Exploring Culture

Exploring Culture is a book for students and trainers full of stories, exercises and a thorough introduction to the synthetic cultures that I use in some of my games. The book appeared in August 2002 with Intercultural Press. I wrote it together with Paul Pedersen and Geert Hofstede.

The material below is not in the book, but some similar stuff appears in chapter 1.

What do you see?

Look at the pictures below and write down for yourself what you see in them. Then click on the hyperlink below and read what other people saw in the picture. Can you also see those things or do they seem very strange interpretations to you?

What did other people from various countries see in this picture with two people?

What did other people from various countries see in this picture with six people?

Debriefing

The people who interpreted the pictures were aged about 14-50, and came from Bolivia, China, Ethiopia, France, Indonesia, Italy, the Netherlands, Peru, Tunisia and Uganda. Perhaps your own interpretation is in the list, perhaps not. As you see, the pictures have an amazing possible number of interpretations. These interpretations differ because people concentrate on different aspects. Some look for unique attributes of the people in the picture. Others look for family relationships, or for hierarchical relationships. Yet others look for gender differences, for cooperation, for antagonism, or for details that highlight professional or religious roles. Try to find out what kind of attributes you have highlighted.

The learning to be drawn from this is that this also holds for social situations in general: just by looking you cannot tell what is happening. Unconsciously you bring your own cultural frame of interpretation to bear upon the situation. This is not to say that culture alone determines how one interprets a picture or a situation. One’s own unique history and personality also play an important role. But some of the interpretations made by people from other parts of the world are probably very strange to your mind.