’s particular family and community will probably help you figure out other things that could help your efforts with his family, and prepare you for when you communicate with them, or eventually meet. (I don’t know much about Telugu families, so I can’t be much help in the specifics). While it seems like he has a great attitude about helping you out here, there may be a lot of things he wouldn’t even think to tell you about, as they’re so natural to him. One thing that really helped me out here was taking a Hinduism course at the same time as Aditya (he was just in it for the easy A). We’d talk about the course topics, and I’d ask about how things worked in his family, and I’d end up hearing five or ten stories from his childhood. I don’t think many people are in a position to take a course like that, but a great alternative is reading fiction & nonfiction books about India and Indian culture together, and then discussing them in relation to his experiences.

So, my main three: address their concerns, keep the communication lines open, and work at understanding his culture (and therefore his family’s reactions).

I hope all of this has been of some help, Travelergal, and I’m wishing the best of luck for you and R- in your efforts to bring his family around! Does anyone else have any suggestions?

“You are too prejudiced. You do not let your eyes see nor your ears hear, and that which is outside your daily life is not of account to you. Do you not think that there are things which you cannot understand, and yet which are? That some people see things that others cannot? … There are always mysteries in life.” – Abraham Van Helsing, metaphysician and scientist from Bram Stoker’s Dracula

I knew my Indian boyfriend was pretty down with his culture, but after meeting his brother-in-law I just looked at R amusedly and said, “Wow. He’s sooo Indian.” R knew exactly what I meant, smiled and said, “Oh, he totally is. You should see him in India. He’s absolutely in his element.”

Later I will unpack this exchange for Gori Girl readers. But first, some background. I’m a white American woman and my R is from a very traditional, South Indian (Telugu) family. Of the Indian families I have had the pleasure of knowing, I feel at liberty to say R’s is the “most hardcore” (i.e. traditional) I’ve known. For example, out of his 200 family members, only one ventured outside of Telugu culture to marry…a Gujarati. R’s little niece and nephew speak Telugu. His mom, pop, sister, brother-in-law, and their kids have often lived in the same house, sharing family responsibilities (which is very common for more traditional families). It has worked well for them.

After spending his first year of life in India, R would travel back almost every year for weeks, sometimes months, as a kid. As an adult he makes it to India at least once every 2-3 years. He has vivid memories of falling violently ill with Hepatitis A as a kid, has witnessed what can be the stifling effects of “the Indian mob”, and struggles to reconcile with the fact that his family members back home do not have the same opportunities he has in America. On a lighter note, he’s suffered through more painful Telugu movies than he can count. He’s also shared a meal with 4,000 people on his sister’s wedding day and considers Indian celebrations to be some of the most festive and vibrant in the world. He’s taken his non-Indian friends to India and enthusiastically introduced them to a whole new world. In India, R gets to hang out and nibble on the best food on the planet (ok, my bias), all day long. And though it’s hard to describe, he slips into an overall slower, more contemplative and thoughtful pace when he’s there. Over the years he has experienced India at its worst and at its best.

Despite all this, R’s more traditional cousins still say he has always “been a little different”. R also really appreciates the United States for the education he has received, the foods from all over the world found here, American music from all nooks and crannies, and well… if I talk about his Marvel comic book fetish he might kill me. Despite all I have listed about his experiences with India and the United States, I’m not sure I have pinpointed what makes him Indian as well as American quite yet.

R’s brother-in-law

AB, R’s brother-in-law, got married the traditional, arranged way. He lives with R’s family, is Hindu, and has of one of the more “typical” Indian professions. Perhaps some of these things somehow affect his “Oh so Indianness” as I initially described. But then again… not exactly. I knew that he did the arranged marriage, did the joint-family stuff before I met him. It might sound funny, but it only occurred to me to state “He’s soooo Indian” after having a drink and conversation with him.

This will be hard to do… but I’m going to try to describe what I think a small part of being Indian is all about. AB has a really chill yet solid way about him. The way he sits, even crosses his legs, puts his hand on his chin, and sort of looks, listens and doesn’t get frazzled about anything at all reminds me so much of my friends in India. It feels very grounding and comforting to be around these sorts of people. AB is someone who seems to really have assumed his traditional (dharmic) role that his family expected of him. However, he doesn’t strike me as a man who has apathy for his choices or a lack of personal agency.

An American may ask, “How do you just marry someone you don’t know? How do you live under your in-laws roof and rules? How do you just sacrifice everything you may want for the wishes (of what seems to be) everyone else? Why don’t you grow a pair and do what you want for yourself?” To this, AB might just shrug, smile a bit wryly, and proceed to look right through the inquisitive American. To AB these questions are not a part of the traditional Indian worldview. They are not a part of his worldview.

Perhaps at some point AB did entertain more individualist notions? Sometimes I think Americans find comfort in this notion, but I get that vibe that he is truly content with his life. He is someone who strikes me as exceptionally kind, and exudes an unyielding understanding for those who don’t even see the way he does. With a serene, uncanny, yet humble confidence he sort of communicates: “it is what it is and I unequivocally accept life in this way.” I mean, how many Americans can say that?

Most of the traditional, conservative Americans I know tend to be pretty set in a certain type of script—much like AB, as he is more conservative and traditional in his respective culture. However, the distinct difference I have noted in someone like AB is his ability to listen, absorb alternatives, and accept difference without judgment. Even AB’s mother-in-law (R’s mom) who is an ultra conservative Indian has said she has no personal problem with American culture, it’s just that she has a really hard time understanding and wrapping her mind around it given where she has come from. In my experience, I have met very few (if any) highly conservative, traditional Americans who exhibit the same Indian-cool in expressing their views and living their values.

I should also note that AB has an absolutely gorgeous, understanding, regal (and yes, oh so Indian) wife, the most adorable, good-natured kids you’ve even met, and very supportive in-laws. Following the traditions laid out centuries before his time worked very well for him.

Back to R

R is a lot like AB in terms of Indianness… but not completely. I think what makes R a “little different,” as his cousins say, is that he has lived most of his life in the U.S. However, many NRIs (non-resident Indians) still choose to go the traditional route just like AB did. I think somehow, for most of R’s life, he has had a little American pilot light on. He was always curious: he wanted to try dating, perhaps imagined more of a nuclear style family, wanted to further explore his quirky, off-beat tastes, and for lack of a better term, was intrigued with parts of an American, “individualist” lifestyle. But R never really felt he had a true opportunity to do these things given what he was raised to believe, what he saw directly modeled around him, and perhaps given the dharmic ideas his parents thought (and he sometimes thought) he had to follow. Unlike AB, following all the Indian ways never really resulted in happiness or contentment for R.

R tried the traditional route with a few arranged engagements, but it didn’t work for him. He also tried doing things the “American” way as well. R dated “Western style” for a while, but no one he met really inspired him to pursue anything more serious. So, because he hadn’t found anyone special through dating, he saw no need to disrupt his incredibly important and dear family life with such information.

Me and R, R and me

As R and I grew in our relationship, and partly because of my patience and understanding of his Indianness, he felt confident I was someone he could take that huge leap, that huge risk with his parents for. As he grew to trust me more and more, he knew he had a safety net, a support system, and someone who would unconditionally love him if he further explored the uncharted, sometimes uncertain territories intrinsic to the dating/American relationship process. This was also a process his parents and family would have a hard time understanding. However, as R finally found someone worth pursuing, he decided to take that risk and let his parents know he was dating someone non-Indian and more importantly, someone who made him truly happy.

Another one of the main reasons R was willing to take a risk, a leap with me, is that he knew I got it.Before knowing him I had traveled India for a month, had many Indian friends, went crazy about the food, and had an overall, general fascination with Indian culture. However, these things are not why I get it – instead:

• I get it because I am genuinely open to difference, exploring it, and am not quick to judge.
• I get it because I am willing to be patient and understanding of his family’s process of accepting me.
• I get it because I realize my culture doesn’t hold all the answers and am curious about what others may have to teach me.

R knew he wouldn’t have to totally become an individualist, an American in all ways to be with me—he knew he could be both Indian and American. I think R’s choice to be with someone like me is yet another example of his Indianness.

Now, before I get too far ahead of myself, I want to make clear that R has not and will not abandon the ways in which he is “Oh so Indian” as we progress in our relationship. AB and R’s Indianness has sure turned my American thinking upside down… and it has been an amazing ride. I expect to learn more and keep incorporating this Indianness into our lives. A lot of what attracted me to R in the first place was his calm, his humility, unbelievable work ethic, and uncanny acceptance of life the way it is. I mean, perhaps I could have found all these things in a white guy—but I never did. I have, however, felt overwhelmed with this strange and wonderful vibe that many of my Indian friends seem to give off.

One of my great friends of a decade, J, was born in India and moved to the States when he was a toddler. Though he has a pretty traditional family, he chooses to embrace individualism and American life in all ways. He dates, is still close with his family, loves basketball, but to be frank, is basically just like a nice white dude at heart. You could put the guy in a dhoti, shove curry down his throat, and blare Hindi music around him and he’s still be that coconut down the street (brown on the outside, white on the inside). So obviously, Indianness isn’t all about that stuff. J chuckles when I light-heartedly call him a coconut and razz him for not being more “Indian.” He knows I’m right! He says I am more Indian than him! Though I love J as a friend, I’ve never had a spark for him beyond his handsome brown skin. I guess I just prefer that hard to pinpoint Indianness far too much—so sue me.

Truth is, I’m not sure if I could ever be with anyone who’s 100% “Soooo Indian” either. I don’t fully get it—the worldview, the mindset—and I doubt I ever truly can. I do have a deep appreciation for it though. At the same time, I have found myself a little bored when dating on the other end of the spectrum: more typical, American men. What can I say: I do love a little difference, a little flava, and a little spark in my life. I suppose this can come in many forms, from people of all different places, but all I know is that I’m glad I found all these things in R.

Though R and I continually have things to work out considering the cultural divide, his traditional family, and parts of his Indianness I simply don’t (or won’t ever probably) get, we both feel we have a darn good shot at happiness given our goals, desires, and how well we fit together. I’m not saying things won’t get tough and difficult for me to understand, in fact I think they will, but I’ll be darned if I’m going into this with a dark and unhopeful attitude. Do you not think that there are things which you cannot understand, and yet which are? At the very least, R is a guy worth all my hopes, dreams, and risks in moving forward.

And lastly, I’d like to confess that by no means am I an expert on what Indianness is. All I really have to go on are my many impressions and hunches. It’s a tough thing, if not an impossible thing, especially for me – a Westerner – to define. Like so many wonderful and inexplicable things in life, I can’t always articulate what it is but I know it when I see it, when I feel it, and when I experience it. When I came back from a month in India, I felt an aching sadness that I had never felt before. India perplexed me as I felt I had loved, loathed, and then longed for it again, all at once. When someone asked me what I missed most about the place, the first thing I said was, “I miss the way people listen to you there.” I didn’t quite know how or why I had felt so heard there but I knew it was much different than anything I had experienced before. Much like my experience in the country, Indianness, I think, is many things: the tension of opposites, an ineffable mystery, and always, always, entirely moving.