On "cultural difference"

Author: Sloka Krishnan
Project: Alternative Law Forum | Human Rights Advocates Connect
Year: 2014
Bangalore, India


Look, I’m not going to write about cultural differences because it’s totalizing and weird. I’m not here for an audience that can gawk at how different things are over there, that wants to smile wryly at those Wacky Indians and their Wacky Customs. The cows! On the roads! The traffic! The inefficiency! Have you used a squat toilet before? Did it feel—spiritual? I’m not going to tell you anecdotes of auto drivers a la Thomas Friedman: I have not suddenly used the bodies of working class Bangaloreans to become an expert on—ah yes, the culture here, or on the politics. Look at me, boldly using my minimal language skills; look at me, adventuring in this Strange and Unknown Environment; look at me and look at the Deep Opinions I’m forming; look at me and the way I can use this place as a site for my own identity formation. I mean: Cultural Difference in the way it’s being described here is a myth, you know? It’s a way for us to objectify them. Meyer says, “the truth is that culture is too complex to be measured meaningfully along just one or two dimensions” (120). Great! True! But coming up with an eight-dimensional culture map in response to that, one that is based on the idea of cultural differences existing only at the national level, is hardly the solution. God, just listen to individuals talk, and pay attention to how they communicate, and work to communicate in ways that work for both of you—it’s not a dramatic cross-cultural strategy; it’s the way humans in the world have any sort of relationship with any other humans. Sometimes people are on time. Sometimes they’re not. Sometimes people are direct. Sometimes they’re not. Okay! So sometimes they are(n’t)! Move on! Navigating the cultural minefield. Those foreigners, I tell you: Are they Human or Explosive? We just don’t know.