Inculturation is that process?

The majority of the world's population dreams of travel, adventure, rich life experience. Strange as it may seem, it is necessary to have a certain "preparation" for dreams to come true. It's not enough to have a passport or tickets in your pocket - there are a lot of other parameters that should be taken into account. One of them can be called inculturation.

What is the point?

In general terms, inculturation is the process of teaching a particular person to the cultural norms of behavior and perceptions of a particular country or nation.

In fact, this is one of the main activities needed not only for travel, but also for personal development. For example, some gestures and words in the cultures of different nationalities can significantly differ in meaning. Without the necessary knowledge, one can unintentionally offend the interlocutor and lose his trust forever. The process of inculturation in this case acts as a kind of fuse against embarrassing situations that a person can easily face while staying abroad or even in his own country.

Narrowing the value

In the previous paragraph, the process of inculturation was described in the most generalized form. To join this kind of training, a person does not need to collect suitcases and buy tickets to Asian countries. Inculturation is, rather, a process of understanding one's own culture. In this case, we mean the peculiarities of the norms of behavior and worldview in one's native country. This is a kind of personality formation within a specific society, taking into account the experience, traditions and cultural tendencies that he has acquired.

Subject-object relations

It should be noted that the process of inculturation is a two-way phenomenon. It combines multidirectional vectors. Personality as a representative of a particular society has a certain impact on culture. At the same time, in the process of maturing and becoming a person, it is the society and its cultural norms that determine the formation of the individual.

Components of training

Specifically, the process of inculturation includes a number of factors necessary to determine the personality as a representative of a particular society, a certain nationality. First of all, these are some general human, basic skills, characteristic for all the bearers of a particular culture. These include behavioral features, reactions to certain verbal or non-verbal acts, awareness of certain values, ways of behavior in specific situations.

By and large, the concept of inculturation with respect to understanding the characteristics of the worldview in other countries includes about the same number of factors, with the only difference that the process takes place more naturally on the territory of one's own country.

In fact, a person within his own country simply does not have a choice in the matter of familiarizing with culture. Since childhood he has come across her, absorbs it and accumulates his whole life.

With the comprehension of the culture of other countries, things are, of course, more complicated: this requires considerably more time, physical, emotional and mental expenses, since our own worldview is not only supplemented, but also completely modified.

Contents of the concept

For a full understanding of the essence of the term, small conclusions must be made to the whole of the foregoing. Inculturation is the acquisition of a complex of knowledge, skills and skills related to the life-support process within a particular culture. In this case, we mean not only professional activities, but also domestic work, the receipt and use of various services and goods. One of the most important moments in the process of inculturation can be called personal development of a person: his view of the world, his attitude towards him, the formation of his favorite occupations, preferences in art forms, ways of leisure or, for example, views on religion.

Of course, inculturation is also the acquisition of communication skills with the surrounding society, interaction with it. In this case, we mean any form of communication between an individual and the surrounding world.

Finally, it is the formation of a definite basis of knowledge and norms regarding the treatment of one's own body, appearance or clothing. Consider, for example, those tribes in which it is customary to put on the necks of women's rings. Within the framework of a specific society, this kind of actions will be regarded as absolutely normal, while in the rest of the world this will be considered a kind of violent measure and will cause condemnation.

Socialization and Inculturation

At first glance, the meaning of these two terms may seem, if not identical, at least very similar. In reality, they differ quite significantly. Socialization and inculturation are a kind of complementary processes, which basically have one main purpose, but they go through different scenarios. There is quite a big difference in the scope of these concepts.

This difference is especially noticeable if inculturation is a process of studying one's own or another's culture. Socialization in this case will act as a so-called teaching of the norms of conduct of the country. Culturalization, inculturation is an introduction to traditions, world outlook, peculiarities of thinking of representatives of foreign cultures, awareness and acceptance of their values.

The process of socialization always passes quickly and quite naturally. It does not require any additional effort and can be based on simple observation. All that is required of a person is the ability to notice certain characteristics of behavior and to repeat them in practice.

Inculturation in cultural studies provides for a considerably greater time cost, and quite often requires additional efforts necessary for independent study of one or another peculiarity of culture.

Socialization and inculturation of personality, as already mentioned, go in parallel, but lead to different results.

Basic mechanisms of inculturation

As in the case of socialization, the main way to assimilate cultural traditions is to imitate, repeat after the bearers of culture. A vivid example of such actions is the behavior of people far from the rules of etiquette during the banquet. In order not to appear uncultured, they simply do the same thing as the rest, more knowledgeable in this matter people.

Mechanisms of inculturation, in essence, are quite simple: observation and repetition. And this applies not only to basic concepts like norms of behavior in society, but also more fundamental phenomena: the inheritance of festive traditions, the memorization of welcome or common expressions, and the appeal to folklore material.

The only obstacle to the person on the road to full inculturation can be his indecisiveness and fear of making a mistake, and this leads to isolation and unwillingness even to try to join one or another culture.

Socialization and inculturation require the use of one more method - direct dialogue with the bearer of culture. In this case, we are talking about the fact that a person who has sufficient knowledge, becomes a mentor who wants to join this or that culture. It should be noted that this does not necessarily have to be a specific person who will introduce the necessary knowledge into the head of the trainee. In this case, it is the process of dialogue, the interpretation of certain rules, that is fundamental. This can be done by family members, tour guides or ordinary passers-by.

If we talk about the fundamental differences between inculturation and socialization, we should note the difference in the results obtained. Socialization is the process of becoming and developing in a society, as a result of which a person becomes a person. Inkulturation is the process of fusion with the culture of society, and as a result - the formation of an intelligent personality.

Types of inculturation

Before talking about the specific stages of the process of inculturation, certain amendments must be made: the culture can be comprehended. In this case, the process will develop according to one scenario - let's call it internal inculturation. A similar but not identical process - the comprehension of cultural traditions of other countries - is the so-called external inculturation.

Process Features

Internal inculturation is divided into two stages: primary and secondary. This process begins almost from the birth of the child. Since childhood, parents, family members, educators, teachers instill in children certain norms of behavior, awareness of phenomena, attitude to life and so on. Thus, from the very childhood the person becomes on a way of comprehension of culture of the people.

The second stage is adult awareness. It requires the application of certain efforts - a person no longer absorbs like a sponge of knowledge and sensation, he himself comes to them, discovers them for himself. It can be said, this is a kind of improvement, expansion of the framework. Thus, it can be said that the concept of inculturation includes at once two similar but not identical plans.

Maximum accuracy

To fully concretize the meaning of the concept, it should be noted that inculturation in cultural studies is a process of comprehending the culture of its people. Accession to other cultures in science is called acculturation. Nevertheless, many researchers do not make such striking differences and use one term, concretizing its meaning.

Results of inculturation

Naturally, the constant comprehension of certain norms by a person leads to certain results. First of all, it is the belonging to a particular culture that largely shapes the personality. In addition, this process has no beginning or end, so the process of parents' inculturation provides a similar process for children, which facilitates the transfer of historical memory, cultural norms and factors of the formation of a certain nationality. This is an endless process of preserving and improving the culture of the country and the people.

It is the process of inculturation that allows a person to get something that will separate him from the rest of the world, make him special. That is why Chinese culture is so different from the American one, that's why the dates of Christmas celebrations differ among Catholics and Orthodox, and Muslims do not exist at all.

Inculturation is an endless accumulation of the experience of an entire nation through the prism of just one individual, absorbing the most important, most fundamental features of one's own culture. It is a constant accumulation, transmission and addition of a knowledge base and ideas about life, the world, God, surrounding society, history, literature and other realities.

It can be said that inculturation is the process of becoming a person in a person, identified as a part of the people.