The Meaning of Culture and Identity

The Meaning of Culture and Identity
This critical analysis focuses on two readings assigned from class 8 to class 10 exploring the meaning of culture and identity among different populations across the world. The first reading by Keith H. Basso (1970) examines the culture of silence among the Western Apache population. The author integrates sociolinguistics and ethno-scientific methods to explain why members belonging to the Western Apache society choose to refrain from speech or “give up on words.” From the cultural dimension, Basso (1970) applies collected evidence to present the values of silence behavior in the Western Apache culture and other societies around the world. In the second reading, Jemima Pierre (2008) discusses the place of contemporary African communities within the structures of global white supremacy and the diasporic discourses of transnational blackness and race. In the discussion, the author believes that race and racialization are critical to the formation of identities and cultural dynamics among local communities. The discussion presents the practice of skin bleaching in Ghana and among other populations of African descent in diaspora, which has attracted global attention. Both Basso (1970) and Pierre (2008) dissect the underlying meanings of cultural practices among different societies through ethnographic research methods.
Based on observations of different contextual variables, Basso (1970) claims that the culture of refraining from speech is shared among different communities, including the Western Apache and the Navajos. Among the Navajo communities, silence behavior is critical during courting, expressing anger, during morning, when interacting with patients, or after a long absence with relatives (Basso, 1970). The Western Apache society refrains from speech based on social situations, especially in ambiguous status of focal participants. They may also choose silence to sum up or reiterate as a response to unpredictability or uncertainty in social relations (Basso, 1970). By exploring the culture of chemical skin bleaching among populations in urban Ghana, Jemima (2008) demonstrates ways in which particular racialized appreciation of meaning are met in modern postcolonial African societies. The author argues that racialization through skin bleaching among the Ghanaians needs to be contextualized within the global racial formations. In other words, it is necessary to examine the interconnectedness of global and local ideologies and racial practices. Jemima’s (2008) observes that the practice of skin bleaching and attaching value to whiteness is not only within the context of Ghana culture, but widespr...