Inhabit Culture   (Part 2)                                            (back to Part 1)
--Adopt Each Other

In this day and age of globalized business, "adapting" has become
quite the buzzword.  Companies that seek to conquer the world's
consumers must adapt products, marketing and advertising
strategies accordingly.  Humans, of course, have been adapting to
one another for their entire history, compiling a tragic record of
environmental upheaval and bloodshed.  Perhaps it's time to move
beyond adapting and start considering adopting.    

Adapting is a very limiting concept.  Adapting to differences ensures
that you never truly inhabit a culture.  Traveling in Asia, I came into
contact with many Westerners who had come to the Far East to
teach their peculiar dialect of English.  Of these, some made the
effort to learn the local language and try the food.  These were the
happy ones.  In contrast, the ones who labored in their efforts to
adapt were complainers.  Always needing someone to translate;
growing sick and tired of McDonalds; griping that nothing was like
the way it was back at home.  

As any of us who have ever been in a relationship can attest, it
helps to adopt the interests of the other.  To be hired by a company
is to agree to adopt that company’s values as our own.  To get
married is to preside over a rash of mergers: families, friends,
futures, and of course, furniture.  The challenge is to balance a
sense of self with a sense of group.  To sing in a chorus or play in
a band is to listen as much to the people next to you as it is to
yourself.  That’s how a single individual can ensure a group is
performing in harmony.  A cohesive team consists of individuals
who have the hearts and the good sense to adopt each other.   

When it comes to cross-cultural communication, no one is
proposing that we all forsake our religions and political systems for
those of our neighboring countries.  But surely there are things
beyond our borders to be appreciated and adopted.  Here in New
York City, the streets teem with the smells of couscous, curry and
kimchi.  Foreign movies and art flood the shores of Manhattan,
many of these forms already the products of cultural fusion.  
Openness leads to exciting, new possibilities; inflexibility produces
cultural rift and drift.

There will always be aspects about other cultures beyond our
grasp.  Adopting what we can understand is the way to build secure
bridges throughout the world.  By focusing on bridges, we turn
away from the hopelessness of building walls and the
senselessness of killing.  Those who only see fit to adapt live as
orphans struggling to survive in their environments.  Those who
willingly adopt strangers and unfamiliar surroundings are the
ones who go on to create new habitats and homes.  

Move on to
Lesson 8   Demonstrate Control
Lesson 7   Inhabit Culture
--Adopt Each Other