sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of empirical investigation an ...

and

cultural studies Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...

, cultural dissonance is a sense of discord, disharmony, confusion, or conflict experienced by people in the midst of change in their cultural environment. The changes are often unexpected, unexplained or not understandable due to various types of cultural dynamics. English speaking migrant children in educational and cultural transition.
Curtin University of Technology. (Thesis) Studies into cultural dissonance take on a wide socio-cultural scope of analysis that inquire into

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work. Microeconomics anal ...

politics Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...

values In ethics and social sciences, value denotes the degree of importance of something or action, with the aim of determining which actions are best to do or what way is best to live (normative ethics in ethics), or to describe the significance of di ...

learning styles Learning styles refer to a range of theories that aim to account for differences in individuals' learning. Although there is ample evidence that individuals express personal preferences for how they prefer to receive information, few studies have ...

, cultural factors, such as

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...

tradition A tradition is a belief or behavior (folk custom) passed down within a group or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common examples include holidays or ...

ethnicity An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

cultural heritage Cultural heritage is the heritage of tangible and intangible heritage assets of a group or society that is inherited from past generations. Not all heritages of past generations are "heritage"; rather, heritage is a product of selection by soc ...

, cultural

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...

, educational formats, classroom design, and even socio-cultural issues such as

ethnocentrism Ethnocentrism in social science and anthropology—as well as in colloquial English discourse—means to apply one's own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge other cultures, practices, behaviors, beliefs, and people, instead o ...

racism Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagoni ...

and their respective historical legacies in the cultures.

Research

Research topics in cultural dissonance tend to be

interdisciplinary Interdisciplinarity or interdisciplinary studies involves the combination of multiple academic disciplines into one activity (e.g., a research project). It draws knowledge from several other fields like sociology, anthropology, psychology, ec ...

drawing from a wide range of disciplines and applying the findings to equally diverse fields and industries.

Education

Winifred L. Macdonald concluded in her thesis that, "... shared markers of language and ethnicity were not sufficient to ensure that the cultural differences in education systems were not experienced by the families." Macdonald also observed that cultural dissonance is sometimes said to inhibit socio-cultural adaptation. Susan Black, an education research consultant, wrote an article in the ''

American School Board Journal The ''American School Board Journal'' is a monthly trade magazine on school administration established in 1891 by the United States National School Boards Association. Scope The focus of the ''American School Board Journal'' is on the challen ...

'' of the

National School Board Association The National School Boards Association (NSBA) is a nonprofit educational organization operating as a federation of state associations of school boards across the United States. Founded in 1940, NSBA represents state school boards associations an ...

that summarized some of the actions recommended by some researchers in education-related cultural dissonance. The recommendations for educators included: # Recognize

# Know and understand the student's

# Understand social, economic and political issues and

in different cultures # Adopt the attitude that students—all students—can

learn Learning is the process of acquiring new understanding, knowledge, behaviors, skills, values, attitudes, and preferences. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, animals, and some machines; there is also evidence for some kind of l ...

# Create genuinely caring classrooms where all students are appreciated and accepted. Other general findings include: * Geneva Gay (University of Washington in Seattle, Washington), proposed that differences can erupt into cultural clashes *Researchers at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory notes that many anecdotal case studies show how culturally responsive practices improve students' behavior and achievement.

Second-generation immigrants

In their book ''Children of Immigration'', Carola and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco discuss dissonance as it relates to Latinos in the United States.Carola and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco
"Children of Immigration"
Harvard University Press, 2001 Suarez Orozco found that second-generation

Hispanics The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to viceroyalties for ...

face more acute forms of cultural dissonance than their first generation parents. They also noticed that second-generation individuals also face "special difficulties" that lead to "three general patterns of adjustment" # attempts to synthesize two cultural traditions # passing as a member of the dominant group # developing of defensive identity such as

gang A gang is a group or society of associates, friends or members of a family with a defined leadership and internal organization that identifies with or claims control over territory in a community and engages, either individually or collective ...

membership

Refugees of war

Suárez-Orozco also compared the experience of exiles from

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribb ...

being reunited with family members with the "...alienated refugees from war-torn Central America..." as they worked through their own adjustment issues, and concluded that Central Americans had to deal with more cultural dissonance than their Cuban counterparts.

Law enforcement

Larry A. Gould wrote a paper for

Northern Arizona University Northern Arizona University (NAU) is a public research university based in Flagstaff, Arizona. It was founded in 1899 as the final public university established in the Arizona Territory, 13 years before Arizona was admitted as the 48th state. ...

"his research reports on the link between feelings of spirituality & how Navajo police officers tend to enforce European-based law. Previous research suggests that a link exists between the officers' depth of feeling of spirituality & the officers' attitude toward the effectiveness traditional methods of social control; however, this research goes a step further & examines the impact of cultural dissonance on the stressors faced by Navajo police officers. The enforcement behavior of the Navajo officers was used as a proxy for the intensity of their feelings concerning the usefulness of traditional vs European-based forces of social control; the underlying assumption being tested is that self-determination is not only a state of law but a state of psychological being. A snowball method of sample development was used to select officers for intensive interviews. The findings suggest that the officers' feeling of spiritual connectedness to his/her culture is inversely related to the strictness of the enforcement of European-based laws. In other words, the more spiritual the officer, the less likely the officer is to rely solely on European-based laws, & the greater the reliance on other methods of problems solving. The finding also suggest that in addition to the stressors normally encounter by all police officers, Navajo officers faced additional stressors that are specific to indigenous officers policing in indigenous communities. 1 Table, 41 References. Adapted from the source document." (Gould)

In sports

Tracy Taylor wrote a paper for the ''

Journal of Sport and Social Issues ''The Journal of Sport & Social Issues'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal that publishes papers in the field of sociology. The journal's editor is C. L. Cole (University of Illinois). It has been in publication since 1977 and is currently publi ...

''. In it she wrote "...This research investigates issues of cultural diversity & inclusiveness in women's netball in Australia using the rhetoric of exclusion. Women & girls from culturally diverse backgrounds spoke of reinforced difference & cultural assimilation in their netball experiences. Women born in other English-speaking countries recalled feelings of inclusion & limited cultural dissonance & indicated that netball helped them feel as part of their new community & gain social capital via participation. Although experiences of explicit exclusion or racial discrimination were virtually nonreported, some women felt a strong sense of cultural conformity to Anglo-centric expectations of behavior. The women's stories & experiences suggest that women from culturally diverse backgrounds have found few opportunities to express their cultural distinctiveness through mainstream Australian sports such as netball. The conclusion reached after this examination is that the rhetoric of exclusion is pervasive in Australian netball & unlikely to change in the near future. 1 Table, 76 References. eprinted by permission of Sage Publications Inc., copyright 2004. (Taylor)

Cultural dissonance in popular culture

Side 2 of the

Firesign Theatre The Firesign Theatre (also known as the Firesigns) was an American surreal comedy troupe who first appeared on November 17, 1966, in a live performance on the Los Angeles radio program ''Radio Free Oz'' on station KPFK FM. They continued ap ...

's 1968 album, ''

Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him ''Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him'' is the first comedy album recorded by the Firesign Theatre. It was originally released in January 1968 by Columbia Records. Synopsis The first side of the original LP presented a trilogy of thre ...

'', features a humorous 18-minute radio drama of a traveler experiencing cultural dissonance on his arrival in a foreign country. For example, the traveler struggles to communicate his wish to send a telegram, only to be informed that yes, his telegram has been sent, at considerable cost, and that he will be receiving it in about an hour.