Cultural cringe

Cultural cringe, in cultural studies and social anthropology, is an internalized inferiority complex which causes people in a country to dismiss their own culture as inferior to the cultures of other countries. It is closely related, although not identical, to the concept of colonial mentality, and is often linked with the display of anti-intellectual attitudes towards thinkers, scientists and artists who originate from a colonial or post-colonial nation. It can also be manifested in individuals in the form of "cultural alienation". In many cases, cultural cringe, or an equivalent term, is an accusation made by a fellow-national, who decries the inferiority complex and asserts the merits of the national culture.

Origin

In 1894, Henry Lawson wrote in his preface to his Short Stories in Prose and Verse: "The Australian writer, until he gets a 'London hearing', is only accepted as an imitator of some recognized English or American author; and, as soon as he shows signs of coming to the front, he is labelled 'The Australian Southey', 'The Australian Burns', or 'The Australian Bret Harte', and lately, 'The Australian Kipling'. Thus no matter how original he may be, he is branded, at the very start, as a plagarist, and by his own country, which thinks, no doubt, that it is paying him a compliment and encouraging him, while it is really doing him a cruel and an almost irreperable injury. But mark! As soon as as the Southern writer goes 'home' and gets some recognition in England, he is 'So-and-So, the well-known Australian author whose work has attracted so much attention in London lately'; and we first hear of him by cable, even though he might have been writing at his best for ten years in Australia." Lawson clearly writes here from bitter experience, evidence enough that the Gestalt of psychological servitude, cultural anxiety and entrenched peer-cruelty which was later to become labelled "the cultural cringe" was pervasive in nineteenth-century Australia, and is thus a fundamental element of Australian self-identity.

The term "cultural cringe" was coined in Australia after the Second World War by the Melbourne critic and social commentator A. A. Phillips, and defined in an influential and highly controversial 1950 essay of the same name. It explored ingrained feelings of inferiority that local intellectuals struggled against, and which were most clearly pronounced in the Australian theatre, music, art and letters. The implications of these insights potentially applied to all former colonial nations, and the essay is now recognised as a cornerstone in the development of post-colonial theory in Australia. In essence, Phillips pointed out that the public widely assumed that anything produced by local dramatists, actors, musicians, artists and writers was necessarily deficient when compared against the works of the British and European counterparts. In the words of the poet Chris Wallace-Crabbe (quoted by Peter Conrad), Australia was being made to rhyme with failure. The only ways local arts professionals could build themselves up in public esteem was either to follow overseas fashions, or, more often, to spend a period of time working in Britain.

In some professions this ingrained attitude heavily affected employment opportunities. British- or European-born applicants would be (and still are) given preferential treatment when applying for jobs, with only those Australians who had worked in the U.K. or the U.S.A. being treated as worthy of appointment or promotion. In this way the cultural cringe caused, during the early to mid 20th century, and continues to cause today, the exodus to Britain and the United States of many young talented Australians across a broad range of fields, from the Arts to even the Sciences. They had to spend time working there in order to advance in their own careers back home. The cultural cringe also is responsible for many former Britons holding senior positions in Australia's public sector.

Some of this could be also applied to other former colonial nations. But as Lawson continued in his 1894 preface: "The same paltry spirit tried to dispose of the greatest of modern short-story writers as 'The Califorian Dickens', but America wasn't built that way - neither was Bret Harte!" The cultural cringe of Australians and the cultural swagger of Americans reflects deep contrasts between the American and the Australian experiences of extricating themselves from English apron-strings. Dealing specifically with Australia, Phillips pointed out that sport has been the only field in which ordinary people accepted that their nation was able to perform and excel internationally. Indeed, while they prided themselves on the qualities of locally produced athletes and sportsmen, whom they invariably considered first rate, Australians behaved as if in more intellectual pursuits the nation generated only second-rate talent. The cultural cringe might therefore be seen as contributing to a strong strand of anti-intellectualism that has underpinned public life in Australia.

Connection with cultural alienation

The cultural cringe is tightly connected with "cultural alienation", that is, the process of devaluing or abandoning one's own culture or cultural background. A person who is culturally alienated places little value on their own or host culture, and instead hungers for that of a — sometimes imposed — colonising nation. The post-colonial theorists Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin link alienation with a sense of dislocation or displacement some peoples (especially those from immigrant cultures) will feel when they look to a distant nation for their values. Culturally alienated societies often exhibit a weak sense of cultural self-identity and place little worth on themselves. The most common manifestation of this alienation among peoples from post-colonial nations at present is an appetite for all things American, from television and music, to clothing, slang, even names. Culturally alienated individuals will also exhibit little knowledge or interest in the history of their host society, placing no real value on such matters.

The issue of cultural alienation has led the Australian sociologists Brian Head and James Walter to interpret the cultural cringe as the belief that one's own country occupies a "subordinate cultural place on the periphery", and that "intellectual standards are set and innovations occur elsewhere". As a consequence, a person who holds this belief is inclined to devalue their own country's cultural, academic and artistic life, and to venerate the "superior" culture of another (colonising) country.

A more sophisticated approach to the issues raised by the cultural cringe, as felt by artistic practitioners in former colonies around the world, was developed and advanced by the Australian art historian Terry Smith in his essay 'The Provincialism Problem'.

Cultural cringe by country

U.S.

For all the obvious reasons.

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Australia

The term cultural cringe is most commonly used in Australia, where it is believed by some to be a fact of Australian cultural life. In Another Look at the cultural cringe, the Australian academic Leonard John Hume examined the idea of cultural cringe as an oversimplification of the complexities of Australian history and culture. His controversial essay argues that "The cultural cringe ... did not exist, but it was needed, and so it was invented." This need is demonstrated by its frequent use to deflect criticism of almost anything, on the grounds that the critic is suffering from the cringe.

The cultural cringe can be expressed in the almost obsessive curiosity of Australians to know what overseas celebrities think of Australia and its culture.

Some commentators claim the cultural cringe particularly affects local television programming in Australia, which is heavily influenced by imported shows, mainly of American and British origin. The Federal government has legislated to keep a quota of Australian content (Australian Content Standard and Television Program Standard 23).

When cultural cringe is applied to prominent Australian personalities, it is often mistaken for another Australian cultural phenomenon known as tall poppy syndrome.

Some argue that a form of cultural cringe resulted in anti-heritage attitudes which lead to the demolition of many world class pre-war buildings in Melbourne and Sydney, destroying some of the world's best examples of Victorian architecture. Modernism was promoted to many Australians as casting off imperial Europe to rebuild a new independent identity, and the existing pre-war architecture, which was a feature of Australian cities, was denigrated. This resulted in many calls to demolish the Royal Exhibition Building, labelled the derogatory term "white elephant". It was not until Queen Elizabeth II granted the building Royal status that Australians began to recognise its value. The building became the first in Australia to be given World Heritage status. This reaction against the cultural cringe continues in some fields such as architecture, where local architects are shunned for using introduced styles.

It has also been claimed that cultural cringe has led to federal government information technology contracts going to large foreign multinationals, rather than domestic IT companies.

Another manifestation of cultural cringe is the "Convict Stain". Many Australians felt a sense of shame about the existence of British Convicts in what is now Australia, and many did not even attempt to investigate their families' origins, for fear that they could be descended from criminals. This was known as the Convict Stain, and it made research all the more difficult. It was most evident in sport, where people with known convict heritage were sometimes banned from sporting clubs. For example, in cricket, the Melbourne Cricket Club has a well known Convict Stain policy, making exception for very few, most notably Tom Wills the inventor of Australian rules football. The effect can be reinforced in Britain, where Australian tourists have been asked in jest if they are "returning to the scene of the crime". In recent decades community attitudes have changed, and many Australians with convict ancestors are now more comfortable investigating and discussing their past.

Canada

Many cultural commentators in Canada have also suggested that a similar process operates in that country as well. The specific phrase "cultural cringe" is not widely used to label the phenomenon in Canada, although it has been used in isolated instances; more typically, Canadian cultural commentators speak of a "Canadian inferiority complex", or label specific instances of the phenomenon with satirical terms such as beaver hour.

Prior to the 1970s, Canadian radio stations gave almost no airtime to Canadian music, and apart from CBC Television, Canadian television stations spent very little money on Canadian-produced programming. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) adopted Canadian content regulations to resolve this, although even today such regulation is still criticized by some Canadians as representing inappropriate government interference in the right of Canadians to choose US entertainment.

Similarly, English Canadian film has an extremely difficult time garnering an audience in Canada.

It has also been claimed that some segments of Quebec society experience cultural cringe in relation both to the rest of Canada and to France. In addition, some western Canadians, mainly from the province of Alberta also have an extended cultural cringe from the rest of Canada. The feeling of isolation from mainstream Canada, and envy of the more populated provinces of Ontario and Quebec contribute to this inferiority complex. This complex is only shared by a small minority of western Canadians.

Ireland

Ireland's historical relationship with Britain has produced tensions between the (forced or voluntary) adoption of many British cultural practices during the long period of English and British political hegemony, and the desire of Irish nationalism to assert Irishness as being distinct from any British identity. One symptom is the epithet "West Brit" applied by one Irish person to another who is felt to adopt excessively the mannerisms of the British (specifically, the English). Many of the distinctive features of Hiberno-English are discouraged as nonstandard. Conversely, those who continually assert the excellence of Irish culture may be derided by others as blinded to its faults by chauvinism.

Ireland's emigrant communities may also have developed different relationships with Irish culture from those living within Ireland. The Irish tourist industry often emphasises aspects of Irish culture which some within Ireland consider stereotypical and either obsolete or fabricated; such as Irish dancing, leprechauns, Aran sweaters, Irish pubs, or thatched cottages. Visiting emigrants, typically Irish Americans, who take pride in such symbols may be labelled "plastic Paddies" by those within Ireland, and seen as not truly Irish, but rather engaged in cultural appropriation.

Professor Vincent Comerford has argued that many of the present-day forms of supposedly traditional Irish cultural elements are fairly new, and were developed around 1900 to emphasise the difference between Ireland and Britain. Gaelic games had declined considerably before the modern rules were established by the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA), founded in 1884; the Irish language was experiencing a very rapid decline prior to the Gaelic Revival; the word "céilí" for Irish music was first used in 1898; Irish dancing was codified only in the 1930s; the Uilleann pipes were redesigned to play louder for large Irish-American audiences from the 1860s; the saffron kilt arose after 1900; a newly-whitewashed cottage was a sign of disease, as limewash was used to kill germs – and so on. In contrast, Professor Declan Kiberd has identified post-colonial aspects throughout Irish literature.

Japan

The cultural cringe of Japan can be traced back to the introduction of Western culture in the 17th, 18th and 19th century. Western knowledge was soon desired at first by Japan in fascination, where it was until 1854, that westernization was desired by the government for Japan to strengthen its power.

After the wars and conflicts of interest of the Bakumatsu period, during the Meiji period, Japan's desire to westernize dominated, nearly wiping out traditional trades in favor of western ideals. In 1885, the article Datsu-A-Ron was published, its emphasis on getting rid of its previous cultural attachments to Asia to advance in the new world. Overtime, Japan would succeed to industrialize and rise in power with the rest of Europe and America, at the price of nearly costing its cultural identity.

Following the aftermath of World War II, the Empire of Japan surrendered to the Allied Powers, and remained in occupation until 1952. After suffering defeat at the hands of its enemies, Japan soon showed a great deal of shame, in light of its immediate recovery in the 1960s.

Mexico

Mexico has experienced sustained cultural cringe dating back to the colonial period where European born people called Peninsulares or Gachupines, were privileged with access the best positions of authority and commerce while Mexican born Spaniards, even if they were 100% European with no indigenous admixture, were barred from such privileges. This led to the suppression of Mexican developments in favor of importing everything from Europe such as: machinery, lawyers, governors, culture, art, science and the common world view among the colonists which was a facsimile of that of Europe.

Today the cultural cringe is still prevalent throughout Mexico where foreign cultures, attitudes, technologies, arts, and academics are seen much more favorably than Mexico's own indigenous scholars, technologies and artists. The result of this has been Brain drain as competent and talented Mexicans choose to move abroad, mostly to the U.S., where they can develop their skills and practice their talents. In the Mexican popular media, news anchors and variety show hosts, Telenovela actors and actresses are distinctly white despite the fact that most of the Mexican population is Mestizo or Indian. This phenomenon still resonates the old colonial attitude of the caste system which favored the European image, culture and aesthetics over Mexican development which it perceives as inferior or substandard.

This attitude is commonly known as malinchismo and its bearers as malinchistas in reference to La Malinche.

New Zealand

New Zealand has had a cultural cringe but has been wearing off in recent years. The New Zealand English accent has been subjected to cultural cringe since the 1900s but it too is lessening in recent years.

In other countries

Other examples include the Scottish cringe, the claimed cultural cringe in Scotland.

South African novelist Deon Meyer explores this theme as it applies to Afrikaners in South Africa in his novel Dead Before Daybreak.

A similar phenomenon can be observed in South Asian nations of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Being ex-colonies, these nations still consider a lot of their local talents or outputs inferior to that of English-speaking world (especially Britain and United States.)

The battle against cultural cringe in Sri Lanka goes far back to the nineteenth century when Anagarika Dharmapala started his nationalist campaign against the British. Most accept Gangodawila Soma Thero as the central figure in the rise of Sinhalese nationalism today. Unlike a few decades ago when English was considered as an elite language, today people who look to the west with servitude are considered as "kalu suddhas" which translates to "black whites" (a derogatory term used for sycophants) and openly censured in the media. Sinhala nationalism is on the upward trend, especially with the chain of defeats of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam by the armed forces of Sri Lanka and the hardline stance of nationalist president Mahinda Rajapaskse against terrorism and terrorist supporters.

See also

• Self-hatred
• Tall poppy syndrome
• Australian culture
• Post-colonialism
• Nationalism
• Globalization
• Xenocentrism

Further reading

• A.A. Phillips, The Australian Tradition : Studies in Colonial Culture, Melbourne, Cheshire, 1958