As a student of psychology, one of the things that interested me the most about coming to South Africa was the chance to experience firsthand a culture that is in some areas vastly different than our own. As a Westerner, and particularly as an American, our culture is primarily focused on the individual. We are taught from an early age that self-reliance and independence are among the most important qualities for a person to have. While our culture is individualist, South Africa tends to be more of a collectivist culture; the focus in collectivist cultures is not the individual but the family and the community. These distinctions deeply influence both countries’ cultures, though for the most part their influence is taken for granted. Both individualism and collectivism have positive and negative effects on people, and I was very interested in seeing these differences at work in a real life situation.
The general atmosphere of South Africa was very open and welcoming; I had many experiences where people would stop and have a friendly conversation with us, particularly when they heard our funny American accents. This is not to say that there aren’t people in the United States who are just as friendly, but it is indicative of the spirit of the people of South Africa. The concept of ubuntu represents the philosophy of many of the people in South Africa. Ubuntu is basically the idea that your humanity is based on your interactions with other people and not based wholly on yourself. This philosophy perfectly summarizes the key difference between collectivist and individualist cultures. In a collectivist culture the self is still important and individual achievements are not taken for granted, but those things are secondary to the health of the community as a whole. In the township of Khayelitsha we visited Vicky’s Bed and Breakfast, a small hotel built from the ground up by Ms. Vicky herself, but she wasn’t interested in telling her own story as much as she was about changing our outlooks on the community which is her home. She encouraged us to come back and tell our friends and family that although the lives of the people living in the townships are not easy, they are doing alright and trying to lift themselves up together. This was a sentiment echoed at my internship at the Impact Direct Ministries. Impact Direct is in charge of several community projects which are designed to help people better themselves, including drug and alcohol counseling and computer and technology classes. These services are provided to the community for free, and the center is open twenty-four hours a day for those in need of counseling. To do this there are a group of counselors who actually live in an attached dormitory at the center. These counselors are mostly former drug users themselves who have had their lives turned around, and they are now trying to help other people do the same. They also have an innovative program which utilizes text messaging services as an alternative form of counseling designed to try and reach the younger crowd in a way which they can relate to and which is unobtrusive. Though I wasn’t able to participate in any counseling either in person or by the text messaging service while I was interning there, I was able to see the passion with which the counselors and volunteers go about their jobs and their dedication to bettering not just themselves but their community.
Collectivist cultures have their downsides as well. Because of the importance put on family and community, it is very important to conform and be a part of that community. There is a much sharper distinction between the in-group and the out-group than in individualist cultures, and in South Africa this can be seen in the intense vigilantism and xenophobia seen particularly in the poorer townships. Take the incident at Mzoli’s as an example, Dr. Layne’s camera was stolen from our van, but members of the community found the thief and returned the camera; however, to protect the business and the community, we were told that the thief would be made an example of and that he would be beaten later that night by members of the community. The community is so important that its members are willing to fight and in some cases kill those who threaten it from within. There is also a good amount of xenophobia in the townships which is directed not at tourists but at the other Africans who move into them. They are not easily accepted into the community, which can eventually lead to violence against them.
At the end of the trip I felt that while I had only just skimmed the surface of South African culture, the effects of a collectivist mentality were still noticeable. Both the good and the bad that come with collectivism were all around us, just like the good and bad of individualism is all around us in the US. This trip showed me that we should strive to find the middle ground between the two, because the healthiest community will most likely be the one that is the most balanced.