Transcript Cultural Relativism - Fiji National University | E

ETH501
Cultural
relativism,
gender &
ethics
Week 5, Lecture
(Dr Martin Gluchman)
Culture: definition
‘Culture has been defined in a
number of ways, but most simply,
as the learned and shared
behavior of a community of
interacting human beings’
Useem, J., & Useem, R. (1963) Human Organizations,
22(3), (p. 169)
Cultural relativism
Every culture has its own ethical
framework to regulate the proper
behavior of its members
Different cultures/societies have
different moral codes
Good = what is socially approved
in a given culture
Cultural differences argument
Cultural relativists think that societies
disagree widely about morality, and
that there are no clear ways to
resolve these differences. They
conclude that there are no objective
values. Cultural relativists view
themselves as tolerant; they see
other cultures, not as wrong, but as
different’
(http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler/et/et-01-00.html)
Padaung Tribe of Burma
INUIT (ESKIMOES)
The snow used to build an igloo must have sufficient
structural strength to be cut and stacked in the
appropriate manner. The best snow to use for this
purpose is snow which has been blown by wind, which
can serve to compact and interlock the ice crystals. The
hole left in the snow where the blocks are cut from is
usually used as the lower half of the shelter. Sometimes,
a short tunnel is constructed at the entrance to reduce
wind and heat loss when the door is opened. Due to
snow's excellent insulating properties, inhabited igloos
are surprisingly comfortable inside.
The architecture of the igloo is unique in that it is dome
that can be raised out of independent blocks leaning on
each other and polished to fit without a previous
supporting structure.
Inuit Eskimoes
“Knud Rasmussen, one of the
most famous early explorers,
reported that he met one
woman who had bourne 20
children but had killed 10 of
them at birth. Female babies
he found were especially liable
to be destroyed, and this was
permitted simply at the parents’
discretion… Old people also,
when they becames too feeble
to contribute to the family, were
left out in the snow to die.”
(Rachels, 1999, pg21)
Worldview of Yanomamo
Yanomamo live in the
Amazonian Forest
-Hostile environment (wars)
-Encourage violence and
aggression
-Yanomamo boys are rarely
punished. For hitting either
parents or girls.
Yanomamo man allows his son to do the following:
“Ariwari is only 4 years old but has learnt that the response to
a flash of anger is to strike someone with his hand and it is not
uncommon to give his father a healthy smack in the face
whenever something displeases him…”
A nationwide campaign is under
way in Cameroon to discourage
the widespread practice of "breast
ironing".
This involves pounding and
massaging the developing breasts of
young girls with hot objects to try to
make them disappear.
Many mothers have no regrets about
ironing their daughter's breasts.
Most tools are warmed before
pounding the girls' chests
"Breast ironing is not a new thing. I
am happy I protected my daughter. I
could not stand the thought of boys
spoiling her with sex before she
completed school," one woman
explained.
"Unfortunately, television is
encouraging all sorts of sexual
immorality in our children." BBC
News, 23 June 2006
BBC News, 23/6/2006
BBC News, 23/6/2006)
Statistics
show that
26%
of
Cameroonian girls at puberty undergo
it, as many mothers believe it protects
their daughters from the sexual
advances of boys and men who think
children are ripe for sex once their
breasts begin to grow (BBC News, 23
June 2006).
The most widely used instrument to
flatten the breasts is a wooden pestle,
used for pounding tubers in the
kitchen. Heated bananas and coconut
shells are also used.
Anthropologist Dr Flavien Ndonko
says that breast ironing is not an
effective method of preventing early
sex and pregnancies because many
of the girls still become pregnant. He
recommends plain talking between
parents and their daughters.
CASE STUDY: SAMBIA TRIBE OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA
Boys and girls are attached to
their mothers at infancy.
A powerful factor is the
father’s aloofness.
In Sambia culture, too much
contact with mother and child
is polluting and unmanly.
Rituals teaches men to be tough. Warriors are trained to kill.
“Suppose you see a woman carrying firewood, a pile of food
and she complains. Her husband is carrying nothing. The man
must carry the baby. The man will say,
“I’ve given the baby to you. It’s something that
belongs to you. If the man carries a child his skin will slacken,
he can become weak, age quickly…”
CASE STUDY ON HOMOSEXUALITY – SAMBIA OF PAPUA
NEW GUINEA - Sambia value homosexuality because it
is part of male initiation rituals.
Among the Sambia, who inhabit the Southeastern
Highlands of Papua New Guinea, every male had
to go through a series of six stages of initiation
that lasted approximately ten years.
Teenagers who were between puberty and the
age of marriage "implanted" their semen daily in
boys between age nine and puberty, so that it
would spread its perceived male virtue through
their growing bodies. At marriage, youths became
bisexuals for a time. After fatherhood,
homosexuality ceased as men became
exclusively heterosexual. This process was
typical of other Pacific cultures.
Pacific Island men were absolutely convinced of
their innate lack of semen and of the necessity of
the homosexual rituals, and they transmitted their
convictions to boys through ritual teaching. Their
beliefs were substantiated when, after years of
ritualized homosexuality, the signs of strength
and masculinity took physical form in the
initiates.
Anthropologists: Franz Boas &
Alfred Kroeber
Two main ideas behind cultural
relativism:
1) All men are completely
civilized
2) There are no higher & lower
cultures
Inequalities between cultures
Reaction against relations of
dominance and subordination
e.g. colonialism
British in Fiji, French in New
Caledonia, Germans &
Americans in Samoa
The colonialists thought that
their way was right/superior
Key strengths to Cultural
Relativism
• Teaches us to respect and to be
tolerant of other cultures
• It encourages us to reflect upon our
own culture and examine our beliefs
• It acknowledges the problem
regarding how all people believe their
own culture is best
• Its seen as more scientific
Weakness to Cultural Relativism
• It prevents talking sensibly about what
is right and wrong
• It can not allow for moral progress
• Do we really disagree that much: if
you lived in the Arctic Circle you might
be a bit tougher about life
• Is this reducing what is right to who
has most power in any given society
• Saying something is wrong is not the
same as forcing someone to agree.
Gender inequalities
within cultures
There are also inequalities
between men and women in
the same culture
This is because most cultures
are patriarchal
Patriarchy
Rule/power of the father
A social system in which the father
is the head of the family & men
have authority over women &
children.
A family or society based on this
system or governed by men
Man as ‘self’; woman as other
de Beauvoir: the second sex
Aristotle held that women are defective
men, human beings lacking in what is
essential to the nature of man; the
ability to reason. He thought the nature
of men is to reason in ways that are
distinctively human; the nature and
function of women is to reproduce, like
other animals (Held, V. 2006:59)
Immanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) claims
that women are incapable of being fully
moral because of their reliance on
emotion rather than reason. Kant said
women were not fit to vote, that they
needed the guidance of more rational
males. Autonomy was not really for
women (MacKinnon, B. 2004).
Dr Carol Gilligan
Feminists like Dr Carol Gilligan, a social and
moral psychologist in her book In a Different
Voice (1982) and Dr Nel Noddings Caring: a
feminine approach to ethics & Moral Education
(1984) argue that:
 traditional ethical theories have emphasised
independence, individualism and rights
 Women have been left out of the history of
ethics; women have been portrayed in very
negative ways by philosophers across the
ages
 Traditional moral theories ignore, trivialize
and demean (degrade) values and virtues
culturally associated with women
Dr Nel Noddings
SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR
(1908-1986)
http://www.fanpix.net/picturegallery/simone-de-beauvoirpicture-10504727.htm
The Second Sex has been
described as the most
important work in the history of
feminist writing.
De Beauvoir attempted to
describe what it means to be a
woman.
Its central idea is summed up
in her famous phrase
"One is not born a woman,
one becomes one."
Clearly, this phrase became the
'bible' of the feminist movement
and definitive declaration of
women's independence.
Faafafini in Samoa
In Samoa, when a
household or
family already has
a number of sons,
it is fairly common
that the youngest
son be raised as a
girl.
Their gender-identity
is not biological,
but socialised.
Simone De Beauvoir (19061986)
De Beauvoir believed that it is only tradition
and social constraints that put women in an
inferior position. Many people at that time
accepted the belief that women were born
inferior. Her ideas shocked many people but
brought inspiration and hope to millions of
women who recognized their own lives in her
writing
http://www.suite101.com/content/simon
e-de-beauvoir-brief-bio-a42274
Gender socialization
Gender socialization: when
boys and girls are taught
the customs, rituals,
attitudes and values of
their culture (acceptable
masculine & feminine
roles)
Think question:
If we accept cultural relativism in
a strict sense (i.e. the view that
we must not look down upon
other people’s cultures) how can
we be critical of practices that
harm women (and men)?
Some cultural practices
that harm women & girls
1) Witch burning
2) Female infanticide
3) Sati
4) Misuse of Shariah laws
5) Genital mutilation
6) Foot binding
7) Breast pounding
1. Witch burning
A couple have been jailed for life
for torturing and drowning a
teenage boy they accused of being
a witch.
Kristy Bamu, 15, was killed by his
sister Magalie Bamu, 29, and her
partner, Eric Bikubi, 28.
He died in a bath at their tower
block flat in Newham, east
London, on Christmas Day 2010
after days of being abused.
He had come to London from Paris
with his two brothers and two
sisters to spend the festive season
with Magalie Bamu.
But things turned sour when the
couple, who were said to be
obsessed with kindoki, the word
for witchcraft in their native
Democratic Republic of the Congo,
accused him of putting spells on a
younger child.
2. Female infanticide
http://www.hakani.org
3. Sati – widow burning
4. Stoning
5. Breast Pounding in
Cameroon, Africa
http://tojesworld.wordpress.com/2010/08/16/breast-ironing-incameroon-another-form-of-child-abuse/
5. Female genital mutilation
Female genital cutting or mutilation
or female circumcision is defined by
the WHO as "all procedures involving
partial or total removal of the external
female genitals or other injury to the
female genital organs whether for
cultural, religious or other nontherapeutic reasons (WHO, 2009).
El Saadawi Nawal
Waris Dirie
Lali - "What happened to me has totally
broken my trust in the women I loved," she
told us. "I didn't believe my mother could let
this happen. My love for her has changed.
"It hurt so much. I would never let my
children suffer this. I don't believe this is right.
It's a stupid, old-fashioned custom. Why can't
we forget it?“ 3 January 2008
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article505796/The-unspeakable-practice-female-circumcisionthats-destroying-young-womens-livesBritain.html#ixzz1e0Po7yqvBy conservative
estimates, 66,000 women and girls living in
Britain have been mutilated.
Mail online – 3
January 2008
Met announced a £20,000 reward last July
for information leading to the conviction of
anyone who performs or abets cutting.
Under the 2003 Female Genital Mutilation
Act, those involved could be jailed for 14
years. Yet the fact that no one has been
prosecuted says much about the problems
the police are facing.
6.Honour Killing
7. Footbinding
Think questions?
Are these cultural practices
ethical?
How do such practices
contribute to the oppression of
women?
Is it fair, right & just to
subject women to these rituals
or cultural practices?
Feminism
Feminists challenge patriarchy
They argue that women and men
should be treated equally
Women’s organizations all over
the world work towards ending
cultural practices that harm
women & lobby for the ratification
of women’s rights
Women’s rights are
the rights claimed for women,
equal to those of men, with
respect to suffrage, property,
the professional fields, etc.
‘During the United Nations Decade for Women
(1976-1985), women from many geographical,
racial, religious, cultural, and class backgrounds
took up organizing to improve the status of
women. The United Nations-sponsored women's
conferences, which took place in Mexico City in
1975, Copenhagen in 1980, and Nairobi in 1985,
were convened to evaluate the status of women
and to formulate strategies for women's
advancement. These conferences were critical
venues at which women came together, debated
their differences and discovered their
commonalties, and gradually began learning to
bridge differences to create a global movement.
In the late eighties and early nineties, women in
diverse countries took up the human rights
framework and began developing the analytic and
political tools that together constitute the ideas
and practices of women's human rights’
www.vitalvoices.org
Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women
A final thought…
In a time of global population rapidly
increasing and depleting natural
resources, what sense does it make
to construct a woman’s identity as
one defined by her reproductive
capacities?