Talk:Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture (Group 06)

Carmel brings up an interesting point in thinking about how culture is situated in the argument for structure or agency. Geertz does mention that there is the endless debate of whether culture is "objective" or "subjective" (300). We can think about culture being "objective" in relation to structure in that people participate and are subject to a culture. For example, there are cultures that are attached to ethnicities that one is born into. My Chinese heritage influences aspects of my life such as what I eat, my mannerisms, and celebrated holidays to name a few. This culture is difficult to detatch one's self from though not entirely impossible. Considering agency then we can say that people have the choice whether or not to participate in some cultures. For example people may recognize consummer culture and choose not to participate or not identify with pop culture. Pop culture and consummer culture are largely present in a place like Vancouver however this culture has room for agency.

I agree with what you have said and I think that Geertz's point about ethnography applies to culture being objective or subjectve. He talks about how it is necessary to look at what the practitioners are doing, something that is essential to understanding both the objective and subjective experience. A person's culture may be the ethnicity they are born into or come from the society they live in, but either way, it is crucial to look at a person in order to comprehend how they view this culture, not just looking at the big picture. These subjective experiences are what create "thick descriptions" and allow for new knowledge.

I agree that Geertz points to the individual to allow for "thick descriptions", but I think that part of this stems from the reality that actions can appear the same superficially while in reality being enacted for very different reasons. If we return to the example of cultural heritage, one may participate in enacting their heritage for varying reasons that are not immediately apparent from a "thin description". A second generation immigrant may eat in a culturally specific manner while with their parents, and may appear indistinguishable from them in this context, but could be engaging in the mannerisms for different reasons than their parents themselves are. For example, the parent may view their food culture as an integral part of their identity, while the child may engage in such practices primarily to please their parents. In this way, a "thin description" of what both parent and child are doing misses the "thick description" of the differing meanings that parent and child ascribe to their actions.

I can agree with Madeleine on that because further talking about food culture and how it is a prominent part of displaying our identity but it can also be identified with the thick description of culture. There are instances for example in Chinese culture where the elders would prefer to have dimsum (usually served during breakfast or lunch) and the children (being me and my cousins) would have to conform to having it even if we don't necessarily like it just to please those that are older than us. Especially with my grandparents its more of a tradition and a cultural way of spending time together by consuming this instead of any other cuisine. Having dimsum with those older than you displays other meanings besides conforming to only consuming it because it may be what our parents tell us to do but it brings together meaning of connectedness, respect and the display of continuing on the chinese culture to further generations.

Your dimsum example made me think back to Merton's concept of latent function. Having dimsum as a tradition that initially embedded in the food culture. After reading your example, I realize that having dimsum in the Chinese culture, it also a form that gathers families together, and we can refer to Merton's concept of latent function.

I think this provides such an interesting avenue for looking at tradition (tying it back to Merton even), how it is understood, how it is celebrated, how it changes not only from person to person, but from generation to generation. The changing interpretations of cultural events, and the dismissal or heaving altering of since-steady traditions can lead to a lot of inter-generational friction à la "back in my day we used to play outside...". As a Gen X/millennial, it is honestly soooo satisfying to see archives of evidence shared on facebook of people saying "back in my day" (or some limited variant of this) for such a long time. It makes sense that this is the case, because various traditions that were so crucial and formative for one generation can be so tedious and ancient for the next, and despite this being the nature of passing time, it can be so wrenching when it feels as though such "necessary" rules, norms, and traditions are being broken. I think this is why people become "more conservative as they get older", not necessarily because of any kind of inherent wisdom gained through age (although older folks do have wise insights, at times), because even if they aren't more politically or socially progressive, there will arguably still be many things that older folks see as important to the well-running of a society, because for them it seemed to be (and often was so important), but now it simply isn't.

Hi Nicole, I think it's great that you bring up that Geertz identifies the cultural struggle between objective and subjective. I found this to be particularly interesting if you look at the language that Mead uses to refer to the I self & the Me Self! When we consider how the two theorists converse with each other, we begin to notice where these similarities lie. For example, does Mead use the generalized other as a way of determining the self as the center?

Hi Nicole,

To build on that, I think it's also important (but not covered by the theory) that the principles extend to subcultures! For instance, participation in subcultures such as being a self-proclaimed hipster, an IG foodie, or even subcultures like the 'brony' documentary that we watched in class; all of these similarly inform an individual's understanding of the world, and cause them to act in specific ways that are contrary to the norm, or are not universal. Relative to your example, although typically Chinese people share many traits, you could contrast between Chinese-Born-Canadians, those who immigrated at a young age, those whose families are from Hong Kong versus Taiwan, etc. and still be able to recognize similarities that inform their understanding of the world and unique actions, but also mannerisms that are particular to each subculture as well, each carrying their own meaning.

I agree with you Nicole especially with the growth of technology it really lets people identify these different sub cultures. People have many options for which cultures they want to be apart of and for many people they choose where they want to live based more on the culture they want to be apart of instead of what is convenient or more ideal. There are some cultures that you are born into or raised in but for many sub cultures such as groups online or in person people grow to pick which ones they want to be apart of.

I would also like to add to Carmel's point about individuals having agency over culture. To Geertz, culture is embedded in a person's actions making it concrete and as he said 'public', rather than culture being an abstract concept. Culture is understood through actions and individual perceptions of those actions. Geertz's account of ethnography describes thick description which entails the symbols and meanings of a particular culture while thin description merely considers the facts and ignores interpretations of actions, and this can be recognized with reference to culture as being either subjective or objective. Taking a subjective stance helps one understand the context and meaning of certain actions, thus making one capable of seeing symbols and their consequences in particular cultures. Thick description reveals consumption and transmission of norms and thus what they mean for people in a particular context.

Hi Luky, Thank you for your sharing. Just like what you mentioned about Clifford Geertz's theory, studying and analysing culture are not an experimental science in search of law, it is actually an interpretive one in search of meaning. Culture is semiotic, it is the process of communication among people, it expresses the feelings and emotions of human beings. A single behavior or thoughts are influenced by the culture that people grow up with. I really like the eye contact example you mentioned, in different culture's environment and background, one same behavior, word or thought can have totally different or even opposite meanings.

Hi Carmel, I agree with you that Greetz push us to a further understanding of the symbols as we are in different culture or agency. As a child, they would not consider the deeper meaning of the symbols until we learn through institutions or even social media as we grow up. But one question comes up on my head, as we learned all these deeper meaning of the symbols, does it bring any benefit to the society as these hand motion or other physical posture are created? I think sometimes the symbols would make things more complicated when we try to express our self clearly to people. With the more complex way to send out the message, will people really get it or they just roughly get what you mean?

Hi Rachel, I would agree with you that the gestures, simple expression of condensed meanings, can possibly cause misunderstanding and vagueness, when used between people who do not share the same cultural context, hence, cannot communicate clearly through that specific gesture. It is, however, important to notice that among people within a certain cultural context, body languages that are commonly shared and frequently used as efficient means of communication. People would clearly interpret what it means as those people in that certain culture have been using that gesture to communicate the specific meanings. As Geertz claims, knowing a specific, accurate 'meaning' of a body motion allows people to effectively communicate.

I really think Aram made a good point that gestures are strongly connected with contents. I just want to add that even if the gestures that are not commonly recognized by people, we are still able to interpret, because contents really explain it to us. For example, when I drive through a construction site, the person with stop sign often doing some random waving gestures, but for drivers, they can tell whether and where they should go. Because the content is based on a construction site.

I agree with both of you when you say that when trying to find a deeper meaning to the symbols that we may misinterpret the original message as put forth by the symbol. Having said that though, I still feel like the onus lies on the person who is doing the interpreting, i.e. an ethnographer, to find the meaning behind the symbols. As well as that, creating a debate regarding the meaning of certain symbols is also not necessarily a bad thing. Geertz also tells us that using just the thin description, which is what we would take certain actions at face value, is quite misleading. Without digging deeper into the interpretation of the symbols, the correlations that may be discovered may be false.

Hi, Rachel! Thanks for an interesting question. I agree with you that symbols sometimes make things more complicated when expressing ourselves to others. On that note, I understand why you would ask whether symbols would aid or distract people from understanding the meaning behind it. How I look at it is this: symbols are somewhat double-sided in that it may act as a way to aid some people's understanding while disabling others'. In other words, symbols may be used to enable a more secretive group communication and bonding, enabling the participating members to understand each other more efficiently while disabling non-members from really getting the message being delivered and/or shared.

Hi Anja, another interpretation I got from reading your comment as well as the section in the text was Weber's concept of 'verstehen'. Verstehen can be understood as the need for interprative understanding of social action in order to arrive at causal explanations. In other words, sociology should be done by immersing yourself in the shoes of others to arrive at explanations. Weber puts a lot of emphasis on the complete understanding of things before arriving at conclusions. I feel the example you used stating that 'one needs certain cultural knowledge and the correct context in order to play the violin' conceptualizes this comparison.

To add on to Adriano's point, I think there can be connections made to Merton's idea of social structure and anomie. Institutions need social norms to exist, which exerts a definite pressure upon certain persons in the society to engage in nonconforming rather than conforming conduct. This can be tied to verstehen and the interpretation of thin and thick descriptions through the need of cultural and social context. The thick description can be expressed as being toward an interpretive theory of culture, but there needs to be a cultural understanding and norms in place within a society for individuals to understand and conform to these concepts and ideals of others. Through this and Merton's explanation of cultural goals and institution norms and the equilibrium achieved in society, it can be easier to tie together relating ideas to better understand the functions within it.

I think you did a really good job summarizing and making the section easier to understand! To add on to your description I would like to give an example for what you mean by gestures having different meanings. Like the "okay" hand gesture in the North American context, it mean "okay", it could also mean the number 3 or something silly like a mask if you were to put the "o" part of the gesture in front of your eye. Could anyone else think of any other examples?

I've heard that the gesture of nodding head can mean different things depending on where you're from. For example, in countries like USA and Canada the nodding suggests the person agrees or "yes". However, it's a different story in some other places. In Bulgaria this motion means "no" and in India, instead of the up and down motion, moving our head side-to-side means "Yes". This means that the "thick description" of this motion can be different depending on the place. It is clear that this mismatch in the description could lead to troubles in some cases. If a person came from a culture where nodding means "yes" and someone nodded saying "no", these two would not be able to communicate properly.

I have another interesting example! If you make a gesture in which you use your index finger to poke or point towards your cheek, South Korean people will take it as your attempt to appear cute. On that note, Korean people often ask little children to make this gesture. I have never really seen this occur in Western cultures, so this gesture probably would have a completely different meaning or not be able to deliver any meaning at all in different cultural contexts.

Derrida's quote : "The center is at the center of totality, and yet since the center does not belong to the totality, the totality has at its center elsewhwere..." (pg.320)

I wonder what Geertz would perceive of this quote? Thinking, I conclude that Geertz would agree that individuals start at a certain point with their thoughts. As individuals come to understand what their thoughts are, they either act in accordance to their thoughts, or act with full force against their thoughts. Their deviation from their thoughts, pushes them to create a whole new center, from which again their actions will be based of. However, this center is different form the previous center, as it is surrounded with new attitudes, and emotions. With this we introduce that each reaction will contribute to a new set of action, and the chain effect will continue until we no longer are who we used to be. My belief is that Geertz would be extremely interested in applying thick description to determine how humans create this mindset shift, and how much do we actually differ from our "original selves".

We can even add in Merton, to this conversation. In Merton's case he would agree with Geertz, suggesting that his latent and manifest functions are a strong basis to understand if individuals intend for this change to happen, or if social action is a phenomenon that works independently.

I think this is an interesting perspective on Geertz's thoughts of Merton's center. An individual's thoughts help to create a center as thoughts are fluid and a person's creativity knows no bounds. However, the problem is that there will always be a larger social structure or center within society that helps to guide a person's thoughts and possibly restricting it's 'play' in some way. For example, for an isolated individual that has never seen or heard of a computer will not be able to create a system of thought that relates to advanced machinery for a person's thoughts is arguably mostly related to what one knows and experienced in the past. The process of creating a new center is definitely not impossible, but very rare and unlikely.