Watch the short home page video clips from “An Idiot Abroad”. Then look up the definitions for culture shock and ethnocentrism.
It is impossible to completely understand another person’s culture because you can really only see their behaviors, not their ideas, values or beliefs. However, we as anthropologists strive to use cultural relativism to view the world. This means we try to understand another’s culture from their viewpoint. We aren’t, of course, always able to avoid judging.
Please share a time when you experienced culture shock.
