In recent blog posts, I’ve written on several occasions regarding two contemporary issues that pertain to the national context of Sudan: the genocide in Darfur and female genital modification (a phenomenon not restricted to Sudan, but practiced in varying frequencies throughout the Sudanic region of Sahel zone Sub-Saharan Africa and to some extent in surrounding cultural regions – but at the same time definitely a phenomenon of Sudan, and often practiced there in a form regarded by many as the most extreme example of female genital modification, what Janice Boddy has called, following local usage, “Pharaonic Circumcision,” which entails excision of all external female genitalia and infibulation of the vaginal opening). My question here is whether concepts of cultural relativism apply to either of these situations.
I’ve also written recently about differing conceptions or senses of “cultural relativism.” There are certain elements of cultural relativism that anthropologists in general tend to agree on. First, there is a recognition of the simple reality of different culturally shaped ways to be in the world. There is no single way to be human, and each of our ways of being human is largely influenced by our cultural contexts, and is “culturally relative” to that extent. Second, for ethnographic research, cultural relativism further entails an at least provisional setting aside of moral or ethical judgment of the cultural practices being observed and analyzed in the field context, and an attempt to understand cultural phenomena on their own terms, within their own logic. As Marshall Sahlins has written recently in his book Waiting for Foucault, Still, this is as much a pragmatic and methodological concern as anything. In order to do quality fieldwork, it is necessary to set aside preconceptions (to the extent humanly possible) and to not continually engage in moral judgment of those being studied. Beyond this, there is debate about the sense, meaning, or implications of cultural relativism. For some, the provisional setting aside of moral or ethical judgment or critique becomes an ultimate setting aside of these activities, at least with regard to the practices and premises of cultural contexts other than of one’s own upbringing. For me, cultural relativism does involve a strong inclination towards respect for the practices of other cultures (I think that’s been one of the strongest contributions of the discipline of anthropology to western culture [and other cultures]) and for the self determination and autonomy of others. Further, though, a concern for self determination and autonomy as well as respect for others as equals, for me, necessitates willingness to engage in cross-cultural dialogue and to critique and be critiqued.
But my question here is not so much the content of debates about cultural relativism but whether those debates about cultural relativism and their implications have any bearing on the issues of female genital modification or the genocide in Darfur? My short answer is “yes” to one, and “no” to the other.
Female Genital Modification is a “traditional” practice in most, if not all, of the communities where it is now performed. (I’m aware of the problems of invoking “tradition,” especially when notions of the traditional are used to imply stasis within the practices of a particular community or homogeneity in practice within a community or region. Still, I find the concept useful in referring to practices that have a history within a specific context [often, but not necessarily a long history] and which relate in important ways to many other elements of the culture. I’m respectful of those, like June Nash, who call for us to speak no more of “Tradition” – and we should speak no more of capital-T, static, essentializing “Tradition” – but I would call instead to speak in more complex, interesting ways of “tradition” or “traditional practice.”) It is important to provisionally set aside judgment (at least for those engaging in ethnographic fieldwork on the topic) and to understand the practice in relation to other features of the cultural context on their own terms, even if we ultimately engage in critique and/or support efforts to alter the practice.
The only element of cultural relativism that applies at all to the genocide in Darfur (or any other genocide, ethnic cleansing, or ethnic violence) is perhaps the goal of understanding the phenomenon on its own terms, the better to end it. Other than that, cultural relativism (and any associated notions of national autonomy) is utterly irrelevant in this case. While a certain amount of ethnic tension in Western and Southern Sudan may be “traditional,” genocide is clearly not and violates in the most extreme way possible the respect for diversity, self determination and autonomy on which cultural relativism is based.
Showing posts with label cultural relativism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cultural relativism. Show all posts
Friday, March 9, 2007
Tuesday, March 6, 2007
Are Some Cultures Better Than Others?
Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s works, such as her current book Infidel or the earlier The Caged Virgin: An Emancipation Proclamation for Women and Islam, make the argument that some cultures are better than others, specifically that Western, liberal culture is superior to Muslim Middle Eastern culture. This runs counter to one tradition of cultural relativism in anthropology that holds there is no basis for establishing the superiority of one culture’s traditions and values over another, or even that all cultures are substantially equivalent in value, that the values of practices of any given cultures are morally or ethically equivalent.
I would argue in principle that some cultures are better than others and that cultures can improve in quality. For example, I would argue quite fiercely with anyone who thought that Western culture after the abolition of slavery was not superior morally and ethically to Western culture before that abolition. At the same time, I am a bit wary of specific comparisons between contemporary cultures (though in a limited way, I will do so below), since such comparisons in the present political climate are more often used for neoconservative than liberal or progressive ends. Instead, I’m more interested (despite my provocative title) in ascertaining whether any and all particular cultures might be improved (and what improvement of a culture would entail), an approach that does not necessitate the comparison of the relative superiority or inferiority of different cultures, but instead assumes that all cultures (very much including Western culture and Muslim Middle Eastern cultures) can be critiqued and improved in some ways (and simultaneously allows for recognition of the merits of all cultures).
Cultural Equivalence?
There is an approach to cultural relativism that evades the critique of other cultures by asserting a moral or ethical equivalency of all cultures and of their practices. This can be seen in the arguments of some, such as Dwight Read, concerning female genital modification. He essentially argues that it is hypocritical for westerners to critique female genital modification in Sudanic Africa and some surrounding areas on grounds of the pain the practice causes, in which regard it is essentially equivalent to some western practices, such as male circumcision, and in that respect, I’d agree with Read. He is also insightful in delineating a separation between moral and scientific modes of discourse in writing about this or other topics. To the extent that Read (or anyone) can be read as implying a general equivalence between female genital modification and male circumcision, there are problems with the approach.
There are some analogous features between these two practices: they are both forms of genital modification and they are both imposed upon children (though of quite different ages) – and to the extent that I have a problem with either practice, it is this imposition of the practice on individuals without consent that I am mainly concerned with. These analogous features do provide for useful comparison, and I have engaged students with just this comparison in classroom settings on several occasions. Along similar lines, I find it useful (as a way of familiarizing the “exotic”) to get students to compare gendered patterns of modesty in dress between various Middle Eastern contexts and Western cultural contexts, but in both comparison of genital modification or practices of modesty it is also crucial to recognize the differences, e.g. that some forms of female genital modification greatly inhibit the experience of sexual pleasure in a way that male circumcision does not; that to the extent male circumcision marks male gendered status in some Western and Middle Eastern contexts, it marks male status as socially superior while female genital modification tends to do the opposite; that even though in both Western and Middle Eastern cultural contexts, women are generally expected to dress more modestly than men, “Western” dress (including when present in Middle Eastern settings) does tend to allow for greater individual expression than the hijab and head covering in places like Saudi Arabia (but also that there are varying degrees of personal expression possible alongside modest dress for women in different Middle Eastern contexts). Such comparison and contrast alone doesn’t indicate superiority or inferiority, but simply that cultures are quite diverse (obviously a long standing anthropological position in its own right) and not equivalent.
Cultural Improvement
What is it that makes a culture better, for example, what makes post-abolition Western culture better than the pre-abolition West? What might make a culture better than it is now? The ability of the individual to autonomously and freely develop their person within the context of the culture is the crucial consideration. In the context of chattel slavery, millions of members of Western culture were clearly in no position to freely develop their lives, experiences, and personhood. The Jim Crow era, with sharecropping arrangements in much of the U.S. Southeast that often functioned as de facto slavery, alongside legal discrimination, was not a vast improvement, but the end of legal enslavement was nonetheless a clear and definite improvement. Racism has clearly not ended today, and so there is plenty of room for improvement for Western culture on this front, but the end of legal discrimination in the U.S. in the context of the civil rights movement was another signal improvement for the culture.
In an earlier post, “Culture, Culture Change, and the Ethics of Cultural Intervention,” I discussed certain aspects of Edward Sapir’s article “Culture: Genuine and Spurious,” namely his discussion of different senses of the word “culture.” In another part of the article, he made a claim for what he called “genuine culture.” By “genuine culture” Sapir meant one which fostered and made possible personal development. Personal development is never completely free – one’s choices are always restricted by the material constraints of one’s historical and cultural circumstances, and one’s operating premises, worldview, and values are highly shaped and influenced by culture, but there are different ways for culture to shape personality and personal development. Sapir used the term “genuine culture” to refer to cultural contexts which influence, channel, or otherwise positively nurture the development of the person, rather than those which greatly restrict personal autonomy or which largely impose forms of discipline and subjectivity upon persons. There are cultural practices in a variety of settings that disturb me. I’ve mentioned chattel slavery and racial discrimination in the history (and in the present in the case of discrimination) of Western culture. Practices like female genital modification in Sudanic Africa or ritualized homosexuality in highland Papuan male initiation also disturb me. What disturbs me in the case of female genital modification is not so much the practice itself, but the absence of consent. Likewise, in the case of ritualized Papuan homosexuality, it is not at all the ritualized homosexuality that bothers me, but, following from the accounts of anthropologists like Gilbert Herdt or Fitz John Porter Poole, its complete involuntariness.
So, what would improve a culture (any culture)? Changes in patterns of cultural practice which have an effect of fostering and nurturing free development of the person to a greater extent than before (again knowing that there’s no such thing as total freedom or total individual autonomy) and lessening restrictions and impositions on personal freedom and autonomy.
I would argue in principle that some cultures are better than others and that cultures can improve in quality. For example, I would argue quite fiercely with anyone who thought that Western culture after the abolition of slavery was not superior morally and ethically to Western culture before that abolition. At the same time, I am a bit wary of specific comparisons between contemporary cultures (though in a limited way, I will do so below), since such comparisons in the present political climate are more often used for neoconservative than liberal or progressive ends. Instead, I’m more interested (despite my provocative title) in ascertaining whether any and all particular cultures might be improved (and what improvement of a culture would entail), an approach that does not necessitate the comparison of the relative superiority or inferiority of different cultures, but instead assumes that all cultures (very much including Western culture and Muslim Middle Eastern cultures) can be critiqued and improved in some ways (and simultaneously allows for recognition of the merits of all cultures).
Cultural Equivalence?
There is an approach to cultural relativism that evades the critique of other cultures by asserting a moral or ethical equivalency of all cultures and of their practices. This can be seen in the arguments of some, such as Dwight Read, concerning female genital modification. He essentially argues that it is hypocritical for westerners to critique female genital modification in Sudanic Africa and some surrounding areas on grounds of the pain the practice causes, in which regard it is essentially equivalent to some western practices, such as male circumcision, and in that respect, I’d agree with Read. He is also insightful in delineating a separation between moral and scientific modes of discourse in writing about this or other topics. To the extent that Read (or anyone) can be read as implying a general equivalence between female genital modification and male circumcision, there are problems with the approach.
There are some analogous features between these two practices: they are both forms of genital modification and they are both imposed upon children (though of quite different ages) – and to the extent that I have a problem with either practice, it is this imposition of the practice on individuals without consent that I am mainly concerned with. These analogous features do provide for useful comparison, and I have engaged students with just this comparison in classroom settings on several occasions. Along similar lines, I find it useful (as a way of familiarizing the “exotic”) to get students to compare gendered patterns of modesty in dress between various Middle Eastern contexts and Western cultural contexts, but in both comparison of genital modification or practices of modesty it is also crucial to recognize the differences, e.g. that some forms of female genital modification greatly inhibit the experience of sexual pleasure in a way that male circumcision does not; that to the extent male circumcision marks male gendered status in some Western and Middle Eastern contexts, it marks male status as socially superior while female genital modification tends to do the opposite; that even though in both Western and Middle Eastern cultural contexts, women are generally expected to dress more modestly than men, “Western” dress (including when present in Middle Eastern settings) does tend to allow for greater individual expression than the hijab and head covering in places like Saudi Arabia (but also that there are varying degrees of personal expression possible alongside modest dress for women in different Middle Eastern contexts). Such comparison and contrast alone doesn’t indicate superiority or inferiority, but simply that cultures are quite diverse (obviously a long standing anthropological position in its own right) and not equivalent.
Cultural Improvement
What is it that makes a culture better, for example, what makes post-abolition Western culture better than the pre-abolition West? What might make a culture better than it is now? The ability of the individual to autonomously and freely develop their person within the context of the culture is the crucial consideration. In the context of chattel slavery, millions of members of Western culture were clearly in no position to freely develop their lives, experiences, and personhood. The Jim Crow era, with sharecropping arrangements in much of the U.S. Southeast that often functioned as de facto slavery, alongside legal discrimination, was not a vast improvement, but the end of legal enslavement was nonetheless a clear and definite improvement. Racism has clearly not ended today, and so there is plenty of room for improvement for Western culture on this front, but the end of legal discrimination in the U.S. in the context of the civil rights movement was another signal improvement for the culture.
In an earlier post, “Culture, Culture Change, and the Ethics of Cultural Intervention,” I discussed certain aspects of Edward Sapir’s article “Culture: Genuine and Spurious,” namely his discussion of different senses of the word “culture.” In another part of the article, he made a claim for what he called “genuine culture.” By “genuine culture” Sapir meant one which fostered and made possible personal development. Personal development is never completely free – one’s choices are always restricted by the material constraints of one’s historical and cultural circumstances, and one’s operating premises, worldview, and values are highly shaped and influenced by culture, but there are different ways for culture to shape personality and personal development. Sapir used the term “genuine culture” to refer to cultural contexts which influence, channel, or otherwise positively nurture the development of the person, rather than those which greatly restrict personal autonomy or which largely impose forms of discipline and subjectivity upon persons. There are cultural practices in a variety of settings that disturb me. I’ve mentioned chattel slavery and racial discrimination in the history (and in the present in the case of discrimination) of Western culture. Practices like female genital modification in Sudanic Africa or ritualized homosexuality in highland Papuan male initiation also disturb me. What disturbs me in the case of female genital modification is not so much the practice itself, but the absence of consent. Likewise, in the case of ritualized Papuan homosexuality, it is not at all the ritualized homosexuality that bothers me, but, following from the accounts of anthropologists like Gilbert Herdt or Fitz John Porter Poole, its complete involuntariness.
So, what would improve a culture (any culture)? Changes in patterns of cultural practice which have an effect of fostering and nurturing free development of the person to a greater extent than before (again knowing that there’s no such thing as total freedom or total individual autonomy) and lessening restrictions and impositions on personal freedom and autonomy.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Tradition and Individual Autonomy
In an earlier post, “Culture, Culture Change, and the Ethics of Cultural Intervention,” I ended by saying:
“On the one hand, the combination of ethical parsimony, cultural relativism, and the valuation of individuals’ autonomy in many situations leads us anthropologically to simply attempt to describe and understand the context at hand. On the other, when the effective autonomy of individuals is at odds or is compromised (e.g. Philippe Bourgois’ example of Costa Rican plantation workers’ lives being largely shaped by decisions of landowners and managers – an example of individuals having opposed interests, or many examples of imposed female genital modification – an example where one individual’s autonomy is compromised by others for reasons typically seen as being in that person’s interest), then we must either be willing to critique such practices or realize that our lack of critique passively and tacitly accepts the imposition of power on the weaker.”
One first principle I am asserting here follows from the enlightenment tradition and project and emphasizes the sanctity and autonomy of the individual’s freedom to act, within the limits of not violating others’ autonomy, i.e. anyone should be free to do and develop their self as they see fit. As with any first premise, this can’t be “proved,” but is a starting assumption which some will agree with and some will not.
At the same time, as a cultural anthropologist I respect the importance of cultural tradition and the diversity of ways to be human. For that matter, for me a corollary of respect for individual autonomy is a limited sort of cultural relativism, insofar as individuality is largely shaped within a particular cultural context and individual autonomy includes the freedom to practice a particular array of cultural patterned behaviors. When at odds, though, for me the individual always trumps tradition and custom (which is not at all to say that any individual’s autonomy trumps another’s right to the traditions or customs of their choosing, but rather that privileging tradition or the “norm” is to privilege one set of individuals’ autonomy over others).
To the extent that it is anything, tradition is the reification or objectification of the results of multiple individuals’ actions. To imagine tradition as functioning in a determinative or mechanistic way is to simplify and falsify the complexities of social interaction. As Pierre Bourdieu has said (Outline of a Theory of Practice, p. 73), “It is necessary to abandon all theories which explicitly or implicitly treat practice as a mechanical reaction, directly determined by the antecedent conditions and entirely reducible to the mechanical functioning of pre-established assemblies, ‘models’ or ‘roles’…” Further, if culture or tradition are not determinative (and they are not), to imagine tradition as requiring adherence and to value tradition more highly than the individual is to privilege a sort of tyranny of the statistical majority at best, and to privilege the more powerful who have greater control over what counts as tradition or status quo practice.
“On the one hand, the combination of ethical parsimony, cultural relativism, and the valuation of individuals’ autonomy in many situations leads us anthropologically to simply attempt to describe and understand the context at hand. On the other, when the effective autonomy of individuals is at odds or is compromised (e.g. Philippe Bourgois’ example of Costa Rican plantation workers’ lives being largely shaped by decisions of landowners and managers – an example of individuals having opposed interests, or many examples of imposed female genital modification – an example where one individual’s autonomy is compromised by others for reasons typically seen as being in that person’s interest), then we must either be willing to critique such practices or realize that our lack of critique passively and tacitly accepts the imposition of power on the weaker.”
One first principle I am asserting here follows from the enlightenment tradition and project and emphasizes the sanctity and autonomy of the individual’s freedom to act, within the limits of not violating others’ autonomy, i.e. anyone should be free to do and develop their self as they see fit. As with any first premise, this can’t be “proved,” but is a starting assumption which some will agree with and some will not.
At the same time, as a cultural anthropologist I respect the importance of cultural tradition and the diversity of ways to be human. For that matter, for me a corollary of respect for individual autonomy is a limited sort of cultural relativism, insofar as individuality is largely shaped within a particular cultural context and individual autonomy includes the freedom to practice a particular array of cultural patterned behaviors. When at odds, though, for me the individual always trumps tradition and custom (which is not at all to say that any individual’s autonomy trumps another’s right to the traditions or customs of their choosing, but rather that privileging tradition or the “norm” is to privilege one set of individuals’ autonomy over others).
To the extent that it is anything, tradition is the reification or objectification of the results of multiple individuals’ actions. To imagine tradition as functioning in a determinative or mechanistic way is to simplify and falsify the complexities of social interaction. As Pierre Bourdieu has said (Outline of a Theory of Practice, p. 73), “It is necessary to abandon all theories which explicitly or implicitly treat practice as a mechanical reaction, directly determined by the antecedent conditions and entirely reducible to the mechanical functioning of pre-established assemblies, ‘models’ or ‘roles’…” Further, if culture or tradition are not determinative (and they are not), to imagine tradition as requiring adherence and to value tradition more highly than the individual is to privilege a sort of tyranny of the statistical majority at best, and to privilege the more powerful who have greater control over what counts as tradition or status quo practice.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Culture, Culture Change, and the Ethics of Cultural Intervention
In an article from 1958, “The Fox Project” (Human Organization, V. 17, pp. 17-19), Sol Tax both described an applied anthropological project with the Fox Indians of Iowa and laid out the basis for anthropologists’ engaging in processes of culture change in what he called “action anthropology.” Why revisit this almost 50 year old article? Primarily because it lucidly gets at the crux of what applied or action anthropology is about, as well as some of the ethical and value considerations associated with it.
Culture and Culture Change
Tax was clearly aware that in attempting to aid the Fox Indians in the economic development of their community, he and his students were engaging in an intervention into culture and engaging directly in a process of culture change. Recognizing this, he also recognized a need for basic ground rules for such intervention into culture. He writes of the potentials for culture change in the Fox community:
“The two irreducible conditions of community-wide changes are that the new behavior does not require either (1) a loss of Fox identity, or (2) violation of Fox moral beliefs. One takes for granted also that the change is practicably possible – that the new behavior required is understandable and feasible, and that there is some reason, from the point of view of the Indians to make it. Given these two general limitations, we suppose any change is possible.”
Implicitly, a particular sense of “culture” is being used here. Anthropologists and others typically recognize two senses of the word “culture” – one the ethos, manners, mores, and patterns of high culture, the other the sense more typically employed by anthropologists focusing on a total patterned lifeway of a people or population. In an important article, “Culture – Genuine and Spurious,” Edward Sapir noted that there are three important senses in which “culture” is used. He recognized that “culture” in the sense of high culture represented a restricted subset of the sense of culture as a total lifeway in that it represented the lifeway of a particular class context. He also noted, though, that there is another important way in which we used “culture.” As with “high culture,” we often use “culture” in a way more restricted than to refer to all aspects of the total patterned lifeway of a population. In this third sense, we mean the core premises of identity, values, ethos, and worldview and a restricted set of practices taken as “typical” or “essential.” It is typically these elements of the lifeway which are most durable, most valued, or that are the intended reference when people speak of their culture. So, for example, maquiladora factories and Coca-Cola are part of the total lifeway of Mexico today, and thus are part of Mexican culture in one sense of the word, but are not the sorts of things people (Mexican or otherwise) typically intend when speaking of “Mexican culture.”
For Tax or the Fox, behaviors or ideas that were simply part of the total lifeway’s set of practices were readily subject to change without controversy. It was those behaviors and ideas seen as essential to identity and moral beliefs (and I would venture to guess also those seen as essential to ethos and worldview) that were highly cherished and not changeable without controversy. Likewise, in contemporary controversies surrounding cultural description, critique, or intervention and cultural relativism, it is change with regard to those elements of the total patterned lifeway that are locally constructed (on whatever basis – in some cases ethos may be most highly touted, in others certain behaviors, in others elements of the worldview) as “the culture” in this third sense that generate controversy. No one (at least no one I can think of or imagine) is likely to criticize a critique by a non-Mexican of maquiladora factory production in Mexico City or Juarez as an example of cultural imperialism (if anything, such industrial production might be seen as cultural imperialism). A critique of “Mexican Machismo” very well might generate controversy, though.
The ethics of cultural intervention
Tax’s article is also useful in laying out provisional value orientations for engaging in applied anthropology and intervening in a particular cultural context. He lays out three values ideally involved when engaging in cultural intervention (or as he even says, “interference”).
His first value is that of truth. While ascertaining truth is an often formidable task, to value truth as a principle seems to me straightforward and non-controversial (except, perhaps, when it’s not – for example in cases where an anthropologist’s view of truth might stand in opposition to that of those being aided via applied anthropological work).
Tax continues:
“Second, we feel most strongly the value of freedom, as it is classically expressed and limited. Freedom in our context usually means freedom for individuals to choose the group with which to identify and freedom for a community to choose its way of life. We would also be embarrassed if it were shown that we are, for example, encouraging Indians to remain Indians, rather than to become something else, or trying to preserve Indian cultures, when the Indians involved would choose otherwise. All we want in our action programs is to provide, if we can, genuine alternatives from which the people involved can freely choose…”
In other words, Tax held (and I hold) the autonomy of the individual as a fundamental value.
Tax’s third value is what he called a “kind of Law of Parsimony which tells us not to settle questions of values unless they concern us.” This is an important pragmatic principle for operation, where, for example, even though some anthropologists involved in the Fox project felt that assimilation was in the interest of the Fox and others did not, Tax felt that it was inessential for them to decide, and in any case, given the higher valuation placed on the autonomy of Fox individuals, this was not the anthropologists’ decision in any case.
He discusses further the possibility of additional operating principles or premises, but decides against this. He uses the following example:
“People are always asking whether we think cannibals have a right to self-determination. With respect to cannibalism, would we not have to impose some value of our own? Now, I neither eat human flesh, nor like the thought of being eaten; I am revolted as others in our culture by the whole idea. I have no notion what I would do if I found myself involved in an action program on a cannibal isle; I can only think of jokes to say. If I attempt to answer seriously I am beset with all the value contradictions involved in so-called cultural relativism. But whatever my personal position on this, it has no significant bearing on what we should do tomorrow to help the Fox Indians develop more constructive relationships within their community, or with other Iowans.”
Frankly, I’m not sure why this example creates a conundrum, insofar as if one take the valuation of the autonomy of each individual at all seriously, then the autonomy of one person to develop themselves and determine their life to the extent possible (which obviously entails continuing to live) clearly outweighs the autonomy of another to eat them. (If you had a cannibal isle where some really autonomously consented to be eaten, then you’d have a real conundrum.) Still, Tax is right that the ethics of one case don’t really impinge on the ethics of another, so such hypothetical cases are pragmatically beside the point. Recognizing that it is pragmatically and ethically efficacious to avoid making decisions or judgment calls when not necessary, though, doesn’t help in knowing what to do when such decisions cannot be avoided. While anthropologists today are unlikely to have to grapple with the autonomy of cannibals, there are cases in virtually every cultural context where different individuals’ effective autonomy stand at odds and impinge upon one another.
While I find Tax’s article wanting in essentially evading this sort of all too common dilemma, at the same time I find that his three basic values (which are essentially the values of the Enlightenment project) serve us well. On the one hand, the combination of ethical parsimony, cultural relativism, and the valuation of individuals’ autonomy in many situations leads us anthropologically to simply attempt to describe and understand the context at hand. On the other, when the effective autonomy of individuals is at odds or is compromised (e.g. Philippe Bourgois’ example of Costa Rican plantation workers’ lives being largely shaped by decisions of landowners and managers – an example of individuals having opposed interests, or many examples of imposed female genital modification – an example where one individual’s autonomy is compromised by others for reasons typically seen as being in that person’s interest), then we must either be willing to critique such practices or realize that our lack of critique passively and tacitly accepts the imposition of power on the weaker.
Culture and Culture Change
Tax was clearly aware that in attempting to aid the Fox Indians in the economic development of their community, he and his students were engaging in an intervention into culture and engaging directly in a process of culture change. Recognizing this, he also recognized a need for basic ground rules for such intervention into culture. He writes of the potentials for culture change in the Fox community:
“The two irreducible conditions of community-wide changes are that the new behavior does not require either (1) a loss of Fox identity, or (2) violation of Fox moral beliefs. One takes for granted also that the change is practicably possible – that the new behavior required is understandable and feasible, and that there is some reason, from the point of view of the Indians to make it. Given these two general limitations, we suppose any change is possible.”
Implicitly, a particular sense of “culture” is being used here. Anthropologists and others typically recognize two senses of the word “culture” – one the ethos, manners, mores, and patterns of high culture, the other the sense more typically employed by anthropologists focusing on a total patterned lifeway of a people or population. In an important article, “Culture – Genuine and Spurious,” Edward Sapir noted that there are three important senses in which “culture” is used. He recognized that “culture” in the sense of high culture represented a restricted subset of the sense of culture as a total lifeway in that it represented the lifeway of a particular class context. He also noted, though, that there is another important way in which we used “culture.” As with “high culture,” we often use “culture” in a way more restricted than to refer to all aspects of the total patterned lifeway of a population. In this third sense, we mean the core premises of identity, values, ethos, and worldview and a restricted set of practices taken as “typical” or “essential.” It is typically these elements of the lifeway which are most durable, most valued, or that are the intended reference when people speak of their culture. So, for example, maquiladora factories and Coca-Cola are part of the total lifeway of Mexico today, and thus are part of Mexican culture in one sense of the word, but are not the sorts of things people (Mexican or otherwise) typically intend when speaking of “Mexican culture.”
For Tax or the Fox, behaviors or ideas that were simply part of the total lifeway’s set of practices were readily subject to change without controversy. It was those behaviors and ideas seen as essential to identity and moral beliefs (and I would venture to guess also those seen as essential to ethos and worldview) that were highly cherished and not changeable without controversy. Likewise, in contemporary controversies surrounding cultural description, critique, or intervention and cultural relativism, it is change with regard to those elements of the total patterned lifeway that are locally constructed (on whatever basis – in some cases ethos may be most highly touted, in others certain behaviors, in others elements of the worldview) as “the culture” in this third sense that generate controversy. No one (at least no one I can think of or imagine) is likely to criticize a critique by a non-Mexican of maquiladora factory production in Mexico City or Juarez as an example of cultural imperialism (if anything, such industrial production might be seen as cultural imperialism). A critique of “Mexican Machismo” very well might generate controversy, though.
The ethics of cultural intervention
Tax’s article is also useful in laying out provisional value orientations for engaging in applied anthropology and intervening in a particular cultural context. He lays out three values ideally involved when engaging in cultural intervention (or as he even says, “interference”).
His first value is that of truth. While ascertaining truth is an often formidable task, to value truth as a principle seems to me straightforward and non-controversial (except, perhaps, when it’s not – for example in cases where an anthropologist’s view of truth might stand in opposition to that of those being aided via applied anthropological work).
Tax continues:
“Second, we feel most strongly the value of freedom, as it is classically expressed and limited. Freedom in our context usually means freedom for individuals to choose the group with which to identify and freedom for a community to choose its way of life. We would also be embarrassed if it were shown that we are, for example, encouraging Indians to remain Indians, rather than to become something else, or trying to preserve Indian cultures, when the Indians involved would choose otherwise. All we want in our action programs is to provide, if we can, genuine alternatives from which the people involved can freely choose…”
In other words, Tax held (and I hold) the autonomy of the individual as a fundamental value.
Tax’s third value is what he called a “kind of Law of Parsimony which tells us not to settle questions of values unless they concern us.” This is an important pragmatic principle for operation, where, for example, even though some anthropologists involved in the Fox project felt that assimilation was in the interest of the Fox and others did not, Tax felt that it was inessential for them to decide, and in any case, given the higher valuation placed on the autonomy of Fox individuals, this was not the anthropologists’ decision in any case.
He discusses further the possibility of additional operating principles or premises, but decides against this. He uses the following example:
“People are always asking whether we think cannibals have a right to self-determination. With respect to cannibalism, would we not have to impose some value of our own? Now, I neither eat human flesh, nor like the thought of being eaten; I am revolted as others in our culture by the whole idea. I have no notion what I would do if I found myself involved in an action program on a cannibal isle; I can only think of jokes to say. If I attempt to answer seriously I am beset with all the value contradictions involved in so-called cultural relativism. But whatever my personal position on this, it has no significant bearing on what we should do tomorrow to help the Fox Indians develop more constructive relationships within their community, or with other Iowans.”
Frankly, I’m not sure why this example creates a conundrum, insofar as if one take the valuation of the autonomy of each individual at all seriously, then the autonomy of one person to develop themselves and determine their life to the extent possible (which obviously entails continuing to live) clearly outweighs the autonomy of another to eat them. (If you had a cannibal isle where some really autonomously consented to be eaten, then you’d have a real conundrum.) Still, Tax is right that the ethics of one case don’t really impinge on the ethics of another, so such hypothetical cases are pragmatically beside the point. Recognizing that it is pragmatically and ethically efficacious to avoid making decisions or judgment calls when not necessary, though, doesn’t help in knowing what to do when such decisions cannot be avoided. While anthropologists today are unlikely to have to grapple with the autonomy of cannibals, there are cases in virtually every cultural context where different individuals’ effective autonomy stand at odds and impinge upon one another.
While I find Tax’s article wanting in essentially evading this sort of all too common dilemma, at the same time I find that his three basic values (which are essentially the values of the Enlightenment project) serve us well. On the one hand, the combination of ethical parsimony, cultural relativism, and the valuation of individuals’ autonomy in many situations leads us anthropologically to simply attempt to describe and understand the context at hand. On the other, when the effective autonomy of individuals is at odds or is compromised (e.g. Philippe Bourgois’ example of Costa Rican plantation workers’ lives being largely shaped by decisions of landowners and managers – an example of individuals having opposed interests, or many examples of imposed female genital modification – an example where one individual’s autonomy is compromised by others for reasons typically seen as being in that person’s interest), then we must either be willing to critique such practices or realize that our lack of critique passively and tacitly accepts the imposition of power on the weaker.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Cultural Relativism: What is is and What it isn't
The greatest intellectual contributions of the discipline of anthropology to contemporary American society and thought are the concept of culture and the associated notion of cultural relativism. Both have a long history within the discipline, but as with any concepts originating in a particular academic discipline and then escaping into the larger culture, they have moved beyond the control of anthropologists. That said, anthropologists (such as myself) are as free as anyone to attempt to influence the development and understanding of such concepts within that broader culture.
In its original conception, cultural relativism was developed by Franz Boas and his students in the early 20th century. Cultural relativism involves first the recognition of and respect for the importance of alternative cultural constructions of the world and the acknowledgment that there is no universal way to be a human being. Secondly, it involves a provisional suspension of ethical or moral judgment about the practices of other cultures and an impetus to understand cultural practices within their own terms or logic.
I would argue that there was both a pragmatic and an ethical motivation for the development of cultural relativism. Pragmatically, cultural relativism allows for better anthropological research. A non-judgmental attitude in research allows for an easier establishment of the rapport necessary to conduct high quality ethnographic work. The attempt to understand cultures within the terms of their own logic leads to a more refined understanding of cultural variability and possibility. As Janice Boddy has written concerning female genital modification (or female genital mutilation if you prefer that terminology) in Sudan, no matter what your moral or ethical position on the topic, the starting point should be cultural relativism. If you are interested in the topic neutrally as simply a subject of anthropological curiosity, then you need to approach it non-judgmentally and attempt to understand the practice on its own terms and within the logical of the cultural context. If you find the practice abhorrent or repellent and wish to alter the practice, you still need first to understand the practice on its own terms in order to have any hope of understanding the practical possibilities for change.
Boas was not out to change cultures (at least not in general – though his writings on race were attempts to intellectually engage racism, expose its absurdity, and contribute to changing it). Still, there was an ethical component to cultural relativism. Much earlier American anthropological work had been notoriously racist and ethnocentric in its approach (and obviously anthropological work in parts of Europe, like Nazi Germany, remained racist for quite some time into the 20th century), and the emphasis on not judging other cultures was an important counter to this. That said, this does not mean that he thought that cultural practices should be held beyond reproach or criticism simply because they were traditional practices of one or another culture. Boas stood for the importance of clarity and logic, whether applied to western culture and the exposure of racism as illogical and counter-factual, or to any other culture. Boas emphasized the equal capacity for logic and illogic cross-culturally.
As Marshall Sahlins has recently noted in Waiting for Foucault, Still:
“Cultural relativism is first and last an interpretive anthropological – that is to say, methodological – procedure. It is not the moral argument that any culture or custom is as good as any other, if not better. Relativism is the simple prescription that, in order to be intelligible, other people’s practices and ideals must be placed in their own historical context, understood as positional values in the field of their own cultural relationships rather than appreciated by categorical and moral judgments of our making. Relativity is the provisional suspension of one’s own judgments in order to situate the practices at issue in the historical and cultural order that made them possible. It is in no other way a matter of advocacy.”
The most important contribution of the idea of cultural relativism has no doubt been the notion that all cultures are worthy of respect. Contrary to what Boas intended, cultural relativism is often invoked to support the notion that because something is a traditional practice of another culture one can’t criticize or critique it. This is analogous to suggesting that no one outside the U.S. Southeast could criticize the racist practices of the Jim Crow era South (an argument at the time made mainly by Southern white racists).
There are a number of problems with this conception of cultural relativism. First, it’s based on a faulty notion of clear and distinct cultures. This is a notion that has been long outmoded in anthropology. Even when anthropologists did model cultures as if they were discrete and bounded entities, it’s clear from close readings of most early 20th century anthropological texts that these anthropologists were well aware that they were treating culture as a model, as a useful fiction that contributed to greater understanding of cultural processes. But that model has long since outlived its usefulness.
The model of clear and distinct cultures has outlived its usefulness on the grounds of both theoretical utility and empirical reality. At a time when the discipline of anthropology was still establishing a cross-cultural ethnological baseline and developing its fundamental concepts, this model was useful in helping to simplify matters so that these two goals could be accomplished. Once the basic data sets and concepts of the discipline were established, however, this simplifying model of discrete cultures was no longer necessary, and models which dealt with cultural processes in a more complex way became more interesting and meaningful.
Further, throughout the 19th and into the 20th century, it was the case that many cultures were relatively bounded and discrete entities. The social life of Australian aborigines was largely Australian aboriginal; though the Kwakiutl potlatch was modified in some details of practice by both the introduction of new trade goods and the demographic consequences of European disease in the 19th century, it remained an overwhelmingly Kwakiutl sort of thing; many tropical South American societies led ways of life largely untouched by European or Euro-American influence (even though metal tools, sugar cane, and rice might have been introduced). Even though cultures were never clear and separate entities, up through the early 20th century, imagining them to be so simply simplified matters. But today, with an expanding global economy, global media, and global flows of people, it is impossible to clearly delineate one culture from another culture, and such a model doesn’t just simplify but distorts matters.
There is no clear cut “other culture,” no “them” that has not been profoundly influenced by western culture (and for that matter a variety of other cultural traditions as well – as Arjun Appadurai has discussed, while western liberals may fret [perhaps with good reason] about global westernization, the Papuan residents of Irian Jaya are more likely to be concerned about Javanization). Further, there is no clear “us”. For example, if I speak of “we” anthropologists, who am I talking about? North American and Western European scholars’ voices have been most clearly represented (and as is common to add, it has been mainly white, male, heterosexual, middle and upper class voices at that), but in my own thinking about cultural relativism and global cultural processes, I have been profoundly influenced by scholars such as the Argentine-Mexican Néstor García Canclini (like myself a Euro-American, but not North or Anglo American) or scholars from South Asia or of South Asian ancestry like Appadurai, and increasingly anthropological discourse has been the product not just of western voices, but Indian and Japanese and “indigenous” voices. Like it or not, we’re involved in global social interactions, and while we can and should refrain from rushing to judgment of other people’s practices, we can’t refrain from interacting with other people and affecting (or being affected by) them. As the notion of cultural boundaries between a “them” and an “us” becomes more and more farcical, it becomes equally farcical to think that “we” for some reason can’t or shouldn’t critically engage “them.”
Second, the refusal to critique the practices of other cultures is not without effect. To refrain from active engagement is to passively accept the status quo, and the status quo in any cultural context is the product of interactions in social settings laden with power relations. Refraining from active engagement is not to be neutral but to privilege the powerful over the weaker.
Finally, cultural relativism, when taken to imply a taboo on cross cultural critique, implies pessimism about the possibility of cross-cultural communication. It is in any case a taboo on cross cultural critical dialogue. Cultural relativism is a crucial means to avoid rushing to judgment of different practices and to foster respect for diversity and autonomy, but we are enmeshed in a global system in which we are always interacting with others. We need to foster critical dialogue cross-culturally, which depends on both respect and the willingness to critique (both ourselves and others) and be critiqued.
In its original conception, cultural relativism was developed by Franz Boas and his students in the early 20th century. Cultural relativism involves first the recognition of and respect for the importance of alternative cultural constructions of the world and the acknowledgment that there is no universal way to be a human being. Secondly, it involves a provisional suspension of ethical or moral judgment about the practices of other cultures and an impetus to understand cultural practices within their own terms or logic.
I would argue that there was both a pragmatic and an ethical motivation for the development of cultural relativism. Pragmatically, cultural relativism allows for better anthropological research. A non-judgmental attitude in research allows for an easier establishment of the rapport necessary to conduct high quality ethnographic work. The attempt to understand cultures within the terms of their own logic leads to a more refined understanding of cultural variability and possibility. As Janice Boddy has written concerning female genital modification (or female genital mutilation if you prefer that terminology) in Sudan, no matter what your moral or ethical position on the topic, the starting point should be cultural relativism. If you are interested in the topic neutrally as simply a subject of anthropological curiosity, then you need to approach it non-judgmentally and attempt to understand the practice on its own terms and within the logical of the cultural context. If you find the practice abhorrent or repellent and wish to alter the practice, you still need first to understand the practice on its own terms in order to have any hope of understanding the practical possibilities for change.
Boas was not out to change cultures (at least not in general – though his writings on race were attempts to intellectually engage racism, expose its absurdity, and contribute to changing it). Still, there was an ethical component to cultural relativism. Much earlier American anthropological work had been notoriously racist and ethnocentric in its approach (and obviously anthropological work in parts of Europe, like Nazi Germany, remained racist for quite some time into the 20th century), and the emphasis on not judging other cultures was an important counter to this. That said, this does not mean that he thought that cultural practices should be held beyond reproach or criticism simply because they were traditional practices of one or another culture. Boas stood for the importance of clarity and logic, whether applied to western culture and the exposure of racism as illogical and counter-factual, or to any other culture. Boas emphasized the equal capacity for logic and illogic cross-culturally.
As Marshall Sahlins has recently noted in Waiting for Foucault, Still:
“Cultural relativism is first and last an interpretive anthropological – that is to say, methodological – procedure. It is not the moral argument that any culture or custom is as good as any other, if not better. Relativism is the simple prescription that, in order to be intelligible, other people’s practices and ideals must be placed in their own historical context, understood as positional values in the field of their own cultural relationships rather than appreciated by categorical and moral judgments of our making. Relativity is the provisional suspension of one’s own judgments in order to situate the practices at issue in the historical and cultural order that made them possible. It is in no other way a matter of advocacy.”
The most important contribution of the idea of cultural relativism has no doubt been the notion that all cultures are worthy of respect. Contrary to what Boas intended, cultural relativism is often invoked to support the notion that because something is a traditional practice of another culture one can’t criticize or critique it. This is analogous to suggesting that no one outside the U.S. Southeast could criticize the racist practices of the Jim Crow era South (an argument at the time made mainly by Southern white racists).
There are a number of problems with this conception of cultural relativism. First, it’s based on a faulty notion of clear and distinct cultures. This is a notion that has been long outmoded in anthropology. Even when anthropologists did model cultures as if they were discrete and bounded entities, it’s clear from close readings of most early 20th century anthropological texts that these anthropologists were well aware that they were treating culture as a model, as a useful fiction that contributed to greater understanding of cultural processes. But that model has long since outlived its usefulness.
The model of clear and distinct cultures has outlived its usefulness on the grounds of both theoretical utility and empirical reality. At a time when the discipline of anthropology was still establishing a cross-cultural ethnological baseline and developing its fundamental concepts, this model was useful in helping to simplify matters so that these two goals could be accomplished. Once the basic data sets and concepts of the discipline were established, however, this simplifying model of discrete cultures was no longer necessary, and models which dealt with cultural processes in a more complex way became more interesting and meaningful.
Further, throughout the 19th and into the 20th century, it was the case that many cultures were relatively bounded and discrete entities. The social life of Australian aborigines was largely Australian aboriginal; though the Kwakiutl potlatch was modified in some details of practice by both the introduction of new trade goods and the demographic consequences of European disease in the 19th century, it remained an overwhelmingly Kwakiutl sort of thing; many tropical South American societies led ways of life largely untouched by European or Euro-American influence (even though metal tools, sugar cane, and rice might have been introduced). Even though cultures were never clear and separate entities, up through the early 20th century, imagining them to be so simply simplified matters. But today, with an expanding global economy, global media, and global flows of people, it is impossible to clearly delineate one culture from another culture, and such a model doesn’t just simplify but distorts matters.
There is no clear cut “other culture,” no “them” that has not been profoundly influenced by western culture (and for that matter a variety of other cultural traditions as well – as Arjun Appadurai has discussed, while western liberals may fret [perhaps with good reason] about global westernization, the Papuan residents of Irian Jaya are more likely to be concerned about Javanization). Further, there is no clear “us”. For example, if I speak of “we” anthropologists, who am I talking about? North American and Western European scholars’ voices have been most clearly represented (and as is common to add, it has been mainly white, male, heterosexual, middle and upper class voices at that), but in my own thinking about cultural relativism and global cultural processes, I have been profoundly influenced by scholars such as the Argentine-Mexican Néstor García Canclini (like myself a Euro-American, but not North or Anglo American) or scholars from South Asia or of South Asian ancestry like Appadurai, and increasingly anthropological discourse has been the product not just of western voices, but Indian and Japanese and “indigenous” voices. Like it or not, we’re involved in global social interactions, and while we can and should refrain from rushing to judgment of other people’s practices, we can’t refrain from interacting with other people and affecting (or being affected by) them. As the notion of cultural boundaries between a “them” and an “us” becomes more and more farcical, it becomes equally farcical to think that “we” for some reason can’t or shouldn’t critically engage “them.”
Second, the refusal to critique the practices of other cultures is not without effect. To refrain from active engagement is to passively accept the status quo, and the status quo in any cultural context is the product of interactions in social settings laden with power relations. Refraining from active engagement is not to be neutral but to privilege the powerful over the weaker.
Finally, cultural relativism, when taken to imply a taboo on cross cultural critique, implies pessimism about the possibility of cross-cultural communication. It is in any case a taboo on cross cultural critical dialogue. Cultural relativism is a crucial means to avoid rushing to judgment of different practices and to foster respect for diversity and autonomy, but we are enmeshed in a global system in which we are always interacting with others. We need to foster critical dialogue cross-culturally, which depends on both respect and the willingness to critique (both ourselves and others) and be critiqued.
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