What do you think is the essence of Chinese culture?

[82riceballs]

By "essence," I mean both an element of Chinese culture that is unique to China and is a highly important value.

In my opinion, harmony would probably rank as the most important value in Chinese culture. Confucius seemed to deem this a valuable principle as he advocated filial piety as well as respect for authority, which both promote harmonious societies. But then, I think the concept of face (different from the western idea of shame) would also be a part of this.

However, I think there is a significant difference between culture and the visible actions of Chinese people... There have been yet a new wave of food scares recently, and I'm sure that if those people had followed principles of Chinese culture, they wouldn't have done that. Also, I'm not sure how harmony applies when the concept is extended to politics...

Sorry about my rambling; that was just a brainstorm of my ideas regarding Chinese culture. As I can't seem to organize my thoughts, I was hoping that a discussion about what people view as the "essence" of Chinese culture would help.

Any help is appreciated

[imron]

an element of Chinese culture that is unique to China

In my opinion, harmony would probably rank as the most important value

Other cultures don't strive for harmony?

[82riceballs]

gaaahh! As you can tell, I'm a deeply confused person...

[lemur]

If you take one characteristic and say "this is specific to this culture", you are likely to end up being embarrassed when someone else points out that the characteristic is shared by another culture. Scholars have found that the essentialist approach does not work.

[hidden12345]

Definitely rice.

[HashiriKata]

You first have to define a NORM before you can put a value on something. Without out a norm, we all normally use our own culture as a point of reference to discuss other cultures, but this is where the mess starts to show (unless we've managed to deceive ourself that our point of reference is truthly the NORM ).

In spite of the above, you can certainly discuss anything as long as from the start you make clear the point of reference from which you'd like the discussion to be based on. For example, you could say: Let's talk about Chinese culture from the point of view of X culture, etc.

Edited November 26, 2008 at 11:29 AM by HashiriKata

[msittig]

What do you think is the essence of Chinese culture?

热闹

Hasn't 和 also been pegged as the essence of Japanese culture?

[aprilz]

I would say it's 家庭. Chinese people have the most complicated titles and names to address everyone in one extended family. The title (like 大伯）can reflect gender, status in the family and the relationship with you.

It just shows how important family is.

[lemur]

I would say it's 家庭. Chinese people have the most complicated titles and names to address everyone in one extended family.

Got a source that establishes that the Chinese system of kinship terminology is the most complicated?

The title (like 大伯）can reflect gender, status in the family and the relationship with you.

It just shows how important family is.

There are other cultures which have complex kinship and address terms. Indian culture comes to mind. Moreover, there is a distinction to be made between conceptual models of reality and what actually happens on the ground.

This is not to say that family is not very important in Chinese culture (it is obvious that it *is*) but I don't agree that it is a distinctive feature of Chinese culture. Again, I just have to look at India to find an example of another culture about which one could make the claim that the importance given to family is its distinctive feature.

[Luobot]

I would say it's 家庭. Chinese people have the most complicated titles and names to address everyone in one extended family. The title (like 大伯）can reflect gender, status in the family and the relationship with you.

It's interesting that 家庭 is and has been an essential defining feature of Chinese culture for thousands of years. I don't know if it is or isn't exclusively the most complicated among the world's cultures, but it's unique and complicated enough for me.

[82riceballs]

If you take one characteristic and say "this is specific to this culture", you are likely to end up being embarrassed when someone else points out that the characteristic is shared by another culture. Scholars have found that the essentialist approach does not work.

True that!

So, I guess I will scratch the "unique" part, which makes sense, as the most important part of my question is the "essence" part, regardless of whether or not the answer is also found in another culture. So, I guess my real question is "what's the one most important thing that defines Chinese culture" (without setting it apart from other cultures).

Is it just me, or is there an inherent contradiction in what I just said...

[outcast]

I don't think there really is anything "unique". Chinese people generally try to see themselves as unique, perhaps out of a desperate childish need to feel special, but in reality for the most part they aren't.

[lemur]

Chinese people generally try to see themselves as unique, perhaps out of a desperate childish need to feel special, but in reality for the most part they aren't.

Actually, even the attempt "to see themselves as unique" is not peculiar to the Chinese but occurs in every culture I've ever looked at, including my own. It is pervasive.

[Guoke]

Chinese people generally try to see themselves as unique, perhaps out of a desperate childish need to feel special, but in reality for the most part they aren't.

Yeah, I can see your point. This is just similar to the fact that European and American people generally try to see themselves as unique, perhaps out of a compulsive infantile need to feel superior, but in reality for the most part they aren't.

[outcast]

Actually I would think the "western superiority complex" you are referring to has more to do with the rather long list of achievements (technical, scientific, political, and societal) that have been made by western countries since the beginning of the Renaissance.

Next time you boycott France, make sure to boycott 高等数学 since a great many fundamental 高等数学 theorems were made by Frenchmen. Also you should boycott electrical current because that is measured in Amperes, which is named for the Frenchman who did very important work on electromagnetism.

Edited December 15, 2008 at 01:37 PM by outcast

[renzhe]

Actually, I would think that the people who spearheaded these achievements didn't suffer from any such complex. All the truly special people I've met have been extremely humble and unconcerned about cultural superiority and such crap.

It's the useless people without achievements who want to feel unique but aren't -- they are the ones with the superiority complex. They tend to find it very important to point out that somebody clever was born in their city, or had the same skin colour, or spoke the same language.

Whether this language is Chinese or English is ultimately irrelevant.

[outcast]

Actually, I would think that the people who spearheaded these achievements didn't suffer from any such complex. All the truly special people I've met have been extremely humble and unconcerned about cultural superiority and such crap.

It's the useless people without achievements who want to feel unique but aren't -- they are the ones with the superiority complex. They tend to find it very important to point out that somebody clever was born in their city, or had the same skin colour, or spoke the same language.

Whether this language is Chinese or English is ultimately irrelevant.

Today 06:24 AM

Good point.

[siledouyaoai]

I read an interesting book on mcdonald's in China and south east Asia recently. It was an anthropological/cultural study of how different people react to the pervasive golden arches, and what that can show us by way of reflection about different cultures. Part of the book which I thought was really interesting was its definition of culture not as a singular body of knowledge, but as a set of reactions that are not set in stone, but shift as the culture reacts to new events (e.g. economic growth, reform and opening, politcal conditions etc). These reactions are often irrational, contradictory and confused, but then i guess that's because culture is made up from people.

I tried to teach 'the culture of western speaking countries' in China, and after two semesters it nearly blew my brain to pieces. I can only pity my students.

[Javer Chen]

country and family. 国and家. Chinese put this before everything.

[jiangl]

country and family. 国and家. Chinese put this before everything.

But, as has been said before in this thread, what society does not appreciate - whether nominally or in practice - country and family? Perhaps the expressions of these values are different, but ultimately I think the values themselves are very common.