Revisiting Cultural Relativism:Towards A Hierarchical Evaluation Of Cultural Traits

Deepening globalization means not only cultural convergence but also cultural divergence, and either case has drawn great attention from culture studies in international and intercultural communication. Cultural convergence does not wholly replace traditional views of cultural differences resulting from different natural environments, historical heritages, religions and other factors forming and affecting different cultures. Concerning cultural development or evolution there have been theories such as evolutionism and diffusionism, and cultural relativism distinguishes itself from the others by its claim for cultural equality, understanding and respect. However, cultural relativism, when put into operation for cultural evaluation, has shown its inherent weakness. This paper is intended to draw upon its rational core argument and overcome its weakness for cultural evaluation. To put it more concretely, we are for the relativist’s claim for equality, respect and understanding and thus are against any evaluation of any given culture as a whole while probing into ways of evaluating specific cultural features or customary practices. For this purpose analyses are made of current evaluation systems and then, taking into consideration the complex and complicated nature of culture, a multi-schema evaluation system is proposed with distinction drawn between essential cultural accouterments and non-essential trappings. All this will hopefully contribute to setting up a new framework of evaluating cultural elements, both material and socio-cultural for a better understanding of foreign cultures and our own and for more effective intercultural communication.