Chinese Culture Article Discussion
Uploaded by Doraemon on Jan 03, 2005
Chinese Culture
In Andrew Nathan's article, "Is Chinese Culture Distinctive? - A Review Article," he attempts to compare and contrast two types of research approaches to answer the question, is Chinese culture truly unique. Nathan analyzes the hermeneutic approach versus the positivist approach. The article explains the differences and similarities between the two approaches and uses Chinese Culture as the means to explain the approaches. Although the topic of the uniqueness of culture is an interesting topic, Nathan does not specifically state what makes culture, moreover Chinese culture, unique. Instead the article describes the difference of opinion in the hermeneutic argument versus the positivist argument.
The article uses comparison to define the differences of Chinese culture versus other cultures. Nathan states in the beginning of his paper, "In analyzing differences, two operations are involved: abstraction (of characteristic to be compared) and comparison. These moves are often made in order to take a third step: to use the differences in culture to explain a difference in some societal outcome..." (Nathan, 924). Obviously, Chinese culture, like any other culture, is filled with its' own traditions and history which makes it unique to its people. What is lacking, however, is the comparison of Chinese culture to other Asian, or Eastern, cultures. Western culture versus Eastern culture is filled with greater differences then that of within Eastern culture. However, what makes Chinese culture different from that of any other Asian culture was not explained. Furthermore, comparing the differences between two Eastern cultures would better answer the question of whether or not Chinese culture truly is distinctive.
Nathan states that the hermeneutic approach "views culture as a historically shaped, socially shared set of symbols..." (Nathan, 924) while the positivist approach view "... culture as a distribution among a population of specifiable and identifiable attitudes, values, and beliefs" (Nathan, 928) and further goes to say that the correct method of studying culture is neither one approach or another, but rather a mixture of the two. Within his analysis of the two approaches, characteristics of Chinese cultures are touched upon. Nathan, however, never goes passed the normal stereotypes of Chinese culture and thus does not analyze Chinese culture in depth. The article mentions the stereotypical characteristics of Chinese culture such as ancestral worship and universal kinship. Both ideas, however...