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Cultural Diversity
In the year 2017, the federal government of Australia establishes its statement about the multiculturalism, which is an idea that represents the meaning of protecting cultural diversity (Ballantyne and Malhi, para.1). Such establishment represents that the government and society of Australia will be the promoter of a mixed society instead of keeping the status of passive tolerance towards the immigrants and refugees. The action of the Australian Government reflects the importance of cultural diversity. Cultural diversity refers to the positive attitude towards the diversity in the perspective of the different cultural area. It represents the spirit of tolerance in modern society. However, even though the concept of cultural diversity is the representation of pure goodness and tolerance, there are still many misuses of the expression and its meaning that causes some ethical dilemmas such as the ignorance of poverty. Through the examination and discussion on the origin definition and specific representation of cultural diversity and its uses and misuses, the definition of the cultural diversity is the quality of the various cultures from around the world that tends to keep those positive features in a branch of culture instead of the representation that labels those issues that comes from the outdated traditions and poverty.
The cultural diversity is mostly used to describes the value of tolerance towards the cultures of other countries or areas, which can reflect on the states of America. The United States of America was the immigrant country with people from all over the world. Various types of people come to the land of the free such as Asian people, African people, Latino people and so on. Therefore, the United States is formed by people from various places into one of the countries that can be the representation of cultural diversity. Numerous cultural factors from all over the world gather in there. The United States that has one of the most prosperous cultural diversity is one of the most advanced developed countries in the world. Therefore, through the example of the United States, it is valid to state that cultural diversity is most often used to describe the tolerance of cultural diversity.
From the perspective of the historical development of cultural diversity, its process and definition improve following the path of the people’s cultural awareness. The discussion of cultural diversity’s concept can be traced back to the essay of the David Crystal’s book Language Death, where Crystal illustrates the severe consequences of the cultural uniformity from the perspective of the human languages. Cultural uniformity can be identified as the contradicting concept of cultural diversity, which occurs in the society constantly when the behaviors of the public start to perform a pattern of advolution (“Explain Cultural Uniformity and Cultural Variability with Examples,” para.1). The concept of cultural diversity is to prevent the cultural uniformity from happening with such a rapid pace. Therefore, in the year 2001, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) established the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity, which confirms that cultural diversity is the common heritage of humanity and the society have an obligation to protect the cultural diversity under the principle of basic ethical requirements (1). The establishment of the declaration on cultural diversity shows the significance of cultural diversity. It also represents the official definition of cultural diversity. Moreover, the UNESCO also passes a statement that has an actual legally binding instrument to each country that signs up for this statement, which is the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. It regulates the values of cultural products, and the specific principles that people should follow during the business involved the cultural products (“Basic Texts of the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions” 3). This convention marks the legalization under the protection of cultural diversity. Gradually, the legalization of protecting cultural diversity shows the improvement of the awareness that the public has towards the cultural diversity. From then on, the cultural diversity is widely used to the protection of the unique features that each culture has around the world. It is used under the context of cultural communication and interaction. It emphasizes the acceptance and tolerance of other cultures instead of selecting the dominant culture and minor cultures.
The cultural diversity is mostly misused as the obstacles for the issue-solving, promoting the cultural communication under the concept of cultural diversity, and the educational procedures, which will cause damage to the real problem-solving. More specifically, cultural diversity becomes the weapon that the people use to against the events and movements that promote the idea of unifying people. For instance, cultural diversity is misused as the reason for the country to ignore their issues of poverty since they consider the issues like poverty as part of the cultural diversity. Moreover, when promoting cultural communication, the respect of cultural diversity becomes the reason for the upper class to perform the cultural isolation on the lower classes. Such unethical performance is all based on the false interpretation and use of the concept of cultural diversity. Also, the misuse of cultural diversity influences the area of the educational system as well. For example, in the article “Understanding Cultural Diversity and Learning,” John U. Ogbu makes an argument that the promoters of the cultural diversity in the educational system do not take the difficulty and executability of the educational methods under the value of cultural diversity into their consideration (Ogbu 11). In other words, cultural diversity cannot be the primary pursuit of education since it will mess with the information that the teachers and classes are trying to convey. The misuse of cultural diversity in the educational system will decrease the efficiency of the teaching, which can damage the society from the basis. Moreover, from the perspective of the attitude towards poverty and behaviors in different cultures, there should be different views other than the protection based on the theory of cultural diversity.
Even the misuse of cultural diversity indeed is a representation of showing that people are taking cultural diversity seriously, the misuse of cultural diversity also can lead to several severe issues for society. The reason why the misuse of cultural diversity exists in society is the avoidance of real questions and obstacles that the public faces during the execution of cultural diversity. In other words, only when the society solves the facing obstacles during the execution of cultural communication under the concept of cultural diversity, will the society stops misusing the concept of cultural diversity. According to the essay of Ben Wisner on the issues of climate change and cultural diversity, the misuse of the “participatory” methods under the concept of cultural diversity may cause the people from the countryside to feel isolated (137). In other words, the misuse of the manuals and toolkits for doing participatory action research from the government will diminish the intention of promoting cultural communications. Instead, the inappropriate methods of cultural diversity will increase the sense of being isolated that the people from the lower class in the society feel. As illustrated by Amory Starr and Jason Adams, it is not ethical to promote those traditions under the value of cultural diversity if those traditions cause damage to the people such as the human sacrifice, underage brides, and so on (23). What this statement tries to convey is that the idea of cultural diversity should not be the obstacles for human beings to pursue the values of freedom and democracy. Overall, the misuse of the concept of cultural diversity in the perspective of education, traditions, and so on, will cause the negative effect to the problems in the process of eliminating the outdated traditions and executing the feasible plan of education.
The uses of the cultural diversity can be identified as the promotion of the different cultures and maintaining the society in a status that people can treat other cultures with the tolerable attitude while also have an awareness of protecting the features in their own cultures, such as the language of a race and so on. For instance, cultural communication can be executed under the concept of cultural diversity. As illustrated by Wisner, cultural diversity can be served as the basic principle for the emergence of hybrid local knowledge (136). More specifically, the proper usage of cultural diversity can stimulate the cultural communication between different classes instead of becoming the barriers. What the use of cultural diversity influences is the regulations principles during the actions of cultural communications. Moreover, the use of cultural diversity is also a requirement for human society to keep health and steady rate of developing. As suggested by the General Conference of UNESCO, the cultural diversity is a necessary value in the development of human beings same as the biodiversity is for nature (1). As known by the public, the biodiversity is what keeps nature to develop and recover for millions of years. In other words, cultural diversity should be the primary pursuit for human beings since it is the motivation that keeps the humankind developing. Another use of cultural diversity is the protection of the world's languages. In terms of the human languages, Crystal states his view on the influence that the unifying process of the world’s cultures has on the human languages, which shows that ninety percent of the language will go extinction in the year of 2100 (43). Such a rapid rate of the extinction shows that the languages and other cultural representations should be protected by the execution of cultural diversity. Therefore, the awareness of the cultural diversity can save various human cultures such as the language from going extinction. Overall, the use of cultural diversity can be identified in the use of cultural communication, the development of human society, and the protection of human cultural features such as the language.
From a broader sense, the definition as the necessary requirement of the human society is the most proper interpretation of cultural diversity’s use since this definition can avoid the misuses of cultural diversity such as the barriers for the solution of specific issues like the poverty and the false interpretation of the cultural communication. More specifically, by considering the cultural diversity as the requirement for the development of the human society, the public will realize that the issues like the poverty should not be included in the definition of cultural diversity since those issues do not bring improvement to the human society. Moreover, there will not be any misinterpretation of cultural communication if the public and governments can take the definition of cultural diversity as the requirement for human society to keep a steady development. Overall, the proper use of the expression “cultural diversity” will benefit society in multiple perspectives.
In conclusion, through the discussion of the uses and misuses of the expression “cultural diversity.” the definition of the cultural diversity can be extended to the quality of the various cultures from around the world that can use by the human beings to keep the multiple cultural features in order to maintain the steady development. The specific misuses of the cultural diversity are various, which include the theory that takes cultural diversity as a reason to execute the cultural isolation, the obstacle when promoting the cultural communication between countries or social classes, and the false direction in the educational system. All three of cultural diversity’s misuse lead to a certain level of damages to society. However, from the perspective of cultural diversity’s uses, the proper uses of the definition of cultural diversity, such as the necessary requirement for the steady development of the human society, the protection of the cultural markers such as the languages, and so on, can indeed bring credible benefits to the society. For instance, the execution of cultural diversity can slow down the process of the language unifying. Moreover, cultural diversity can be one of the standards that can identify an event to be beneficial or harmful for the society.
Works Cited
Ballantyne, Glenda and Amrita Malhi. “Interculturalism: How Diverse Societies Can Do Better Than Passive Tolerance.” The Conversation, 21 March 2017, https://theconversation.com/interculturalism-how-diverse-societies-can-do-better-than-passive-tolerance-72874. Accessed 23 Nov. 2018.
“Basic Texts of the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.” UNESCO, 2001, https://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0021/002148/214824e.pdf Accessed 23 Nov. 2018.
Crystal, David. Language Death. Cambridge University Press, 2018.
“Explain Cultural Uniformity and Cultural Variability with Examples.” Study Points, 25 Oct. 2014, https://studypoints.blogspot.com/2014/10/explain-cultural-uniformity-and.html Accessed 23 Nov. 2018.
Ogbu, John U. “Understanding Cultural Diversity and Learning”. Sage Journals, vol. 21, no. 8, 1992, pp. 5-14.
Starr, Amory and Jason Adams. "Anti-globalization: The Global Fight for Local Autonomy". New Political Science. vol. 25 no.1, 2003, pp. 19–42.
UNESCO. "UNESCO Universal Declaration On Cultural Diversity." UNESCO, 2002.
Wisner, Ben. “Climate Change and Cultural Diversity.” Blackwell Publishing, 2010, https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/32326001/Climate_Change_and_Cultural_Diversity_ISSJ_2010.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A&Expires=1542943134&Signature=oysW5g4%2FUsuaR9o4EPWR6gEMOF8%3D&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DClimate_change_and_cultural_diversity.pdf Accessed 23 Nov. 2018.
