Yrjo's point was my original one. What I have observed over the past
few days is a cross-cultural issue sliding rapidly into a
monocultural (American) solution finding process. The very process now embarked upon
excludes and alienates people like me.
My original point (perhaps not made clearly enough) was that if
cross-cultural environments such as this, the only way of being
inclusive is for each individual to take responsibility for
monitoring their own assumptions and reactions and locating them in
their own cultural context. Imposing 'rules' and 'processes' on
others cannot achieve the object of mutual respect and courtesy
in any open community (or any community at all, actually).
Only recognising that my own responses are culturally situated and
checking out the other's meaning and context before reacting can
achieve that.
If there are people who want an xmca which operates according to
American cultural and linguistic norms and within the nuances of
American socio-political discourse, why not just say so? Then the
rest of us, together with those Americans who enjoy and value
cultural and lingustic diversity, can go off and play together
somewhere else.
Let me check something out. Given that in this debate many
non-Americans and, indeed, many Americans, have pointed out in
various ways what I have just asserted, and that none of those posts
have influenced in the slghtest way what has subsequently happened,
am I to assume that others DO want a list that operates only in a
North American context? Or is it simply that some people simply do
not understand that other contexts exist and therefore find
contributions such as mine to be gibberish? Or do many believe that
there are some superordinate cultural and linguistic norms that have
precedence over and an existence independent of any specific cultural
context? Or is it that I am the one who perceives all this as
gibberish because there is a perfectly sensible point that I have
missed because of my own inadequate understanding of American modes
of expression?
Phillip Capper
Centre for Research on Work, Education and Business (WEB Research)
PO Box 2855
9th Floor 142 Featherston Street
Wellington
New Zealand
Phone: (64) 04 499 8140
Mobile: 021 251 9741
Fx: (64) 04 499 8395
phillip.capper@webresearch.co.nz
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