What I learned in Cultural Anthropology 101

Mongolian Youth Wrestling Festival

Short Answer: Not very much (even when I paid attention 😛 )

Actually it was Cultural Anthropology 2, many years ago.

There was one concept that I remember to this day and that is “cultural relativism”.  To put this concept in terms we can all understand the LACK of cultural relativism can be summed up as:

“Every other culture in the world except mine is stupid/sucks”

You can read the technical definition here if you like, but I found it intensely boring.

So I bring it up, because I’d like to to increase “cultural relativism” or in simple terms “open mindedness towards other people and their cultures”.

A few days ago,  I saw this video post on social media:

Comment 1: “Why are they wrestling in boots and underwear”

Reply to Comment1: “They are trying to cover everything a singlet is not.”

Now, however sincere the comments may have been, what we can notice here is the mentality of evaluating culture “A” based on culture “B” ( not to mention any implied negative overtone, which must be discounted).

Hopefully the more exposure we have to the world’s people and cultures the more this phenomena will diminish.

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