Customer Reviews

Beyond Culture

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's amazing to me that the (brilliantly simple) ideas found in this book aren't more a part of public consciousness and discussion, especially 25 years after its publication. These aren't high-flying concepts. They're experimentally proven and frighteningly basic revelations about how humans function, and the fact that they were never a part of my curriculum in one of the best prep schools in the country and then a top Ivy League school simply drives home Hall's point about the state of academia. My only complaint is that the book jumps around quickly and doesn't always spend as much time as I'd like on particular threads. It also isn't particularly actionable, but given its conclusions this is not surprising. I recommend Maps of Meaning by Jordan Peterson for another fascinating look at how the cross-cultural human psyche is configured. It's a powerful counterpoint to the fashionable but vacuous idea that everything in culture is an arbitrary construct, unconnected to millions of years of evolution of the human organism.

This is a brilliant book. I thoroughly enjoyed it and am looking forward to reading more of Hall.

Hall was one of the influences on Robert Moran, a professor who teaches Cross-Cultural Communications at the American Graduate School of International Management (see his book "Managing Cultural Differences"). Although Moran and his co-authors draw on dozens of sources, somehow Hall and his concept of Low-Context and High-Context cultures made a big impression on me in Moran's class. My only regret is having waited so long to actually read this classic.

Hall introduces the concept of context as an human behavioral influence. A high-context situation is one in which much of the communication is non-verbal or understood because of the shared context. He characterizes societies as being either low-context, which are typical of northern Europe, or high-context, most dramatically represented by Japan. Context even affects language, and human speech patterns will change, depending upon who they are speaking to and the context of the communication.

I also thought that his concept of `action chains' was perceptive. An AC is a sequence of events in which two or more individuals participate. Shaking hands is a simple chain; becoming engaged is a more complex one. Again, different cultures vary in their emphasis on completing action chains. An American may be very casual about dropping an ongoing chain, which may be very negatively received in other cultures.

His chapter "Culture as an Irrational Force" is full of good common-sense advice on getting along with other people. Hall has provided advice to diplomats and corporate executives, and his book reflects this practical experience. While it delves into theory, his concepts always have a concrete application.

I found his next-to-last chapter, "Culture as an Irrational Force," entertaining, but I had to agree with much of its overt overt political agenda. He has some very strong political opinions on human institutions and the declining state of academia. According to Hall, "Bureacracies have no soul, no memory, and no conscience."

Certainly, anyone interested in cross-cultural communications would benefit from this book. At a time when both America and Europe are dealing with immigration issues, this is also an helpful text to help build an awareness of cultural underpinnings that can otherwise be negatively interpreted, leading to misunderstanding and prejudice.

Hall provides us with simple but logical comments on culture and its influence on behavior. Leading us from his first experiences as anthropologist to the creation of his well- known communication theory (high- & low-context communication). What does culture do for us in our daily-lifes? Do we have to look at it from a neutral point of view or is it just one more issues we should feel guilty about? His journey through culture helps us identifying key-issues that all of us should care about in general. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.

I read this book for the first time over 20 years ago after I graduated from college with an unrelated science major which I found loathesome and never used. I had already read "The Hidden Dimension" when working with an architect. I am not about to read this one again due to its complexity and the fact it "sunk in" then. Here are some of Hall's highlights:

Ch. 1 (The Paradox of Culture): "One wonders how many individuals who have been forced to adjust to eight-hour, nine-to-five schedules have sacrificed their creativity, and what the social and human cost of this sacrifice has been."

Ch. 3 (Consistency and Life): "He is forced into the position of thinking and feeling that anyone whose behavior is not predictable or is peculiar in any way is slightly out of his mind, improperly brought up, irresponsible, psychopathic, politically motivated to a point beyond all redemption, or just plain inferior."

Ch. 7 (Contexts, High and Low): "... in high context systems, people in places of authority are personally and truly (not just in theory) responsible for the actions of subordinates down to the lowest man. In low context systems, responsibility is diffused throughout the system and difficult to pin down ..."

Ch. 11 (Covert Culture and Action Chains): "The investigation of out-of-awareness culture can be accomplished only by actual observation of real events in normal settings and contexts. ... Culture is therefore very closely related to if not synonymous with what has been defined as "mind".

Ch. 12 (Imagery and Memory): "Our problems in education are exacerbated by eductional systems and philosophies that stress verbal facility at the expense of other important parts of man's mind ..."

Ch. 13 (Cultural and Primate Bases of Education): "One reason psychotherapy is so slow is that in order to change one thing it is necessary to alter the entire psyche, because the different parts of the psyche are functionally interrelated."

Ch. 13: Over bureaucratization: "The problem with bureaucracies is that they have to work hard and long to keep from substituting self-serving survival and growth for their original primary objective. ... Bureaucracies have no soul, no memory and no conscience."

Ch. 14 (Culture as an Irrational Force): "Since the men and women responsible for these [anthropological] studies for the most part are both well trained in Anglo-American social science methodology and well motivated, one can only assume that there is something basically wrong with the way in which social science research is often conducted."

This is not Hall's best known book but it incorporates many of the ideas that were originally presented in the Silent Language and applies them to culture. The idea of monochronic (M-Time) and polychronic time (P-Time) are briefly summarised as well. The underlying concept of Beyond Culture is that man is an evolutionary being and although we cannot evolve to adapt to our environment at the rate of insects we can continue to evolve through extensions. These extensions are the things we create such as fire and tools at the basic level and cars, computers, and mobile phones at the more complex level. In this way we have continued to evolve beyond the limits of our biology.

In a similar sense, culture is an extension of our personal being and is used to prevent us from having to explain every little detail. Regardless of whether a culture is "high" or "low" it contains a body of knowledge that provides for ease of communication among members. He develops this idea in the concept of action chains which is a sequence in which several people participate. Culture is by its nature participatory and understanding action chains within a culture can help us to understand how to prevent ourselves from running aground in a culture different from our own.

He also looks at culture and education and lampoons the current state of higher education in the western context. I find this somewhat unwarranted. He concludes with chapters on the irrationality of culture and our identification with culture. However irrational a culture may be to those who identify with it it makes perfect sense.

I do not always agree with the interpretation of cultural examples that he cites but his ideas are interesting and can be helpful in understanding cross/intercultural experiences. I would recommend this book to those who are, at least in passing, with his overall concepts of culture.

Since other reviewers have summarized this book, my suggestion is to read it with present-day work environments in mind. There is an increasing emphasis of Diversity and Globalization in the workplace. This book can be difficult to wade through, but the concepts stick with you. It was very easy to take the concepts and compare them to the daily situations of working in a multi-cultural corporate environment. Sometimes the best information, is from an original source or work. I would suggest reading this, just because Hall's premises still bear the brunt of time and provide that "ah-ha" awareness to an experience.

If you're reading this, you will really appreciate Beyond Culture.

It is a most annoying book. A lot of books have a hook, clearly displayed on the cover, which is described repeatedly from every angle throughout the book.

This one has deep thoughts time and again. You read a page, perhaps two, and put down the book to feel how it relates to your life and experience. Then you must pick up the book again to look for the next nugget. And there - another set of thoughts that resonate with you.

If you are still reading this review, I cannot overly recommend that you embrace this book.

This book had so many "YES!!!" moments for me that I hardly know where to touch down. The way Hall describes how to recognize the differences between low and high context cultures is awesome. This guy clearly was a heavyweight having been all over the world and studied this stuff for decades.

If you need to learn why someone from another culture is so different from you, this book is an excellent tool. It's in plain and understandable English and there are a lot of examples to explain the concepts he puts forth. All of it just makes complete sense. Great great book!

Edward Hall is officially my hero when it comes to cross-cultural issues.

Beyond culture is a classic in cultural and anthropological literature. The book was originally written in 1976 and part of the content and research is somewhat dated at the time of this review (2010). I found it a hard to read book (mainly language-wise) but still worth reading. The book had average parts mixed with truly insightful parts and stories.

The book explores a broad amount of subjects and discusses how they are all interrelated -- from depletion of resources to misalignment of education and the human body. These are all driven by culture and the disability of people to recognize the impact culture has on their thinking and behavior. People become more aware of their own culture when interacting with other cultures... in fact, perhaps understanding of your own culture is perhaps the key learning when studying other cultures.

The book consists of 15 chapters, all relative short. Chapters sometimes cover completely different topics, yet always relate back to the main thread of the book... transcending culture by better recognition of your own culture. The first couple of chapters introduce concepts which are used throughout the book. A key concept introduced is the idea of humans creating 'extensions' (tools) which perform functions that previously were performed by the body. The extensions are able to develop faster than the human body.

Early chapters cover differences in cultures related to different experience of time (S-time and P-time), different experience of rhythm and different experience of space. Edward Hall is well-known for the concepts of low-context and high-context cultures, which are introduced in six to eight.

Later chapters discuss human and culture from different perspectives. Chapter ten introduces the action chains which provide a way of analyzing cultural situations. Later chapters cover the functioning of the brain and how this relates to education, cultural irrationality, and identification.

The language in the book was hard to read (which is interesting as the author several times criticizes language). At times, the author used too much words or jumped too fast from topic to topic (for me). Still, parts of the book were truly insightful. Because of the language and the out-of-date-ness, I was doubting between 3 and 4 stars, but as the book is truly insightful at times, I decided four stars. Recommended for people looking for interesting cultural insights.

I've always found Hall's books to be interesting and relevant to my life from business to spirituality and this book has lived up to that same expectation. In this book Hall, discusses inter-cultural communication patterns and raises up concerns about the tendency to focus toward using external resources as opposed to examining and utilizing internal, behavior skills. I find this relevant in an age where more than ever the focus is on using technology to communicate, with all the inherent problems that brings, especially when relying on text only to interact. This is a useful book for exploring cross cultural communication and examining the increasing role of technology in communication.