by Natália Pureza
When we talk about any country or culture, we talk about stereotypes. And the problem with stereotypes, as the Nigerian writer Chimamanda said in her speech about the single story “Is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete” and I believe that she is right. Countries and cultures do have characteristics, but people usually make the mistake of reading this sentence in the singular, not in the plural. Therefore, they tend to build only one story or to look at only one side of them.
In my recent research project, “Brazil in the eyes of others: Brazilian music”, I had the opportunity to see my own culture, or at least a part of it, with the eyes of people from other countries. It was an amazing experience talking to them. And it was also intriguing how they, people that had never met me before, could tell me about the kind of music I supposedly listen to or the abilities I supposedly have. But what impressed me the most was to realize how insane we all are by believing that any culture could fit in one or two sentences, such as “Samba is the only kind of music in Brazil”.
A culture is a vast and changing expression of a people; like a choir is made of many different voices, a culture is made of all the unique things people are together. Unfortunately, stereotypes reduce it. And just to name a few about my own country, Brazil, I personally am not happy all the time or go to the beach every day. There is no way for a country, with any extension, to have its people behaving all the same all the time, because people are not the same anywhere. And even though people do not mean to have those stereotypes, sometimes they are the only story they have about us, because they are the only story that was ever told about us. And the same thing happens when we look at other cultures.
The stereotypes, more than all the other definitions, are a barrier – they keep us from realizing how beautifully diverse a culture is. By the end of my research, I was able to identify the stereotypes the outsiders had about Brazilian music before coming here, but I was also glad to realize that the interviewees of the research had broken this barrier. And now Brazil, and its people, is something else to them, something they can connect to. Furthermore, as we had this opportunity of talking to them, we are also breaking some stereotypes of our own. This changes, for us and for them, the way we see the world and ourselves – but it is not a given thing. It requires us to be open and to be kind enough to understand that what makes us different and unique is also what make us equals, and it means being human. It means being made of many stories.
When we talk about any country or culture, we talk about stereotypes. And the problem with stereotypes, as the Nigerian writer Chimamanda said in her speech about the single story “Is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete” and I believe that she is right. Countries and cultures do have characteristics, but people usually make the mistake of reading this sentence in the singular, not in the plural. Therefore, they tend to build only one story or to look at only one side of them.
In my recent research project, “Brazil in the eyes of others: Brazilian music”, I had the opportunity to see my own culture, or at least a part of it, with the eyes of people from other countries. It was an amazing experience talking to them. And it was also intriguing how they, people that had never met me before, could tell me about the kind of music I supposedly listen to or the abilities I supposedly have. But what impressed me the most was to realize how insane we all are by believing that any culture could fit in one or two sentences, such as “Samba is the only kind of music in Brazil”.
A culture is a vast and changing expression of a people; like a choir is made of many different voices, a culture is made of all the unique things people are together. Unfortunately, stereotypes reduce it. And just to name a few about my own country, Brazil, I personally am not happy all the time or go to the beach every day. There is no way for a country, with any extension, to have its people behaving all the same all the time, because people are not the same anywhere. And even though people do not mean to have those stereotypes, sometimes they are the only story they have about us, because they are the only story that was ever told about us. And the same thing happens when we look at other cultures.
The stereotypes, more than all the other definitions, are a barrier – they keep us from realizing how beautifully diverse a culture is. By the end of my research, I was able to identify the stereotypes the outsiders had about Brazilian music before coming here, but I was also glad to realize that the interviewees of the research had broken this barrier. And now Brazil, and its people, is something else to them, something they can connect to. Furthermore, as we had this opportunity of talking to them, we are also breaking some stereotypes of our own. This changes, for us and for them, the way we see the world and ourselves – but it is not a given thing. It requires us to be open and to be kind enough to understand that what makes us different and unique is also what make us equals, and it means being human. It means being made of many stories.