Self-Awareness Question: Culture

[ysabetwordsmith]

Folks have mentioned an interest in questions and conversations that make them think. So I've decided to offer more of those. This is the current list on self-awareness.

74. Do you feel connected to your culture?

Define "my" and "culture."  

If "my" simply means "standing in" then usually no.  If "my" means "feeling a sense of belonging" then the question is circular.

If "culture" means the wider society, then no.  I have little in common with the mainstream and almost no tolerance left for it.  If "culture" means "any cohesive group of people" then I have an affinity for various cultures.  I have connections with queer, Pagan, fannish, and various other subcultures.  My heritage cultures include Irish, African, and Native American.  Dreamwidth is kind of a culture, and my own audience is certainly a distinct group within that.

Comments

[cmcmck]

My heritage includes English, Welsh, Scottish, Latvian Jewish, Italian, Breton and Romani.

I suppose being trans is 'cultural' too and that can certainly exclude some of us from mainstream 'culture' as a result.

So as you say, it's a matter of definition!

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> My heritage includes English, Welsh, Scottish, Latvian Jewish, Italian, Breton and Romani. <<

Wow, that's an exciting collection!

>> I suppose being trans is 'cultural' too and that can certainly exclude some of us from mainstream 'culture' as a result. <<

It is cultural. Transfolk have developed a cohesive culture over the last, hmm, not quite century in America -- plus of course bits of trans appearances as far back as recorded history goes. I weird out a lot of genderqueer people because I am aware of that depth in ways most of them just aren't, so I never bought into the modern binary. It always seemed obviously stupid to me when there were so many other options. But I have managed to tip some folks to everything from the widely assorted Native American two-spirits to the galaturri and kurgarri of sand-lost Sumer. You never know what'll stick.

>> So as you say, it's a matter of definition! <<

I tend to lean anthropological in my definitions of culture, art, etc. This is not usually what other people have in mind.

Re: Thoughts

[(Anonymous)]

>>It is cultural.<<

A separate system of existing in the world that is transmitted down through generations = culture.

Although, this did make me wonder: could different genders be said to have different cultures (despite being all mashed together in wider society) and if so might this explain why we're always seeming to bicker like disgruntled sports rivals? Or conversely, why it's easier to get along with folk who are stepping out of typical gender roles or traveling across wider (not-gender) cultural lines?

>>I tend to lean anthropological in my definitions of culture, art, etc. <<

Well, most people have the "I speyshul!" coding in their mental software...which perhaps explains some of the rudeness and general whatever in society lately. Or since the invention of writing. Which is still comparatively recent, against 2mil years...

Odd thought: If anthropology is the study of human societies, what would the study of nonhuman societies / sapient societies be? Xenoanthropology? Sapioanthropology?

For that matter, does one even need to be sapient to have a society [social insects]?

[arlie]

Like you, I ask "which culture would that be"? I'm still in many ways more connected to Canadian left wing intellectuals of British origin, circa 1960, this being my early childhood, then I am to anything on offer today.

My culture of choice was geek/nerd culture, but these days that's been replaced in many domains with varying mixes of "wanna get rich quick" and "look how big a dick I haveam. And when that's not the problem, it's invaded with demands to make it comfortable for every stereotypical demographic group under the sun, except the group that founded it. (Need to get rid of all that inherently offensive autistic behaviour; after all, the most useful tool for engineering is "social skills".)

Most commonly though, I feel too old to be accepted as part of any current culture. No tools that are easy for me to use; everything has to be up to the minute - those of us who want something else simply can't purchase it. People insisting that if I die of covid, it doesn't matter, because the average old person who dies of covid would have died within 2 years anyway, and those would have been low QALY years. And besides, the person opining this desperately wants to party, and that need is far more important than the safety of any post-breeder, or non-breeder of post-breeding age. (I'm 63 for the record - looked like about a 1% chance of dying if I got it, when those particular educated opinions seemed to be all over the net.)

And then there was neo-pagan culture, from which I ran screaming about 20 years ago, after giving it about a 30 year run.

Perhaps if I have a culture now, it's remnants of Enlightenment culture, minus the roughly simultaneous self-congratulating racism.

OTOH, maybe I'm just writing from the depressed side of my mind, before taking my morning head meds, and while feeling overall crappy from illness. I'm not always this bummed out ;-(