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What is the difference between cultural appropriation and cultural appreciation?
What is cultural appreciation?
How do you know if a culture is appropriation?
Why is cultural appropriation important?
What does it mean to appreciate a culture?
Is cultural appropriation a trend or a fad?
Sep 18, 2024 · What is Cultural Appreciation? In contrast to cultural appropriation, cultural appreciation (also known as cultural exchange) refers to the respectful sharing of ideas, traditions, and practices between cultures in a way that considers all context and meaning.
- Overview
- What’s the short answer?
- What does it mean to appreciate a culture other than your own?
- What does it mean to appropriate a culture other than your own?
- How do you know which one you’re doing?
- Why does it matter?
- What steps can you take to appreciate rather than appropriate?
- What if you miss the mark?
- Are there certain things you should simply avoid saying or doing?
- Where can you learn more?
Cultural influences abound in the food you eat, the music you listen to, and perhaps even the clothing you wear or the decor in your home.
Sharing culture is generally positive. Someone who chooses to share parts of their culture can spread information about their beliefs, history, and way of life.
You, in turn, get the opportunity to learn more about another culture and share yours as well.
This exchange can lead to a better understanding of and appreciation for perspectives and traditions different from your own.
But as you probably learned in your kindergarten days, sharing and taking are two different things.
Similarly, appreciating another culture and appropriating aspects of that culture are also two very different things — though many people aren’t quite sure where one ends and the other begins.
Appropriation happens when members of one culture adopt specific aspects of a different culture without consent.
Often the people doing the appropriating belong to a privileged group, while the people they take from belong to an oppressed or marginalized group.
Cultural appropriation leads to a narrow look at other cultures and often exploitation of those cultures.
In contrast, appreciation involves a desire for knowledge and deeper understanding of a culture.
People who truly want to appreciate a culture offer respect to members of that culture and their traditions by participating only when invited to do so.
Appreciation provides an opportunity to share ideas and cultural awareness.
Appreciating another culture involves an interest in learning about that culture.
You share your knowledge only with permission and always credit people who belong to that culture. Cultural appreciation also involves fair compensation.
If you do purchase art, clothing, or other items, you buy directly from creators. Plus, you take the time to learn the significance behind the item and how it should or shouldn’t be used.
For example, buying a set of chopsticks to eat with is perfectly acceptable. Using those same chopsticks as a hair accessory is not.
In general, you’re probably appreciating a culture if you:
•have permission to use cultural elements
The difference between appropriation and appreciation can get a little complicated.
In short, if your use of cultural items or practices exploits that culture in any way, you’re appropriating — whether you realize it or not.
Other markers of appropriation include presenting elements of a culture in ways that:
•give a skewed or inaccurate perspective of that culture
•reinforce stereotypes
•conflict with the intended use of those elements
Context matters when it comes to telling appreciation and appropriation apart.
Say you’re an exchange student, and your host family invites you to wear traditional clothes to participate in an annual celebration. This is perfectly fine. Your participation helps you learn more about their culture, a key reason behind your desire to study abroad.
If your host family gifts you those clothes, you might bring them home and treasure them, but you certainly wouldn’t want to wear them as a Halloween costume.
But what if your school asked you to give a speech about your homestay at an upcoming culture night? Could you wear them then?
Here’s where things can get a little confusing. You want to share your experiences in another country, but not at the expense of someone who belongs to that culture.
Perhaps you decide to wear the clothes but include in your presentation some photographs of your host family at the celebration to help illustrate when traditional dress is typically worn.
When people take elements of another culture for their own use, they often adopt certain aspects and reject others that don’t interest them, instead of trying to understand the culture as a whole.
This belittles the significance behind cultural items or practices.
Many American sports teams use totem poles, headdresses, “native dances,” and “war cries” that mock Indigenous practices. This appropriation ignores the fact that white settlers forced many Native Americans to give up their culture, and they criticized as “heathen” and “savage” the sacred traditions that are now misrepresented for profit.
Since appropriation tends to romanticize or sexualize certain cultural elements, it can perpetuate stereotypes and racism. It also drowns out the voices of people who belong to a given culture by giving outsiders who’ve appropriated it more space.
If you’re concerned you might have mistakenly appropriated cultural elements in the past, these tips can help you do better in the future:
•Choose books, music, art, and food that originate from and accurately represent specific cultures, instead of “culturally inspired” experiences.
•To amplify cultural voices, look for books, essays, or other creative works written by members of the culture, instead of works by outsiders looking in.
•Purchase art and other cultural items from the creator.
•When studying other cultures, take the time to learn how to correctly pronounce names of people and places.
•Skip terms taken from other cultures, such as calling your friends your “tribe” or saying you have a “spirit animal.”
Appropriation can still happen when you don’t intend to cause harm.
If someone calls you out, the only good response is to apologize and adjust your behavior immediately.
You might disagree, but do some research of your own before making excuses or insisting on your right to use the item, wear the clothing, or say the word.
Though the person calling you out might have an explanation about why something is appropriative, you should always be ready to learn on your own instead of looking to others to educate you.
Say you find a fancy candle holder at a thrift shop. You aren’t Jewish, so you have no idea it’s a menorah, a special candelabra that has deep significance in Judaism.
You bring it home and fill it with candles, but one day a friend notices it and seems very confused. “I didn’t know you were Jewish,” they say.
Certain behaviors are never appreciative.
Always avoid:
•dressing up as someone from another culture as a costume
•wearing blackface
•wearing clothing or jewelry with religious or spiritual significance when you don’t practice that religion
•any behavior that stereotypes or puts down members of another culture
Sep 5, 2020 · There's a big difference between cultural appropriation and cultural appreciation. If you show love and appreciation for parts of a culture, such as clothing, hairstyles, or accessories, but...
- Henry Blodget
Jun 30, 2021 · The appropriation vs appreciation debate is a nuanced one, but perhaps the easiest way of describing the difference is this – appropriation either mocks or ridicules a culture, or involves...
- John Wiley & Sons
Nov 15, 2023 · In contrast to cultural appropriation, cultural appreciation embodies a respectful and informed approach to engaging with elements from cultures other than one’s own. It’s about celebrating diversity in a way that honors and respects the cultural sources.
Jul 13, 2021 · Lipsitz, writing in the the 1990s, argued that cultural appreciation becomes cultural appropriation “when an element of culture is adopted from a marginalized group without respect for its...
Nov 1, 2021 · Appreciating culture often involves community, connection, and learning, whereas appropriation is typically an individual choice influenced by popular media. So, what are some ways to celebrate a culture without exploiting it?
