Fw: Parenting across cultures

[Tabouli]

No: HPFGUIDX 35519

[Note: I cleared this post with the Mods before sending it, as I was aware that it was totally OT, but wanted to respond to Jo Ellen's comments on-list.  Any further responses on this thread should go to OT-Chatter]



Just read Jo Ellen's response to my amendment to the "Parenting Across Cultures" post, to which I've responded off-list.  I'll restrain myself to an on-list paraphrase of that post here (hopefully not sounding too abrupt in the process...)

1. My first paragraph was *comparative*, referring to averages.  On average, people in the US are more emotionally expressive than Australians.  I didn't mean there were no expressive Aussies or repressed Americans by any means.  I would, however, venture that the typical Australian eyeroll threshold is one of the, if not the, lowest in the world!

2.  I am well, well aware that most Americans can't afford therapy.  All the same, don't Oprah, soapies, movies, etc. still expose all Americans who can afford a televison to the sort of language I mentioned, to some degree?

3. On the subject of "great leaps in judging US culture", my comments were (a) referring to a cultural *ideal*, which is NOT the same thing as the cultural *norm* or the *majority*.  It's not at all uncommon for approximating the cultural ideal to be the domain of the privileged.  Also (b) referring to individualist cultures in general, not the US in particular.

(I live in Australia, hence I have first hand experience of an individualist culture and parenting styles therein.  And have worked for 10 years with people *not* raised in individualist cultures who come to Australia and struggle with the level of independence expected, the need to be assertive, the very concept of "rights", etc.etc.  To some degree, I'm one of them)

4. I'm not actually criticising those who reject "democratic" parenting!  I've been told repeatedly by RL people that parents inevitably discover they have to be more authoritarian than they intended as a starry eyed naive childless person.  No doubt I will too, though I intend to aim at a more democratic style than I received if I have any children.  I'm not totally ignorant on the subject of rearing children - my last partner had two, for a start, and my friends who are parents get sick of my perpetual analytical questioning and observation on the subject of parenting...

5. I'm not basing my comments on watching a few TV programs and reading books on US childrearing... I'm basing them on cross-cultural theories and research (most of which is *written* by Americans!).

Anyway, enough of this on the main list... if anyone wants to discuss this topic further, or delve into my qualifications or explanations for my comments, you're welcome to send them to OT-Chatter or to me personally off-list!

Tabouli (steeling herself)


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