早稲田社学 2012 IV

When Americans are asked about their culture or culture in general, they generally do not have very solid responses. To be sure, they almost always have a response, but their responses, more often than not, suggest that there is little real understanding of culture or the role it plays in their lives ― or the lives of anyone else. Nearly all of them readily admit they have rarely thought much about it. In the eyes of some, culture simply refers to the place where one is born or is that which makes us human. Most Americans in fact see culture as related to tradition, heritage, nationality, or a way of life. For still other Americans, it is what characterizes those "other" people "out there" somewhere else in the world. It is common to hear culture associated with family or some racial grouping people recognize or to which they are assigned. Fortunately, only a few Americans continue to suggest that it is a biological term or something associated with the performing arts as might be reported in their papers. In almost every case, when Americans are asked what they mean by their responses, they have considerable difficulty explaining what they mean. When asked where culture comes from, there is rarely any agreement. Their responses range from history, tradition, memory, and generations, to environment, family, and inventions ― even God and nature. That it might come from the many groups with which they associate is not generally recognized, except for perhaps their family.

In fact, many Americans believe that culture does come from their families where they learned their family traditions and their heritage. They know what culture is, but have difficulty in verbalizing what they know. Too many people are basically unsure of what it means. This is not so very surprising when considering that they have been deluged with the suggestion that perhaps there is no American culture, or the idea that if there is one for the United States, it is a melting pot culture. It is also not surprising when you consider that Americans in general tend to see themselves first and primarily as individuals. They tend to respond rather negatively to any suggestion that they are part of a collective, or larger group, with whom they might share the ideas and practices they perceive as unique to themselves. They are offended by the suggestion that their ideas and practices resulted from their being born, raised, and educated in America, or that they may share similar ideas and behaviors with others. That this would make them less unique than they have been led to believe is too offensive even to consider. Despite this individual centeredness of most Americans, they readily group people together into social categories and speak of these groups by way of gross generalizations and stereotypes. Of course, as with most people, Americans tend to see themselves as unlike anyone else and they Eire convinced that their country and culture are better than those of anyone else.

Despite the lack of any real sense of culture and the role it plays in their lives, Americans, like most other people, do not (nor do they have to) think consciously about their culture. Most people do not think about culture until there is a reason to do so. On a day-to-day basis, most people just go about the task of living: doing all those things they have been taught to do, believing all those things they have been taught to believe, and living with all those things that time has led them simply to take for granted. They will readily defend it if it comes tinder attack from outside the group. They will criticize it if it does not live up to the promises they learned or if something must be changed because "times change." Americans, as with people in any other culture, especially those of the modern complex cultures, believe they "know" their own culture(s), but they know only small bits and pieces of it (them). Compounding the problem still more, Americans, just like everyone else, tend to see their culture in terms of it being _ natural ― simply the way things are. Even scholars who have studied this uniquely . human quality for a great many years: continue to struggle with its understanding.

(Adapted from American Culture: Myth and Reality of a Culture of Diversity)

Answers  1b  2c  3a  4e,i  5c