Evaluate a Cultural Incident

Practice your learning by using the D-I-E model to interpret the cultural interaction below. The incident is based on experiences of Peace Corps volunteers and could happen in any culture you might be introduced to. After you read the selection, reflect upon what you've read. Relate your reflections to the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity and use the D-I-E model of debriefing to help you interpret what is happening.

Friendly Advice

You teach in a rural area and often eat at a local tea shop, run by a low-caste family with whom you are very friendly. Today, your headmaster advised you to stop eating there. He says it hurts your social standing and indirectly hurts the reputation of his school for you to be seen so often in the company of untouchables. What do you do?

            In this situation, the headmaster advised me to stop eating at a local tea shop, run by a low-caste family with whom I am very friendly. He said that it hurts my social standing and therefore hurts the reputation of his school for me to be seen in the company of such low-caste people. Obviously there is a difference in our cultural understandings of this situation, and I have to decide what to do next.

            The headmaster does not want me to be seen in the company of lower-caste people. Maybe in the values of the host country, people should only be in company of those belonging to the same social rank. Spending time with those of a lower caste could lower my own rank and therefore anyone associated with me, specifically the school I attend. Though in my own cultural understanding, spending time with the less fortunate is admired, in the host culture it is looked down upon and doesn’t only affect me, but everyone associated with me.

            In this situation, I, naturally, wanted to act upon the ways of my own culture: I saw it as friendly and generous to eat at this tea shop which may not get good business. I felt very uncomfortable being asked not to do so; at first, it seemed like the headmaster was being haughty and unkind. I felt like I would offend the owners of the shop, who are my friends. It was difficult for me to feel morally right in choosing not to eat there anymore, but in learning about the host culture and realizing that the headmaster was only giving me friendly advice, not being haughty, I am becoming more able to adapt to their views and actions.