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Sociocultural level of analysis

What is culture?

Starter activity

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Access the questionnaire on cultural intelligence at http://blog.global-dynamics.com/test-your-cultural-intelligence-0/

Complete as whole class exercise or individually.

Points for discussion

1. How many questions were you confident you knew the answers to?

2. How much did you rely on ‘common knowledge’ or cultural stereotypes to answer questions?

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Elements of culture

Triandis (1980) distinguishes between objective and subjective elements of culture:

• Objective aspects of culture are physical things such as clothing, food, music and buildings. These are fairly obvious.

• Subjective aspects of culture are cultural practices including beliefs, values and shared ideas. These cannot be seen but they exert powerful influences on behaviour.

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Command words: The language of the learning outcomes

• Define the terms culture and cultural norms.

• Examine the role of two cultural dimensions on behaviour (for example individualism/ collectivism, power/distance).

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Activity: Exploring culture

Culture refers to the shared habits of a community and cultural norms are rules which regulate behaviour within a particular culture.

1. Describe in detail one ‘shared habit’ of your cultural group (for example, celebration of a festival, with its associated food, rituals, ceremonies).

2. Identify one or more cultural rules in your example that you would explain to a ‘cultural stranger’ before inviting them to join you.

Hofstede’s cultural classification model

Hofstede distinguished four dimensions by which cultures vary:

1. In individualistic cultures personal identity (e.g. career choice, choice of partner) is viewed as a matter of choice. In collectivist cultures, the wider social group (notably the family) have a far greater influence and identity is largely defined by roles and relationships.

2. Masculine cultures value attributes such as achievement, independence and competition. Feminine cultures value caring and co-operation.

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Hofstede’s cultural classification modelContinued

3. In ‘power’ cultures, unequal relationships are tolerated or accepted even by those low down in the social hierarchy. Business organisations and families are strongly hierarchical. ‘Distance’ cultures value equality in business and family relationships.

4. Uncertainty avoidance cultures are those in which risk taking is largely disapproved of.

5. A fifth dimension time orientation was added later.

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Activity

1. Working in a pair, discuss your own culture with reference to each of Hofstede’s 5 dimensions.

2. Try to identify where you would place your culture.

3. Compare your answers with the rest of the class.