Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

For this assignment I spoke with my sister-in-law Renae. Although Renae is a Caucasian female, she is legally deaf. As a result of this disability, she is often perceived as being different and falls victim to many negative stereotypes. 

According to Renae, culture is part of an individuals personality which is reflected through their beliefs, environment, experiences, and customs. Renae defines diversity as being being different from other individuals within a group, community, are environment. Being deaf, this is something that Renae knows a lot about. 

After reviewing Renae’s responses, I believe that there are a couple aspects of diversity and culture that coincide with the information being discussed so far in the course. The first aspect is having one’s culture embedded in their behaviors and personality. For examples, one’s beliefs and values, traditions, religion, and ethnic/racial background, etc. collectively make up one’s culture. The second aspect is diversity being compromised one individual and collective differences. In addition to gender, race/ethnicity, abilities/disabilities, etc. can influence diversity. 

There is a one thing that is omitted from Renae’s definition of diversity. That is that diversity can only be experienced when individuals encompass characteristics that are not accepted within a dominant population. For example, there is little diversity in a group of 4 Hispanic males that are considered to be Republican. However, if there was a Hispanic, female, democrat in the mix, there would be some degree of diversity. 

There are a couple ways that thinking about other people’s definitions of culture and diversity have influenced my understanding of the topic. The first way is that no matter one’s educational or cultural background, everyone tends to have similar definitions of these two terms.  The second way is that although similar, individual definitions are influenced by their perceptions and experiences.