Cultural Adjustment Essay, Research Paper

“An analysis of cultural shocks”

Coming to America was one of my dreams, so I started working on it and

after completing collage, I received the visa for the States and bought

the ticket to come to America. I was a little bit confused because I

had been hearing about America since my childhood. There is a huge

cultural difference between my society and the modern society of the

States, and because of these differences, my friends and I faced some

problems after coming here. These problems are commonly called cultural

shocks. By analyzing the differences between America and my own

country of Pakistan, in the areas of gender roles, family, marriage and

celebrations, one can see how cultural shocks occur.

Since my birth, I have been living in a society where the men and women

are not all to interact with each other as over here. It is one of the

biggest differences in my culture and the culture here. There are

usually separate classes for girls and boys in my society, but over

here, there is no concept of this. In addition, I know you will

surprise to earn that having a boyfriend for a girl or a girlfriend

for a boy is a difficult achievement.

In my society there is a joint family system, the children live

together with their parents whether they are under 18 or not. Over

here, there is a concept of “individualism”. Every one has an

individual life, making their own decisions for every thing. Here, a

person over 18 living with his parents is considered an immature

person. In my culture, a person not living with his parents doesn’t

have a respectable place in the society, because it is our social and

religious custom to take care of our parents.

Divorce is common here, but in my society it’s not good to even think

about it. People are divorced, but not as commonly as over here. For

example, among every 100 married people, perhaps just one is divorced,

but over here out of hundred, about fifty are divorced or separated.

Also, some couples live together without a legal marriage.

One day, I went to a wedding ceremony with my uncle .It was one of his

friends’ weddings. I just sat there, wondering when the people would

sing songs and when the lunch would start, but after kissing each

other, my uncle’s friend and his wife went on a long drive in their car

with a poster on the back saying, “Just got married”. It was really

surprising for me to attend a wedding like this, because in my culture,

the wedding ceremony is for five to six days. We sing songs for the

couple, eat together with the whole family, buy new clothes for the

ceremony and invite all our relatives and friends. I remember in my

brothers wedding there were about a thousand people.

Here, for celebrating a happy occasion, people just usually go to

clubs, drink, dance and go home late night and sleep. In my culture,

it’s totally different. To celebrate an occasion, the whole family sits

together, talks, or goes to any good restaurant, but usually we cook

our food by our self. The ladies take over the kitchen, while men sit

and talk or watch any news channel. Boys make a separate group and

watch a movie or talk on any interesting topic. So we usually just

talk, talk and talk, and that’s the way we enjoy ourselves. We do have

a concept that time is money, so we don’t waste our time in useless

things.

As I mention earlier, both the nations have a lot of cultural

differences. I really like some differences and some I don’t. But I

believe that with an open mind and a friendly attitude, I will be

able to make friends, get accustomed to the values, believes and

behaviors of the new culture and perhaps get to enjoy my life in the

states and eventually find ways of attaining the dream, to be an

engineer, as I took my first step on the American soil. At the end I

would like to say, ” The nation who cannot keep its own culture will

last forever”.

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