This. Book! Do you ever find yourself scratching your head and wondering why in the world a person, an organization, or even a whole society acts the way they do? Are you interested in people and what makes them tick? Clotaire Rapaille has some fascinating insights into this.
So, what is the Culture Code and what does it have to do with what we're seeing in our country? The Code is, "the unconscious meaning we apply to any given thing - a car, a type of food, a relationship, even a country - via the culture in which we are raised." (pg.5, The Culture Code) The connection with our collective behavior comes through the understanding we can gain by learning about the impact our culture has on us.
The tag line on the book reads, "An ingenious way to understand why people around the world live and buy as they do." While this book is undoubtedly valuable to those involved in marketing, it's so much more than that. Rapaille shares how he is able to understand a person's core beliefs, often using as examples how he has assisted corporations with marketing various products. As we understand cultural beliefs, we can then question the impact those beliefs have on us personally.
Let me give you an example.
The last chapter of the book is "Never Giving Up, Never Growing Up: The Code for America." (pgs. 191-199)
From the chapter (with my comments in parenthesis)-
"The Code for America encompasses all the other Codes in this book. It addresses the way we think of ourselves from the widest perspective within our culture and touches on the other Codes at least indirectly. Understanding the Code for America helps us understand why we think of love as false expectations, health as movement, luxury as military stripes, and the president as (get this) Moses.
"So how do Americans see America?
"Certainly we see ourselves as 'new.' As adolescents, we would, of course. (Since America is such a young country, earlier in the book he makes the case that we're collectively still in our teenage years.) There are no ancient parts of America except our forests and canyons. We're always building and renewing, preferring to tear things down rather than preserve. (We've seen blatant examples of this recently.) Our place-names even reflect this. You can step into your car in New York and drive into New England, where you'll pass New Haven, New London, and Newton....(How many states, areas, or cities can you think of the have 'new' in their name?)
"We also see ourselves as occupants of vast amounts of space. Were you to step into your car again and drive due west, you could drive for a week and still be in America. In Europe you could drive through four different countries in half a day. This sense of size pervades our culture....We want everything in abundance, from our cars to our homes to our meals. Americans don't want to hear that they need to downsize or scale back." (Hence the penchant on both sides of the aisle for vastly overspending and living outside our means.)
"Another fascinating thing about America, though, is that within these vast spaces one can find both tremendous diversity and unity....'E pluribus unum' - ' 'From the many, one' - is a truly fitting motto for this culture.
"This sense of newness, size, diversity, and unity forms a very strong imprint on Americans. Our symbols are eagles gliding in midair, a huge statue of a woman welcoming visitors to out shores, a flag being raised on top of the ruins of a devastated building. These symbols form for us a very strong image of who we are meant to be."
In recounting the discovery sessions Rapaille held with the research group to get to the imprints they had with America, he says, "The range of these messages (the memories of the subjects) were very striking: from the simplicity of a father's bedtime stories to the innocence of a child learning about Lincoln for the first time; from the sadness and resolve of seeing the image of a fallen icon or youngsters bearing up under tragedy (9/11), to the pride of witnessing our flag flying on alien soil (the moon). What did not change, though, was the energy of the stories. The use of phrases like, 'everything we should be trying to achieve,' 'it sounded big and meant a lot to me,' 'I saw hope,' 'keep it alive,' and 'greatness dancing in my head' suggest a mythological dimension, a hyper reality that came to mind when Americans thought about America.
"The American Culture Code for America is DREAM.
"Dreams have driven this culture from its earliest days....We are the product of dreams and the makers of dreams.
"Discovering this Code puts many of the other Codes in this book into context....We see the American president as Moses because we dream that someone can lead us to an even better America."
Looking through this lens we can more easily understand why someone as brash and outlandish as Donald Trump was elected: enough Americans felt like the direction politicians were taking things was eroding their vision of the Dream and he seemed like someone bold enough to right the ship, so to speak. We can also see why the opposition to him is so strong: to many others Trump feels like someone who will irreparably damage the Dream.
As Americans shaped by our culture, when we believe someone or some group is messing with our Dream, we fight back - in one way or another.
There is much ugliness on display lately. As Rapaille points out, "Our European friends have predicted the 'end' of America dozens of times, but the end has never even come close to happening." In our present circumstances, We the People have the power to determine the outcome of recent events.
Be it rioting in the streets, occupying the Capitol, political bullying, or any other behavior that crosses lines of legality, morality, or simply is incomprehensible to us, we can move toward understanding - not condoning - but at least understanding, if we take a step back and look at the bigger picture. There is currently far too much of blaming and name calling. Both do no one any good.
Understanding can bring us to a place of power, a place where we can see what needs to be done and see what lies within our circle of influence. The very best we can do is to live well and with kindness and promote understanding and respect in our personal world.
We cannot control what anyone else does - be they politician or protestor or anyone else. So the only questions with any real power we can ask are - What can I do? and How shall I do it?
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