The Importance of Cultural Awareness

Why is it important to study other cultures?

It is important to study other cultures because if you don’t learn about other cultures you could get the totally wrong idea about anything, or you could just be self-centered about your culture and start something bad. People who don’t know anything about other cultures beside their own can develop a phobia/fear, called xenophobia. Xenophobia is a fear of other cultures, it can make you angry at another culture for no reason. It affects many people worldwide and still is continuing to be a bad thing that can start wars, cause innocent people to die, and much worse situations. Researchers say about 150,000 people have Xenophobia and the numbers don’t seem to stop rising.

Culture is very important to learn about and can affect your life greatly, people who have learned about other cultures than their own have even switched over to new religions. People who have switched over have met new people, started a new life, etc. The people who are eager/willing to learn about new cultures have been proven to be happier in life and even caused other people to be happier as well. Some people who hate other religions different from their own think it is extremely sinful and bad to not follow their culture, they may hate someone they have never met for no explained reason. Those kind of ignorant people have caused bad things to happen, whether it be 9/11 or even breaking up a family or hurting someone.

In reality other cultures can be something great. There are hundreds of thousands of religions that you can look into, like for example if you are Christian, you could potentially want to become Muslim because you think that their gods are terrific! You have freedom to be whoever you want to be in life and have your own beliefs, some countries don’t and if someone doesn’t believe in who their ruler/leader says to believe in they can be enslaved, get taken away, or even killed.

You should always try to learn about new cultures, whether it be eating new food, trying new clothes, or even talking to a friend or someone you know about their culture. If you know about more than one culture you could potentially do great in life and always be happy to meet new people.

Some politicians think that it is the worst thing in the world to be non-Christian in some places, they might deport you if you were say Muslim in a Christian neighborhood, or if you didn’t go to church you could get threatened or even worse. People who have the Xenophobia fear are generally living in a more afraid society and hating people more and more.

Different types of cultures are important to learn about because the world has all different types of varieties and you should at least try to learn about more than one to get a better education and lifestyle.

Again, the people who are stubborn and stick to their one religion for some stupid personal grudge are generally less happy and depressed.

In the time that humans have been alive, cultures and grudges have affected the entire world in serious ways. Whether it be a famous dictator mad about someone offending him by rejecting his culture, or a world war started over a simple couple of words, people just want to be themselves and not what their families tell them to be, or what their leader/president/public figure says to be. People are constantly getting judged for being themselves and nobody is planning on stopping who they are for anything.

To conclude the essay, every culture is beautiful and it should be treated that way. All culture should be celebrated, even if you don’t like it. I’m not saying to celebrate every single one of the cultural holidays, just try to be able to recognize and accept other cultures so you can always be happy and not get Xenophobia. Culture is beautiful and deserves recognition.

And that is why culture is important.