The Importance of Cultural Relativism.
This is an essay I wrote for my Cultural Anthropology Class. While it is focused on the importance of cultural relativism, it also equally reflects the importance of striving to understand other people's different points of view and outlooks of life, including those who are from the "same culture."
When I first came to the United States to study and told other people that I come from Spain, many people directly mentioned how outrageous the Spanish tradition of bullfighting is. “I can’t believe the Spanish kill bulls for entertainment. That’s inexcusable!” I often heard. But “don’t Americans do the same?” I then asked. We do not need to eat beef to survive; however, Americans, just like many others, kill bulls for the meat, for the taste. Thus, it could be argued that they kill bulls for “entertainment,” just like the Spanish do. This cultural clash gave me a sense of the importance of cultural relativism: “the principle that all cultural systems are inherently equal in value, and therefore, that each cultural item must be understood on its own terms” (ACA: Glossary). To be a cultural relativist, however, does not mean that we necessarily need to agree with other cultures; it means that we have to engage with them, to understand them in their own particular context. It is only by doing so that we are able to make the right ethical judgments and calls, and to even be able to succeed at changing other cultural systems. Cultural relativism is in this way an important first step that needs to be taken before deciding whether or how to take action to change or improve a culture.
Throughout the years, scholars have struggled to agree on a concrete definition and on the benefits of cultural relativism. According to Rosaldo, for example, cultural relativism is merely “the urgency of studying and learning from other cultures and the belief that because somebody has a different form of life, they’re not deranged, or evil” (2000:3). In the case of bullfighting, for example, Americans and others view it as a mere act of animal cruelty, which would make them think of the Spanish as evil people. But if they studied what Spaniards’ own take on bullfighting is, they would maybe come to understand that the reason why Spaniards agree to such an act is because they regard the act in a very different way. For them, bullfighting is not an inhuman act of animal cruelty or a sport; for Spaniards, it is a form of art, a beautiful image that pits matador and bull in a unifying image of power, courage and glory. What cultural relativism thus tells us is that bullfighting must be viewed from the perspective of the culture in which it takes place – its history, its folklore, its ideas of bravery, its ideas of sex roles. By doing so, we are at the same time reminded that not only do others have culture, but “we” do have culture too. In this way, as Rosaldo well stated, “some things we do and take for granted can inspire other people's abhorrence” (2000:6). While Americans might find killing bulls for the act of bullfighting unconceivable, at the same time Hindus might feel disgusted by the idea that Americans kill cows and bulls to eat their meat, since in Hinduism the cow is revered as the source of food and symbol of life and may never be killed.
Cultural relativism thus calls us to understand, but we must remember that “to understand is not to forgive. Just because you come to terms with how something works in another culture does not mean you have to agree with it” (Rosaldo 2000:5). Unlike what Abu-Lughod claims, cultural relativism need not necessarily mean that we must respect whatever goes on elsewhere as “just their culture and not my business to judge or interfere, only to try to understand” (2013:136). Cultural relativism is not meant to be a way of justifying ideas or ideologies such as Nazism, by claiming that these should just be understood as cultural. However, to look through the lens of cultural relativism is the first thing we need to do before allowing for any kind of critique or action to change a cultural system.
Abu-Lughod criticizes the concept of cultural relativism because she claims that to merely understand others’ beliefs, values and practices is not enough. As she argues, we must also examine our own responsibilities to change situations in which others find themselves and interfere when we believe is necessary (2013:137). However, to change a culture’s notions and beliefs is often a very difficult task because, as Rosaldo explains, our own imagination is limited by the culture we have grown up in. However, “if we actually go elsewhere and look at what other people do, we can expand our world and challenge our own notions” (Rosaldo 2000:4). As Geertz argues, humans are “unfinished animals,” by which he means that we are not genetically programmed to do what we do, and the way we humans finish ourselves is through culture (1973:49). But, as Geertz claims, all “our ideas, values, acts, emotions are cultural products, products manufactured” (1973:50).
In conclusion, our culture is a product we ourselves have created, and that is thus constantly changing. This means that we are in fact capable of modifying those beliefs, values and practices. We are capable of changing a culture, and of ultimately changing men, since “culture provides the link between what men are intrinsically capable of becoming and what they actually in fact become” (Geertz 1973:52). Thus, it would be possible to change beliefs about, for example, bullfighting, in different directions: Spaniards might start to view bullfighting as an act of animal cruelty, while Americans could also change their ideas to now regard it as a form of fine art. In either way, by changing such notions, we are at the same time changing the people and the cultures behind them.
However, in determining whether and how to change a culture, it is crucial to be a cultural relativist first. We must first move away from our ethnocentric ideas and try to study and understand that culture in its own terms, "recognizing and respecting differences—precisely as products of different histories, as expressions of different circumstances, and as manifestations of differently structured desires" (Abu-Lughod).
We need to accept the fact that we may differ from other cultures in our ideas, wants and needs in order to not get lost far enough into our ethnocentrism to think of our Western values and standards as universals that we must impose on to other cultures in order to "improve" their societies.
The reason for the major importance of being a cultural relativist before taking any type of action is that if we fail to do so, we may not succeed at changing the culture or, even worse, we might change the culture in a way that does more harm than good. Abu-Lughod, in her article “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?” gives a clear example of such a case. In her article, she explains how Western people assumed that Afghan women needed to be liberated from the Taliban, believing that the ultimate sign of their oppression was that they were forced to wear the burqa (2013:135). Consequently, in trying to “liberate” them and provide them with better lives, they started all kinds of actions to “unveil” these women. However, Westerners failed to understand that Afghan women have different notions of veiling from them. While Westerners may consider women covering themselves as a sign of their ‘unfreedom,’ for the Afghan women it is often regarded as the opposite: as “a liberating invention because it enabled women to move out of segregated living spaces while still observing the basic moral requirements of separating and protecting women from unrelated men” (Abu-Lughod 2013:135). The Western people failed to be cultural relativists first, and thus focused on the wrong things, which ultimately resulted in Afghan women’s increased hardship, instead of in their salvation. They had to “be aware of differences, respectful of other paths toward social change that might give women better lives” (Abu-Lughod 2013:137). Even before that, they needed to understand the Afghan culture in its own context and ask whether Afghan women even have any desire for liberation or more freedom.
Cultural relativism must thus always be taken into serious consideration and be regarded as the first necessary step in order to make the right judgments or changes to a culture. Had the Western people closely observed and understood Afghan culture from a cultural relativist’s perspective first, maybe Afghan women would now be living better lives.
