Beyond Culture

Hall argues that language is poorly suited to describe culture because of its myriad limitations. Fortunately, Hall writes, language is a “system for organizing information and for releasing thoughts and responses in other organisms” rather than a “system for transferring thoughts from one brain to another” (57); language releases thoughts but doesn’t implant them like intercultural experience does. Hall reflects on being moved between rooms and even into different hotels without warning in Japan, remarking that such treatment is reserved for low-ranking individuals in the United States. The “language of space” externalizes status in the United States but not in Japan (62), where Hall needed to reprogram his American brain to not perceive insult or fall victim to the “conventional […] common response […] found even among anthropologists” (63). Hall later learned that guests wear the same clothing (okata) at hotels in Japan, reinforcing the feeling of belonging that hotels, as part of a high-context culture, strive to cultivate. Hall suggests that the Japanese exercise both high-context and low-context modes of culture: They nurture closeness starting at home in childhood, but in public, they emphasize “self-control, distance, and hiding inner feelings” (67).