How the West was one : the Western as individualist, the African as communitarian
- Authors: Metz, Thaddeus
- Date: 2014-12-22
- Subjects: Communitarianism , Individualism , Western philosophy
- Type: Article
- Identifier: uj:5622 , ISSN 00131857 , http://hdl.handle.net/10210/14650
- Description: There is a kernel of truth in the claim that Western philosophy and practice of education is individualistic; theory in Euro-America tends to prize properties that are internal to a human being, such as her autonomy, rationality, knowledge, pleasure, desires, self-esteem and self- realisation, and education there tends to adopt techniques focused on the individual placed at some distance from others. What is striking about other philosophical–educational traditions in the East and the South is that they are typically much more communitarian. I argue that since geographical terms such as 'Western', 'African' and the like are best construed as picking out properties that are salient in a region, it is fair to conclude that the Western is individualist and that the African is communitarian. What this means is that if I am correct about a noticeable contrast between philosophies of education typical in the West and in sub-Saharan Africa, and if there are, upon reflection, attractive facets of communitarianism, then those in the West and in societies influenced by it should in some real sense become less Western, in order to take them on.
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Organisatoriese doeltreffendheid in Suid-Afrika en Japan.
- Authors: Spoelstra, H.I.J. , Raubenheimer, I. van W.
- Date: 1981
- Subjects: Organisational practices , Individualism , Groupism , Organisational effectiveness
- Type: Article
- Identifier: uj:6544 , http://hdl.handle.net/10210/2743
- Description: In different cultures various work values determine organisational practises which in turn tend to determine effectiveness. Three cultural groups namely Japanese, White South Africans and Black South Africans are compared by means of a questionnaire determining relative emphasis on the values of individualism and gregariousness (groupism). Attitudes of the various cultures with respect to organisational practises are also measured using an attitude scale. The data are analysed by means of descriptive statistics and discriminate analysis. Results show that although basic values are the same for White South Africans and Japanese their actual hierarchical structures differ. The gregarious characteristic of the Japanese appears to be to a large extent responsible for their organisational effectiveness. Further research concerning the values of Black workers is suggested.
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The relationship between individualism/collectivism, locus of control and sense of coherence
- Authors: Bayne, Gregory
- Date: 2011-02-28T06:19:16Z
- Subjects: Social change , Stress (Psychology) , Personality and culture , Locus of control , Adjustment (Psychology) , Individualism , Coherence (Psychology)
- Type: Thesis
- Identifier: uj:7036 , http://hdl.handle.net/10210/3558
- Description: M.A. , The primary objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between Locus of Control, Individualism/Collectivism and Sense of Coherence between two groups of participants by using three measures. The study will also investigate the significance of the relationship between Locus of Control and the Individualism/Collectivism, and between Sense of Coherence and Locus of Control. The motivation for the study stems from a question regarding how cultural perceptual style interacts with personality traits to influence a person's Sense of Coherence. A further question faced by all South Africans, regards how one adapts to the cultural changes being experienced in the country, while at the same time maintaining a sense of self·identity. While there are many possible questions, this study will focus on investigating the interaction between the three constructs of Sense of Coherence. Locus of Control, and Individualism/Collectivism. The three core constructs of Sense of Coherence. Locus of Control, and Individualism/Collectivism are defined as follows: • Antonovsky (1987) defines Sense of Coherence as a global orientation that expresses the extent to which one has a pervasive. enduring though dynamic feeling of confidence as a function of one's sense of comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness. • Locus of Control refers to a generalised disposition. acquired from past experience, to believe that rewards either are, or are not, controllable by a person's own efforts. Such that those who are externally oriented hold the view that their success is due to factors outside their control such as chance and luck while internally oriented persons attribute success to their personal effort and ability. • Individualism and Collectivism are cultural perceptual styles which indicate whether individuals acts largely for their self interests, or in regard for collective group harmony.
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The relationship between university students' background characteristics, individualism-collectivism scores and intercultural attitudes
- Authors: Wagendorp, Ingrid
- Date: 2008-11-14T14:18:40Z
- Subjects: College students' attitudes , Cross-cultural studies , Intergroup relations , Individualism , Collectivism
- Type: Thesis
- Identifier: uj:14690 , http://hdl.handle.net/10210/1683
- Description: M.A. , The recent social and political changes that have taken place in South Africa, particularly the integration of the universities, makes this an ideal setting for the study of students’ attitudes and perceptions of their own and other cultural groups. A limitation of existing attitude studies in South Africa and abroad is that these studies have focussed minimally on identifying cultural perceptual processes that underlie intergroup attitudes. In addition, these studies tend to focus mainly on the attitudes of single ethno-cultural groups towards one or a few specific ethnic target groups. The variation of group attitudes of each other across diverse cultural orientation groups has thus mostly been neglected. In order to address such problems, this study aimed at examining cultural group attitudes and core value-orientations (Individualism and Collectivism) amongst 1st and 2nd year psychology volunteer students at RAU. More specifically, this study aimed at determining the variation of group attitudes and value-orientations in terms of a number of independent variables, and the correlation between group attitudes and core value-orientations. The study employed a questionnaire survey with a sample of 541 1st and 2nd year psychology volunteer students at RAU. The sample included male and female students from the broad cultural orientation groups (Western, African, Middle-Eastern (Muslim) and Indian/Asian cultural orientation groups), and the three main language groups (English, Afrikaans and African languages), as well as resident students and day-students from various faculties and academic years of study. The assessment instruments comprised of an Individualism and Collectivism Likert Scale (IS/CS) (Gudykunst, 1995), designed to measure generalised core value-orientations, and a Semantic Differential Scale (SDS) (Nieuwoudt, 1973), designed to measure attitudes towards five broad cultural orientation groups, namely: Western-Afrikaans, Western-English, Indian/Asian, Middle-Eastern (Muslim) and Indigenous African groups. The independent variables included in the analyses of the data were: gender, resident vs. day-students (intimacy and frequency of contact variable), cultural group membership/identity, and first language. The construct validity and the internal reliability of the I/CS and SDS were investigated by means of principal axis factor analysis and Cronbach alpha reliability coefficients. Independent t-tests were used to identify statistically significant differences between the IS/CS and SDS scores of the male and female respondents and the resident students and day-students. ANOVA and subsequent Scheffé or Dunnett T3 post-hoc tests were used to identify the group similarities and differences in the scores for the five cultural-identity groups and the three language groups. Finally, Pearsons’ product-moment correlations were used to identify significant correlations between the IS/CS and SDS scores. Important findings were the following: • Females indicated significantly stronger Individualism and Collectivism scores than males. • Day-students indicated significantly stronger Collectivism scores than resident students. • Statistically significant differences were identified in the IS/CS scores of the five cultural-identity groups and the three language groups. • Males and females differed significantly from one another in terms of their perceptions of Indian/Asian cultural groups. • Resident students and day-students differed significantly from one another in terms of their perceptions of Western-Afrikaans and African cultural groups. • The five cultural-orientation groups and the three language groups differed significantly from one another in terms of their perceptions of Western-Afrikaans, Western-English and African cultural groups. • Significant correlations for the Collectivism scores and the SDS scores for the perceptions of the Western-English, Indian/Asian, Middle-Eastern and African cultures were identified. These correlations were however extremely low, indicating that conducting a regression analysis of the SDS attitude scores in terms of the IS/CS scores was not feasible. Theoretical implications were discussed and recommendations were made for future research in this field.
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