President Wood's Newspaper Column

back

The Importance of Culture
Dr. Gerald E. Wood, Ed.D. President
(Published in The Crescent-News, December 2, 2007)

One of the fathers of sociology, Max Weber once observed, “. . . man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun.  I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.”

So if we were to try and understand those webs of significance we weave, perhaps we can make meaning out of the cultural life we share together, since all cultural experience is social.  A web consists of thousands of strands intricately woven together.  If you think of a spider web shimmering in the light of morning and then every strand set to vibrating as a droplet of dew is captured on one side of the web ,you may have a metaphorical sense for how our shared experience creates mutual cultural meaning.

Is our cultural experience in the Midwest, or specifically Northwest Ohio, different than say that of people In the Northeast?  We must be careful with generalizations too far afield but there are strands in this culture different than those of the collective experience in many parts of the Northeast.  We Midwesterners place a high priority on politeness, being friendly and respectful.  Not unlike many Asian cultures, even when doing business we want to be assured the other party feels a comfortable connection to us and thinks of us as reasonable, decent, friendly people. 

During a recent trip to China, any business that I wanted to conduct with local Chinese officials or educators began with a wonderful banquet, little talk of business, and pleasant exchanges divulging some tidbits of who we were as people.  This practice of hospitality has become ritualized in China and its purpose clear – we must first come to trust on another to some degree before negotiating.  And yes, the Chinese are very skilled negotiators.  Does it surprise you that our Northwest Ohio cultural web in this regard has real similarities to the Chinese?  Having lived In the U.S. Northeast, I can tell you urban or rural New Englanders tend to believe such rituals of friendship are not as necessary as getting to the point and not wasting time.  As a child growing up in New Hampshire I found many people abrupt.  As a young person coming from another culture it took time for me to realize there was no ill intent in what I considered rude behavior.  A kind of stoic check of personal emotions interacting with others was valued. 

Fredric Roberts, a cultural photographer, presented his work to a group of people at Defiance College recently.  Roberts, after having been a successful financier working with mega-mergers in this country and around the world, described how he woke up to the fact that he “just didn’t have it in him to do one more merger.”  He wanted out, and he began a search for meaning in his life by taking forays all over Asia living among and photographing traditional societies less affected by “progress and modernization” than most.   I was impressed at how much genuine respect he had for the cultures he encountered that were so vastly different than the high powered, profit-driven material culture that had made him an extremely wealthy man.  As he described Hindu societies and Buddhist villages where he worked hard to adopt their cultural ways, he discovered strands of his own cultural web vibrated strongly to the realization that the high value placed on material wealth by our society does not bring happiness or fulfillment.  He described time and again meeting people living on a subsistence level who in their cultural web of meaning, often including strong family or tribe ties, were genuinely happy and living fulfilled meaningful lives.            

It is imperative in a global age where we are more likely than not to encounter other cultures, even cultural differences within the United States with its regional, racial/ethnic diversity, that we examine our own web as we open ourselves to learning what the meaning-webs of other cultures are about.  It has been my experience that becoming more aware of my own rituals, symbols, and values I have assimilated, and then working to understand and appreciate those of others’ culture, enriches my cultural experience and informs my life in a meaningful way.