Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

 

The three people I asked to define culture and diversity was my boyfriend, my daughter and a colleague.  I chose these three people because I wanted to get a perspective from a male, a young adult and someone who is culturally different than myself and happens to be a little bit older.

My boyfriend defined culture as our beliefs and values, religion,  how we celebrate holidays, our traditions, foods we eat, and the language we speak.

He defined diversity as the differences between people, the difference between cultures.

My daughter defined culture as heritage, traditions, beliefs and values things based on ethnicity.

She defined diversity as different ethnicities and the differences between heritage, traditions and beliefs.

My colleague defined culture as coming from our heritage and family.  It includes things like our religion and beliefs, how we do things such as celebrate holidays and how we use traditions, it is how we raise our children, how we interact with others, how we view the world.

She defined diversity as the differences within our culture and it is what makes us unique from others in the sense of a being part of a particular race or ethnic group,  but especially is what makes us unique as individuals. 

The aspects I received from my participants' answers were included from what I have studied so far with this course.  Some examples are the answers that were very similar to and would be defined as surface culture such as celebrating holidays, traditions, and the foods we eat.  Some of the answers were also similar to and would be defined as deep culture such as heritage, values and beliefs, language, and how we raise our children. 

The aspect about culture in which I do feel was omitted by all three of my participants would be in  reference to the dominant culture.  However I am not sure prior to taking this class if I was asked about culture and diversity if I  would reference the dominant culture either, as I did not think about it in the terms I do now. 

The way other people viewed culture and diversity was very similar to my thoughts.  However, I found the answers in which my colleague gave in terms of how we interact with others and how we view the world to be interesting as while I know we all have different perspectives based on our experiences those experiences and perspectives can be or become part of one's culture and I am not sure if I thought of culture as including such experiences.