Do you know what anthropology is? You’re not alone if you don’t! As an anthropology major, I find myself explaining what it entails all of the time. A short answer is that it's the study of what makes us human.
I’ve discovered that while not exactly obscure, anthropology is often considered a discipline without much to offer. The public perception is that anthropologists are a bunch of white men in their sixties that travel to a country in Africa, South America, or Asia and “study” the local people.
This perception, though not exactly accurate, is fair because that’s exactly what anthropology used to be, especially from the late 19th century to mid-20th century. Anthropology has evolved into a field ripe with scholars that approach their communities of interest with respect and use their research for advocacy and social justice.
There are many ideas that contemporary anthropology embraces that I think everyone would find useful if they want to make a change in their community or the world at large. To me, cultural relativism is the most important and the easiest to apply to everyday life.
So, what is cultural relativism?
Ever had culture shock? That feeling of disorienting what-way-is-up/how-do-I-act commonly associated with experiencing a radically different culture for the first time? It's intimidating and often makes us retreat into ourselves instead of learning more about the fascinating cultural traits that we're seeing.
The practice of cultural relativism is used for combating feelings of culture shock because those feelings often morph into harsh judgment. Cultural relativism is the idea that one should a judge a culture based on that culture's criteria and not on one's own criteria. For example, eating insects is a common practice in many cultures. If I were to judge that cultural practice based on mainstream American norms, I may deem turning insects into a meal gross and incomprehensible. But, if I judge that practice based on the norms of the culture it's a part of, I would consider insects to be a nutritious and practical meal.
What's surprising is that it doesn't take much travel to experience culture shock. As someone who is Baltimore born-and-raised, driving through the small, rural towns of western Maryland always takes me aback. Am I still in the same state? Residents of small towns probably feel culture shock too when visiting a big city for the first time.
Whether you want to understand the importance of a hijab or simply want to understand why in the world your friend went vegan, cultural relativism is an invaluable way to regard unfamiliar cultures or practices with respect. Cultural relativism seems like such a simple idea but it has a huge positive impact when taken seriously. It allows us to keep our personal judgment in check and deter discrimination.
Some contest cultural relativism on the grounds that it evokes sympathy and tolerance for groups that commit heinous acts or are perpetrators of crime. But cultural relativism was not intended to evoke sympathy for anyone, it instead evokes empathy. Sympathy is about feeling pity and tends to be an instinctual emotion. Rarely do we feel sympathy for people that are responsible for acts we consider immoral, like hate crimes and murder. But empathy is about understanding the feelings of another. Why do they do what they do? What is their justification?
Is there a way to change the inner-city situations that often make some people feel that they need to rob for money to support their families? It must be made clear that empathy and understanding do not necessarily equal "feeling bad" but instead allow for deeper understanding of specific situations, a deeper understanding that can lead to positive social change.
Even if one feels sympathy, that sympathy is not enough to help the problem. Sympathy creates motivation but no direction. There have been countless times that I've felt a strong urge to become involved in homeless activism but my plans often stopped there because I never cultivated a proper understanding of the issue.
Cultural relativism made clear to me the importance of understanding how people that experience homelessness feel and what they see as problems that I may not. The most effective way to gain a cultural relativistic viewpoint is to actually talk face-to-face to affected populations and pick their brains. They are the experts of their situations.
Learning and practicing cultural relativism has opened my eyes to the many biases and assumptions that I hold about certain people or places. There's no way to instantly make those biases vanish but they can be checked and controlled. I've realized that humans are so much more alike than they are different and that differing culture norms don't have to be a barrier to unity.
