Why do American children sleep alone instead of with their
parents? Why do middle-aged Western women yearn for their youth,
while young wives in India look forward to being middle-aged? In
these provocative essays, one of the most brilliant advocates of
cultural psychology reminds us that cultural differences in mental
life lie at the heart of any understanding of the human
condition.
Drawing on ethnographic studies of the distinctive modes of
psychological functioning in communities around the world, Richard
Shweder explores ethnic and cultural differences in ideals of
gender, in the life of the emotions, in conceptions of mature
adulthood and the stages of life, and in moral judgments about
right and wrong.
Shweder, a cultural pluralist, dares readers to broaden their
own conceptions of what is good, true, beautiful, and efficient and
to take a closer look at specific cultural practices--parent/child
cosleeping, arranged marriage, male and female genital
modifications--that we may initially find alien or disturbing. He
invites us to reject both radical relativism (the view that
whatever is, is okay) and imperial visions of universal progressive
cultural development (for example, the idea that "the West is
Best") and to engage in more deeply informed cultural critique.
The knowable world, Shweder observes, is incomplete if seen
from any one point of view, incoherent if seen from all points of
view at once, and empty if seen from nowhere in particular. This
work strives for the "view from manywheres" in a culturally diverse
yet interdependent world.
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