Family Culture

 When I say the word "culture" what do you think? 

Often what comes to mind for me, is one of my favorite places in the world. ESPAÑA! When I think of culture I think of a place thriving with life, a place where people from all over the world had an impact on me. I think of a beautiful country where I got to live for a year and a half while learning a different language; eating foods from Africans, Brazilians, Bolivians, Spaniards. Romanians, Russians, Islanders etc. I think of a place thriving with... "culture" a place different from how I grew up. A place that was different because different behaviors were accepted, different languages were taught, different customs were practiced, and where overall the foods, traditions, holidays clothes etc. WERE ALL ....DIFFERENT!!

Now all of this does in fact encompass culture, but what we often skim over, fail to miss, neglect to see; is the idea that culture can also mean FAMILY.  You might think that it's a weird concept, but it's true; every family has their own individual culture, and what is normal in our family might not be normal to another, it kind of ties back into that rules concept from last week. 

Culture can be defined as different ideals, practices, beliefs, behaviors, traditions, attitudes etc. that you have within a group. Each family differs in these concepts, so let me give you an example of some family cultures regarding meal preparation. 

My roommate and I were discussing this week about some of our college guy friends expectations for the woman to do all of the cooking; they come in and they eat, the woman cooks and cleans up. To me, because of my family culture, I think this is a less than ideal way of having meal times in a home. 

Let me explain my family culture a little bit. My family culture is one where although my Dad provides for the family, and my Mom stays home with the kids (you can see some very traditional roles here) no job is specifically assigned to the man or woman. For example, my dad did not expect to come home from work, with his meal plated and on the table; in the same sense my Dad was not expected to do all the "manly chores" such as yardwork, and fixing things. All of these roles were shared and were done simply by whoever got to them first. So mealtime in my family often went like this when I was little; if Dad came home from work and dinner was not on the table, he lovingly took the responsibility upon himself to start cooking, and often others would come in and help him as he went.

Let me explain a different family culture of a friend I know. In his family both parents work, Dad works from home and mom goes to an office to work. In this family, although Dad is home and could easily cook dinner for the family; mom is expected to prepare dinner every single day. If mom gets off late from work, the family does not make dinner, but simply waits until Mom gets home and prepares them something. 

I have another friend, that has a culture of traditional roles in all senses of the word in her family. Dad goes to work, Mom stays home, Dad expects dinner to be on the table when he gets home and if not makes comments like "well I went to work all day ...what did you do."

I will not make a statement on which way a home cooked family meal should be done, all that I am pointing out is that family culture means that the definition of normal is different for each family; and that family culture makes children feel that one way of doing something is "right" while another is not.  Everytime I went in to a home where the Dad didn't cook, I had the perspective that Dad should pull his weight and help where the family needed help; my perspective came from the teachings of my family culture. 

I believe that one of the hardest things for a newly married couple, can sometimes be the merging of  two cultures. Two ways of living have to come together and find out how to make their own culture; and sometimes that's hard because we have to mold, reshape, and adjust the culture that we have known all our life, while still preserving the parts of the culture that you value and think are truly important. 

So here is your challenge for the week:

Think of different aspects of your family culture; choose one aspect that you might want to adjust and one aspect that you hope will last for generations; and then, TALK about it! Talk about it with a friend, talk about it at dinner etc. We learn when we communicate!

Ex: I hope to preserve the family culture of meal time for generations (a culture where everyone helps when needed, it's not one person's specific responsibility, and in the end we all sit down to eat together). My roommate with her future family wants to adjust the dinner culture a little bit (she loves family dinner, but wants to have the family culture of "see a need fill a need," instead of "we wait for mom to cook us dinner.")

This week, I hope you will decide on one family cultural aspect to improve, and one aspect to continue passing on from generation to generation.