A focus on culture: a reflection on stereotypes

On Monday, the complex, delicate topic we discussed about was culture. In particular, we cast light on how Italian culture is perceived by the members of other national communities. We visited a website containing quite a detailed list of all the most significant social habits, attitudes and behaviours Italian people show in ordinary life and we realized that most of the aspects highlighted may reflect to some extent our real way of dealing with people, but they are mainly a series of stereotypes.

But what are stereotypes? What do they imply? Are stereotypes positive or negative? According to the Collins Cobuild, English dictionary for advanced learners, a stereotype is ‘a fixed general image or set of characteristics that a lot of people believe represent a particular type of person or thing’. L. Sciolla (2002: 153) states that a stereotype is a pattern dealing with certain beliefs on the personal characteristics of social groups as a whole and focuses on the “self-protective reasons” implied in stereotypes, i.e. the need for national communities to keep or achieve a positive image of themselves. Therefore, stereotypes are some sort of categories that people use, or rather “build” over time, in order to “classify” the human, social, cultural, religious and political reality round them, but also to “represent” themselves and the community they belong to. In so doing, the whole reality is categorised, simplified, but also homogenized. In my opinion, this last aspect is particularly worth of note. The reason lies in the fact that we can’t apply a pattern, that is, something fixed, “fossilised”, to a community of people, as it is human nature to evolve and change over time.

With regard to this issue, I’d like to mention the Hofstede Model, according to which national culture differences can be subdivided into five dimensions:

1)power distance

2)individualism

3)masculinity

4)uncertainty avoidance

5)long-term orientation

This model, though being very interesting in itself, is a double-edged weapon, in that on the one hand it allows us to make an in-depth analysis of cultural differences (or similarities) all over the world, but on the other it seems to take it for granted that the data referred to a particular country do not refer to each of the group members. It may be obvious, but I think that, unfortunately, it is not so obvious as we might think… And that’s why it often happens that the members of a certain community label the members of a different community as self-centred – just to cite one example – without considering the crucial fact that a population is made up of individuals, with their own points of view, perspectives, opinions, beliefs, etc. Hence, this model is not to be taken as gospel, simply because what can be applied to a general cultural community can’t always be applied to a single person (there are always exceptions to the rule!). Besides, as I previously pointed out, people’s behaviours, as well as their way of thinking, can change over time and, therefore, what can be applied to a certain community in a certain period, can’t always be applied to the same community in a different period.

To sum up, there are multiple factors we must always take into account if we want to analyse the great cultural variety characterising our world, but, most importantly, we must always be aware that, if on the one hand exploiting models is a good way for organizing and simplifying the reality, on the other there is a danger that we simplify too much and “build” a distorted view of humankind.