Rigoberta Menchú Tum
© Getty Images/Bloomberg
Menchú’s father started a group to fight the repression of the indigenous and poor, and at 20, Menchú joined the movement, Comité de Unidad Campesina (CUC, meaning “Peasant Unity Committee”), which the government claimed was communist inspired. Her father was murdered during a military assault, and her mother was tortured and killed. Menchú moved to Mexico with many other exiles to continue their nonviolent fight for rights and democracy.
The values of the native population represented by Menchú focus on respect for and a profound spiritual relationship with the environment, equality of all people, freedom from economic oppression, the dignity of her culture, and the benefits of cooperation over competition. The landowners tended to stress freedom of people to pursue their individual self-interests (even if inequality resulted), the value of competition, and the right to own property and to do whatever one desired to exploit that property for economic gain. Individual property rights were thought to be more important than preservation of indigenous cultures. Economic growth and profits were held in higher regard than religious connectedness to the earth.
The values of the native population and those of the landowners are in conflict. Only time will tell if the work of Indian activists such as Rigoberta Menchú Tum and her family will make a difference in the lives of this indigenous population.
Thinking Sociologically
The experiences of Rigoberta Menchú Tum provide some examples of clashes between dominant and less powerful groups within a single nation. What are some examples of cultural conflict among groups in your society? Which (if any) reflect the types of cultural clashes experienced by Rigoberta? How do these conflicts impact the stability of the overall society? Why?
The conflict in values between First Nations and the national cultures of Canada, the United States, and many Latin American countries has had serious consequences. For example, cooperation is a cultural value that has been passed on through generations of Native Americans. Their survival has always depended on group cooperation in the hunt, in war, and in daily life. The value of cooperation can place native children at a disadvantage in North American schools that emphasize competition. Native American and Canadian First Nations children experience more success in classrooms that stress cooperation and sociability over competition and individuality (Lake 1990; Mehan 1992).
Beliefs are ideas we hold about life, about the way society works, and about where we fit into the world. They are expressed as specific statements that we hold to be true. Many Hindus, for example, believe that fulfilling behavioral expectations of one’s own social caste will lead to rewards in one’s next birth, or incarnation. In the next life, good people will be born into a higher social status. In contrast, some Christians believe that one’s fate in the afterlife depends on whether one believes in certain ideas—for instance, that Jesus Christ is one’s personal savior. Beliefs come from traditions established over time, sacred scriptures, experiences people have had, and lessons given by parents and teachers or other individuals in authority. Beliefs, based on values, influence the choices we make. For example, one value might be that the environment is worth preserving. A belief based on that value would be that humans should make efforts to curb climate change.
Values and beliefs, as elements of nonmaterial culture, are expressed in two forms: an ideal culture and a real culture. Ideal culture consists of practices, beliefs, and values regarded as most desirable in society, and are consciously taught to children. Not everyone, however, follows the approved cultural patterns, even though people may say they do. Sometimes our values contradict one another. Real culture refers to the way things in society are actually done. For example, family time and money are both highly valued in U.S. society. However, in order to make money, we often have to sacrifice time with our families.
Norms are rules of behavior shared by members of a society and rooted in the value system. Examples include our rather routine behaviors, from saying “Hi” to people we meet to obeying traffic signs. Norms range from religious warnings such as “Thou shalt not kill” to the expectation in many societies that young people will complete their high school education. Sometimes the origins of particular norms are clear. Few people wonder, for instance, why there is a norm to stop and look both ways at a stop sign. Other norms, such as the rule in many societies that women should wear skirts but men should not, have been passed on through the generations and have become unconsciously accepted patterns and a part of tradition. Sometimes we may not know how norms originated or even be aware of norms until they are violated.
Norms generally fall into two categories—folkways and mores—based largely on their importance and people’s response to the breach of those norms. Folkways are customs and usually desirable behaviors, but they are not strictly enforced. Examples of folkways include responding appropriately and politely when introduced to someone, speaking quietly in a library, not scratching your genitals in public, using proper table manners, and covering your mouth when you cough. Violation of these norms causes people to think you are weird or even uncouth but not necessarily immoral or criminal.
Mores are norms that most members observe because they have great moral significance in a society. Conforming to mores is a matter of right and wrong, and violations of many mores are treated very seriously. The person who deviates from mores is considered immoral or criminal. Being faithful in a marriage has been among the stronger mores in U.S. society, though this has been gradually changing with high-profile cases in the news. Table 3.3 provides examples of violations of folkways and mores.
▼ Table 3.3
Taboos are the strongest form of mores. They concern actions considered unthinkable or unspeakable in the culture. For example, most societies have taboos that forbid incest (sexual relations with a close relative) and prohibit defacing or eating a human corpse. Taboos are most common and numerous in societies without centralized governments to establish formal laws and to maintain jails.
Taboos and other moral codes are of the utmost importance to a group because they provide guidelines for what is right and wrong. Yet behaviors that are taboo in one situation may be acceptable at another time and place. The incest taboo is an example found in most cultures, yet the application of the incest taboo varies greatly across cultures. Ivory Coast and China have no laws forbidding incest except in special cases, and many countries qualify what blood relatives can marry under what circumstances (Quora 2016). In medieval Europe, if a man and a woman were within seven degrees of relatedness and wanted to marry, the marriage could be denied by the priest as incestuous. (Your first cousin is a third degree of relatedness from you.) Of course, in Europe, exceptions were made for the royal families, where cousins often married. By contrast, the Balinese sometimes permit twins to marry because it is believed they have already been intimately bonded together in the womb (Henley 2008; Leslie and Korman 1989). In some African and Native American societies, one cannot marry a sibling but might be expected to marry a first cousin. As Table 3.4 illustrates, the definition of what is and what is not incest varies even from state to state in the United States (Greenspan 2018).
▼ Table 3.4
Source: Wikipedia 2018.
Laws are norms formally encoded by those holding political power in society, such as laws against stealing property or killing another person. The violator of a law is likely to be perceived not just as a weird or an immoral person but also as a criminal who deserves formal punishment. Many mores are passed
