# data[].attributes.body
Religion + Multicultural Australia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Updated November 07, 2019 08:11:19

Religion in Australia is rich and unlike anywhere else in the world, but most of the country believes those who worship should keep their beliefs to themselves.

When Vivashni and Avineil Marahaj invited guests to their wedding, some of their non-Hindu friends asked if it would be a "traditional" ceremony.

The answer was no, not really.

This wedding spanned four days and was steeped in Hindu culture, but this ceremony was notably modern.

Sure, there was a statue of a Hindu god in the hotel foyer, but the groom rolled up the driveway in a McLaren.

If it was traditional, the pair wouldn't have seen each other for a week before the wedding; Vivashni wouldn't have left the house.

"From the outside [you] think it's traditional. You see different colours, there's a fire, they do different things, they're not drinking," Avineil, 30, said.

But this young Australian couple broke Hindu tradition by exchanging rings and partying on day four at a very boozy reception.

To get to the heart of the question - it's not that this wedding was traditional, it's that it wasn't Christian.

Contemporary Australia is often referred to as a multicultural society. We seem comfortable with the cultures, but not with the religions they bring.

"I come from a religious background and everyone around me is religious. So that's all I know," Vivashni, 27, said.

"But in the bigger community or nationwide I don't think that's how other people see Australia. We're all about the beer and the barbeques.

"I don't think Australia is perceived as a religious country."

In some communities, religion might not be visible, but it is very much there.

Only 30 per cent of Australians counted in the 2016 census identified as having no religion. That number had increased from 2011, but more than 60 per cent of Australians still identified with an organised religion.

While Christianity is declining, it still makes up the bulk of the religious landscape, then Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. Hinduism is one of the country's fastest growing faiths.

Vivashni's cultural heritage is Fijian-Indian. She moved to Australia from Fiji when she was seven years old.

Twenty years later, on her wedding day, she is sitting in a function centre's dressing room dripping in a dress sari that was custom made in Delhi.

Moments before she walks downstairs, her eyes nervously follow her bridesmaids as they dance to Indian music and grill our photographer about that time he met Kim Kardashian.

In many ways the wedding was no different to one that might start in a chapel or church.

There were the jokes about how much this all cost the parents (a lot), the bride's brother struggled with his speech and kids were running wild at the back of the room - forgotten, assumed safe, left to play.

At the front of the room, Vivashni and Avineil had taken seven steps around a fire to signify their needs and promises to one another.

This wedding is an Arya Samaj ceremony, a type of Hindu service Vivashni describes as strong and pure.

"Where I come from, we pray to a rock, we have different forms of God. Whereas where he comes from, they pray to fire," Vivashni said.

"That's why it's so important that fire is the most important thing in the whole ceremony. That's what is our witness to the wedding."

At a Western wedding, the couple might sign the legal marriage documents after saying their vows.

Vivashni and Avineil did that a week out from the day and were technically already married, but without the religious ceremony and the cultural celebrations that surrounded it, they would not have felt it.

On day one of celebrations, 250 guests danced and watched as henna was applied to the bride's hands and feet.

The darker the henna is by the day of the religious ceremony, the more the groom loves you - so tradition says.

This event was held at the bride's family home in one of the most religious areas of Australia.

It's not exactly a Bible belt

A group of suburbs in Western Sydney are among the country's most religious postcodes, according to the 2016 Census, but you couldn't fairly call the area a "Bible belt".

Eighty-five per cent of residents in the post codes that cover Greenacre, Chullora, Bossley Park and Horsley Park do have a religious affiliation, but the doctrines differ.

In postcode 2190, including Greenacre and surrounds, the same number of people identify as Christian as they do Muslim.

In neighbouring 2176, including Bossley Park and surrounds, the number of Christians triples and there are six times as many Buddhists as Muslims.

"We're one of the most religiously diverse countries in the world," said Dr Gary Bouma, who is an expert on religious diversity at Monash University in Melbourne and an Anglican priest.

"The way we're most diverse is that not only do we have a very large number of specific religious groups in the country, but unlike any other country in the world, we [also] have religious communities that are very substantial."

Islam, Buddhism, Presbyterian and Eastern Orthodox represent more than 2 per cent of the population each.

Just as Christians don't like to be lumped together, the minority religions practise different denominations too.

The result is hundreds of different religious groups and a rich tapestry of faiths inside a country that officially calls itself secular.

These groups can worship at the same time, in the same city and all look very different.

Like this Russian Orthodox priest, who enters his church at Cabramatta.

The incense symbolises prayers rising to heaven.

And like Sabian Mandaeans who follow the teachings of John the Baptist.

Here, they're baptised in the Nepean River west of Sydney.

And like Vietnamese Caodaism, which is said to be a combination of faiths.

Worshippers at this temple in Western Sydney make offerings to God.

What is our problem with religion?

Despite our religious diversity, 66 per cent of respondents to the Australia Talks National Survey said they believed Australia would not be better off if people were more religious.

And 60 per cent of respondents said Australians who were religious should keep their religious beliefs to themselves.

Dr Bouma said Australia had "an allergy to organised religion".

"Australia has a low temperature expectation of religion - don't get too excited about it - and those who do get very excited about it or get more serious about it are viewed with a little bit of suspicion," he said.

"That has always and forever been the case in Australia."

In conversations with several practising Australians, the subjective notion of freedom of religion was raised.

One young believer said she felt it was socially OK to be religious in Australia as long as worship was done in private.

The problem is that in many religious communities, it's the public expression of faith that makes people feel genuinely free to practise it.

"You can run it back to the First Fleet and the first 50 years of convict settlement in this country," Dr Bouma said.

"Religion came as something to make them be good people, to make them toe the line."

Can young people save our souls?

While stories out of the 2016 census were quick to splash the headline 'Australia is losing its faith', Dr Bouma said if you took a deeper look at the numbers, that was not exactly true.

He said while the 'no religion' response went up, the number of people identifying as 'atheist' did not increase and when it came to something as fluid as faith, that distinction mattered.

Spirituality is very different from the institutions of organised religion, and Dr Bouma and fellow researcher Anna Halafoff believe Australia's young people are starting some new traditions around faith.

In a nationally representative survey of Australian teenagers called the AGZ study, only 23 per cent identified as "this worldly", or as having no belief in anything other than what can be proven by science.

Fifty-eight per cent had some form of spirituality, including 17 per cent who said they were committed to a specific religion.

"They may still believe in God or a higher power. They may be practicing yoga, meditation, using tarot cards, believing in astrology, and things like reincarnation or karma. So, other things that ... have a more spiritual dimension," Ms Halafoff said.

Vivashni grew up in a home that followed an organised religion, and a fairly conservative version of it, but she has a broader view.

She will always identify as a Hindu, but believes her modern way of worship is to be of service.

"I don't see myself as a religious girl, I see myself as a spiritual girl and I think they are very different," she said.

Despite being scared of being different years ago, the young nurse is now proud of her spirituality - and of "having a four-day wedding" - and believes young people are more accepting simply because they're more exposed to the religious component of our multiculturalism.

The researchers agree.

In their study, Dr Bouma, Ms Halafoff and their colleagues found 91 per cent of teenagers agreed that "having people of many different faiths made Australia a better place to live".

A deeper look at the Australia Talks National Survey showed young people were more likely than older Australians to be accepting of people expressing their religious beliefs.

"They're up to their eyeballs in it. They're in places where they're swimming in a sea of diversity and they say it's OK," Dr Bouma said.

From organised religion to casual spirituality, faith in Australia is different to anywhere else in the world.

Diversity - of people and their practice - is something only Australia can call a tradition.
This week, the ABC is talking about religion as part of the Australia Talks project. To see how your life compares with other Australians', use our interactive tool - available in English, Arabic, simplified Chinese and Vietnamese.
Credits

Reporting, digital production and additional photography: The Specialist Reporting Team's Emily Clark

Photography: The Specialist Reporting Team's Brendan Esposito

Read next

Topics: religion-and-beliefs, community-and-society, hinduism, christianity, islam, buddhism, atheism, catholic, spirituality, australia

First posted November 07, 2019 05:46:09

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'We're all about the beer and BBQs': The religion-sized gap in Australia's identity

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Updated November 07, 2019 08:11:19 Religion in Australia is rich and unlike anywhere else in the world, but most of the country believes those who worship should keep their beliefs to themselves. When Vivashni and Avineil Marahaj invited guests to their wedding, some of their non-Hindu friends asked if it would be a "traditional" ceremony.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
One of the main problems travelers face is communicating with the locals. Even if you never leave home without your trusty phrase book, communication is as much about nonverbal cues as it is about talking.

In fact, people rely more heavily on hand gestures and body language when in situations where they are unable to verbally interact with someone.

But did you know that not all hand gestures mean the same thing in every country? In some places, gestures that we use on a daily basis in the U.S. to portray positive emotion or agreement, for example, might mean something highly offensive in a foreign land.

Take the OK sign - the simple hand signal where you put your thumb and first finger together to create a circular shape. In the U.S. we use it to convey agreement and compliance. Yet it is seen as offensive in Greece, Spain, and Brazil. In those countries it means that you are calling someone an a**hole. In Turkey, that sign is also an insult toward gay people.
Related: How Not to Be a Bad American Abroad - Tips From a State Department Official
So aside from keeping your hands firmly in your pockets while you are traveling, what can you do to ensure that you don't insult the locals or end up in a bar brawl? The last time I checked, there was no section in any of my phrasebooks for hand gestures.

1. The chin flick. Brushing the back of your hand underneath your chin in a flicking motion means "get lost" in Belgium, northern Italy, and Tunisia. In France, this gesture is known as la barbe ("the beard") and is the hand-sign equivalent of macho grandstanding.
You should probably just never do this. (Photo: Kyrylo Glivin/Alamy)

2. The fig. A clenched fist with your thumb between your first and second fingers means "screw you" (to put it mildly) in Turkey, Russia, and Indonesia. And in some countries it symbolizes lady parts. You know what I mean.
Talk to the hand. (Photo: Tuan Tran/Moment/Getty Images)
Related: Surefire Ways to Spot an American on a Cruise
3. Forearm jerk. This is the action of punching your fist into your elbow joint while raising the other fist up in front of you. It will not get you a positive reaction in most parts of southern Europe or Brazil, and it's used commonly by soccer fans wanting to send an offensive message to the fans of the opposing team.

4. The moutza. In Greece, Mexico, the Middle East, and Africa, the action of raising your open hand, palm out, with spread fingers in front of someone is a serious sign of displeasure. Possibly one of the oldest hand gestures still in use, it dates all the way back to ancient Byzantium, when criminals were chained to donkeys and paraded through the streets, where locals would rub their own feces onto the prisoner.

5. The cutis. Flicking your thumb from the back of your upper front teeth toward someone is seriously nasty in India and Pakistan and simply means "f*** you." Very nice. This sign will likely get you ejected from any place of business and not welcomed back.
You may want to rethink how you convey the word "no." (Photo: Elijas van Roon/Corbis)
Related: The Craziest and Rudest Things Ever Said to Flight Attendants
6. Five fathers. Arab and Caribbean countries see the action of pointing your right index finger and the grouped finger tips of your left hand as a way of saying, "you have five fathers." Or, in harsher terms, "your mother is promiscuous." So if you want to get deported in the Middle East, this is your go-to.
Just never do this. (Photo: Thomas Nanos/Alamy)
You may think you are being friendly. You are wrong. (Photo: Alejandro Moreno de Carlos/Stocksy)

There are also several gestures that we use on a daily basis in the U.S., almost as a reflex, that mean something completely different elsewhere.
Don't be a jerk. (Photo: Aleksandra Kovac/Stocksy)
Related: Pictures of the Rudest, Grossest Tourists in the Air
7. Head shake. Most people assume that nodding your head is the universal sign for "yes" and shaking your head is the sign for "no." But in Greece and Bulgaria, these actions are reversed. This can lead to some serious confusion if you are being hit on or trying to order food off a menu.

8. Crossing your fingers. In Vietnam, crossing your fingers, as we would in the U.S. to wish for luck, depicts a woman's genitalia and is considered extremely insulting if aimed at another person. It is the hand-sign alternative of calling someone the c-word.
In France, this means you are itching for a fight. (Photo: Mahdees Mahjoob/Alamy)

9. Horns. The placement of your fingers to show horns, usually known as the symbol for "rock on," has a different meaning in Spain, Greece, and Italy - where it is called the "corna" and is considered a suggestive gesture made to a man to imply that his wife is cheating on him. It dates back more than 2,500 years and signifies a bull's horns.
Do you have any idea why this could be considered offensive? (Photo: Wason Wanichakorn/AP Photo)
Related: The Most Accidentally Offensive Things Americans Do While Traveling
10. Thumbs up. The thumbs-up sign does not mean "that's great" in Australia as it does here. There, it means "up yours" or the painful-sounding "sit on it." Basically, you are telling a person that you hope he gets something inserted up his bottom.

11. Come on over. In the Philippines, using your hand to make a "come here" gesture is one of the most offensive things you can do. In fact, this gesture is deemed so bad that you can actually get arrested for using it. We promise you that the last place you want to end up on your vacation is inside a Philippine prison.
WATCH: How to Really Irk the Locals in England
12. Crossed arms. Crossing your arms in front of you is considered a huge sign of arrogance in Finland. Standing with this posture in a bar is likely to get you into a fight.

Some countries have their own unique gestures with specific meanings.

13. Fist shakes. In Austria, shaking two fists in front of you is a way of wishing someone good luck.

14. Slapping your fist. In France, slapping the palm of your hand over your other fist is seen as an aggressive gesture that suggests you want to beat up the person it's aimed at. It is similar to telling someone to step outside.

15. Hand shakes. In Russia, shaking hands, or doing pretty much anything else, over a threshold is considered extremely unlucky.

16. Three-fingered salute. In Thailand, the raised arm with three fingers extended (like the gesture used in The Hunger Games) was outlawed after it became a symbol of opposition to the country's military coup in 2012. How very original.

Not all gestures are made with your hands:

17. Feet gestures. In India, one of the worst things you can do socially is to show a person the soles of your feet or use your feet to point to or touch things. Feet are seen as unclean and the lowest point of the body. Resist the urge to give yourself a pedicure in public, or you might be faced with some angry locals.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
18 Gestures That Can Cause Offense Around the World

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
One of the main problems travelers face is communicating with the locals. Even if you never leave home without your trusty phrase book, communication is as much about nonverbal cues as it is about talking. In fact, people rely more heavily on hand gestures and body language when in situations where they are unable to verbally interact with someone.

# data[].attributes.headline
Birth Order: How your position in your family can influence your personality.

# data[].attributes.subject
Birth Order: How your position in your family can influence your personality.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Are you the firstborn, a middle child or youngest in your family?

Are you a high achiever, a peacemaker or the life of the party?

Your position in the family can affect your personality, behaviour and view of the world, according to the experts.

Birth order is considered by some researchers and psychologists to be one of the most powerful influences on personality, along with genetics, gender, temperament and parenting styles.

The firstborn child: The high achiever

Eldest children tend to be high achievers and leaders who may be controlling and bossy and likely to take on responsibility.

They seek approval, are usually perfectionists, and tend to have more in common with other firstborns than their own siblings.

First-borns tend to be:

High achievers

Perfectionists

Responsible

Goal-setters

Determined

Rule keepers

Detail people

The second and middle child: The peacemaker

Second and middle children are more likely to be the peacemaker of the family, are good at negotiating and are more willing to go with the flow.

They seek attention and often have more friends than the firstborn children to compensate for a lack of family attention.

The youngest child: The outgoing charmer

Youngest children tend to be more outgoing and charming to get attention, yet have a greater sense of independence.

They tend to have more freedom and are subsequently more likely to try new things and do what they want to do.

"Birth order accounts for the differences between kids within families," parenting expert and author Michael Grose said.

"Most parents sometimes throw their hands up in the air wondering why their first and their second are so different.

"They may be the same gender, born two years apart, have the same educational experience yet they're as different as chalk and cheese.

"That's where birth order comes in."

Taking up family roles

Mr Grose said no two children ever take on the same role within a family.

"It's that notion of taking up roles - we all take up roles within a group, and of course the first group we're in is our family," Mr Grose said.

"So kids take up different roles and personality styles and because it happens so young - at a time when we're forming all our habits, characteristics and personality - it tends to stick."

Birth order knowledge can help parents better understand why their children behave the way they do.

Each child in the same family is also subject to different parenting.

"Parents will raise their firstborns quite differently to a later born child, that's largely due to focus and experience," Mr Grose said.

"Also when you're firstborn, for a while you're on your own; if you're the last one born of four kids you're surrounded by a group and the expectations are different as well."

Gender and age gap also play a part when it comes to birth order influences.

"When you have a gap of five to six years your family starts again," Mr Grose said.

Birth order and your parenting style

Mr Grose said your own birth order and your partner's birth order can impact how you parent.

"When two firstborns are married to each other, now that's an organised family," Mr Grose joked.

"When two youngest are married, the garbage is lucky to be put out, it's a bit more of a laidback place."

Mr Grose said birth order knowledge can help parents better understand the drivers behind their children, and why they themselves parent the way they do.

"It should be considered when looking for ways to raise happy, well adjusted children," he said.

Tips for raising children in each birth order position

Mr Grose recommended throwing birth order knowledge "into the mix" when raising your kids.

He suggested parents release the pressure on firstborns and only children. Eldest children tend to put a great deal of pressure on themselves as it is.

Help second-born and middle children feel special, give them some one-on-one time.

Save some responsibilities for the youngest child and ensure that they make their own decisions and speak for themselves.

'Bossy', organised eldest child

Evie Cuthbertson is the eldest of three and said she liked being the firstborn in her family.

"Apparently I'm bossy," she said.

"I have a tendency to take charge; I like to organise things."

It is no surprise then that Ms Cuthbertson works as a management consultant.

Middle child invisibility

Jenny Blake was one of five children and is now the mother of five, as well as two step-children.

She said as a middle child, she had to learn to "argue and fight for everything".

"I can communicate very well, and I'm a very good negotiator because I had to negotiate up and I had to negotiate down," she said.

Ms Blake said at times she felt invisible.

"There was a lot of attention given to the oldest and the youngest," she said.

"I look back and think it was really quite good, I could disappear and do my own thing without anyone noticing.

"So much so that I got left at home alone. When they packed up the car one day and went off to mass as they did every Sunday, I came out of the toilet and no-one was home."

Ms Blake, who works in communications, said she has seen the same scenario play out with her own children.

"My middle son is also very good at language and trying to decipher what needs to be said," she said.

Youngest child left with hand-me-downs

Older children usually get the new clothes, new bikes and new toys, while youngest children often receive a lot of hand-me-downs.

"I remember when I was 14 I got my first pair of new school pants," youngest child and ACT Menslink CEO Martin Fisk said.

"With an oldest brother who was 11 years older than me I was wearing 1960s pants.

"They were all moth-bally, and I used to dread the change of season."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How birth order can affect your personality

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Are you the firstborn, a middle child or youngest in your family? Are you a high achiever, a peacemaker or the life of the party? Your position in the family can affect your personality, behaviour and view of the world, according to the experts.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Researchers examine the old adage that birth order plays a significant role in shaping who we are

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Ultimate 16 Personality Types Overview | Personality Perfect

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Myers Briggs 16 personality types overview. What's your type? Take the free test and find out in just 2 minutes!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The world is full of amazing cultures, many of which have unique customs that have carried on throughout the millenia. Travel allows us to witness other ways of life and to learn from them. Sometimes the habits are so far from what we know at home, that they seem strange or even offensive to us, but that's just the way things are in certain parts of the world. Who are we to judge?

Entering a country as an intrigued spectator can allow us to learn from other cultures and even though we may cringe at the thought of some quirks, they are what make travel so incredible.

1. Bride Kidnapping: In Kyrgyzstan, bride kidnapping is still very much a part of day-to-day life and it is exactly what the name would suggest. Women are often abducted from their homes or from public places. The captors are usually a hopeful groom, wishing to marry the stolen woman. She is brought back to the family's home where they continuously harass her to take the suitor's hand in marriage.

These altercations have sometimes turned violent but on most occasions, the woman submits and agrees to become the bride. The family places a wedding veil on the new bride's head to finalize the agreement. Although bride kidnapping is technically illegal in present-day Kyrgyzstan, it is still a common occurrence throughout the country. Almost all elderly women speak of the day they were kidnapped, while younger men look forward to the day that they can steal their own bride.

Photo By Evgeni Zotov via Flickr

2. Chinese Pregnancy: When a woman has a baby in China, it is common for her to be kept in the house for a month or more. Many Chinese people believe that a mother is very susceptible to sickness and disease following childbirth and therefore the parents and grandparents of the new mother will often lock the doors and make sure that she stays inside.

If maternal imprisonment isn't interesting enough, when a child is born in China it is automatically 1-year-old on its day of birth. A child then becomes one year older on the date of spring festival... not on his or her birthday. Therefore, if a child is born a day before spring festival, then the day after he or she would be 2 years old, even after only being alive for 2 days! This is just one of many quirks of the Chinese culture.

3. Stepping On A Mongolian's Foot: In Mongolia, if you step on a person's feet by accident, it immediately means war. That is why every Mongolian will quickly rush to shake your hand after such an offence has occurred. If you step on a Mongolian's foot and fail to shake his or her hand, you should prepare for battle! There are many other cultural quirks in Mongolia that you should know about before travelling to this nomadic land.
You wouldn't want to step on his foot!
4. Taroof in Iran: In western countries, it is not uncommon to deny a generous offer at first, just to be polite. In Iran, this act of consideration is taken to an entirely new level. If you are offered something in Iran, then you should deny it three times to avoid accepting an offer that the best ower cannot afford.

-You don't have to pay for this taxi ride.

No, I insist. I want to pay.

-Really, you are a good man. No need to pay.

No, I have money here. I would like to pay you for the ride.

-Your money is no good here.

No I must pay. I insist that you take my money.

-Okay thank-you.

A nice cafe in Iran
This is the typical exchange of generosity in Iran and although it happens less with the younger generations, it is still an important part of culture in the country. For travelers visiting Iran, taroof is an etiquette mine field that should be navigated carefully. Although Iranians understand that foreigners may not know the rules of taroof, it is still considered extremely rude to accept a generous offer on the first try. A traveler who accepts a free taxi ride has definitely offended the poor taxi driver who was simply following his rule of taroof.

5. Sorcery in Mozambique: Sometimes western medicine is too expensive, or it is unable to cure certain ailments. In Mozambique and many other parts of Africa, magic is often a family's only option. Curses can be conjured and sickness can be conquered by the words of a gifted sorcerer. Also, there are times when laws do not properly punish the criminals for their crimes, and sometimes the victim's family will call on a sorcerer to curse the evildoer.

These are just some of the many cultural quirks that make our world so diverse! Listed here are some of the stranger customs travelers may come across, but there are also many quirks that we could all learn from. Like the hospitality of an Egyptian, the communal support of an African village, and the revered family ties of an Indian household. Travel allows us to peer into these new lifestyles and gain something from each of them.

Do you know of an interesting cultural quirk? Please share with us in the comments below.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The world is full of amazing cultures, many of which have unique customs that have carried on throughout the millenia. Travel allows us to witness other ways of life and to learn from them.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
man and woman with flags painted on face

Each country may have its own unique traits, behaviours, and attitudes - but they rarely match the national stereotypes.

Whether it's the caricature of the introverted English, the brash Americans or the industrious Japanese, national stereotypes are easy to come by. But do countries really have their own distinct personalities?

When psychologists have given the same personality test to hundreds or thousands of people from different nations, they have indeed found that the average scores tend to come out differently across cultures. In other words, the average personality in one country often really is different from the average personality in another.

Crucially, these average differences in personality between nations are not the same as the stereotypes we hold. Although we tend to agree with each other about what the typical personality type is in a given country, including our own, the research suggests that our assumptions are often wide of the mark.

Comprehensive global studies have shown that some personality traits are more prevalent in some cultures - like extraversion in Brazil (Credit: Getty Images)

Several large international studies have now documented cross-cultural differences in average personality. One of the most extensive was published in 2005 by Robert McCrae and 79 collaborators around the world, who profiled more than 12,000 college students from 51 cultures. Based on averaging these personality profiles, the researchers were able to present an "aggregate" trait score for each of the cultures.

The highest scoring cultural groups for Extraversion on average were Brazilians, French Swiss and the Maltese, while the lowest scoring were Nigerians, Moroccans and Indonesians. The highest scoring for Openness to Experience were German-speaking Swiss, Danes and Germans, while the lowest scoring on average were Hong Kong Chinese, Northern Irish and Kuwaitis. The study also uncovered variation between countries in the three other main personality traits of Neuroticism, Conscientiousness and Agreeableness.

Of course, it's important to remember that these are averages and there is a lot of overlap between countries; there are undoubtedly a lot of people in Indonesia who are more extraverted than some from Brazil. There are also complications and controversies around how to interpret these kind of results, such as the huge challenge of ensuring that personality questionnaires are translated to mean exactly the same thing to participants in all the different cultures, and that the samples in each culture are truly representative of that culture. Last year, Katherine Corker at Kenyon College and colleagues demonstrated that small but non-trivial differences in the average personality scores between students at different US universities, thus showing the risks of inferring too much about an entire country from a single sample.

Critics of this field also point out issues like how much citizens of different countries are disposed to tick extreme scores on a psychological test (although McCrae and his collaborators did address some of these concerns, for example by including a measure of "acquiescence" - people's tendency to agree with survey items).

Despite these methodological challenges, several large studies have repeatedly uncovered variation in average personality across the globe, and the results usually chime in theoretically consistent ways with other measures - countries that score higher in Extraversion, for example, also tend to score higher in average levels of self-esteem. International studies of personality have also shown that while average trait levels vary between cultures, the basic structure of personality, organised into five main traits, seems to be a universal.

Consider another huge study of cross-cultural personality differences, led by David Schmitt at Bradley University and published in 2007, that involved over 17,000 people from 56 different nations around the world. Again, between-nation variation emerged in average personality. For example, the highest average scores for trait Neuroticism were found in Japan and Argentina while the lowest were found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Slovenia. Meanwhile, the highest scoring nations for Agreeableness, on average, were the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Jordan, while Japan and Lithuania scored the lowest.

This study also looked at similarities in average personality across supra-national regions, finding for example, that people in Africa tended to score higher on trait Conscientiousness than people from all other world regions, while people in East Asia tended to score lower.

But while differences in personality do exist between cultures and nations, they often don't match up with the widely held stereotypes of national character. You probably have an idea in your head of what the average personality profile is of people from the various cultures that you're familiar with. Take the trait of Extraversion. Here in the UK most of us would probably say that the average English person is far more reserved than the average American. But these kinds of national personality stereotypes are rarely accurate (in fact, the 51-culture study described above found that average Extraversion was higher in England than in the USA; the 56-culture study found that Americans edged it, but with very little difference between the two countries).

Early in the 2000s, in one of the first comparisons of national stereotypes with real national personality differences, Robert McCrae tested the assumptions about national personality held by a group of people who arguably ought to know better than most: experts in cross-cultural psychology. McCrae presented a panel of eight of these experts with a list of 26 different world cultures for which he had average personality data. Then for each of each of the five main personality traits, McCrae asked the experts to organise the cultures into lists according to the seven highest- and lowest-scoring. The experts' performance was woeful. Compared with the actual personality data, the experts performed no better than if they had simply been guessing.

The rest of us seem to fare no better. In 2005, Antonio Terracciano and his colleagues asked nearly 4,000 participants, mostly college students, from 49 cultures across six continents to estimate the average personality profile of a person from their own culture. Once again, the participants' idea of the typical personality type in their country did not match their country's actual personality profile. A more recent study published in 2013 involving over 3,000 participants in 26 nations came to a similar conclusion.

Some researchers posit that islanders may be less extraverted and open-minded because their ancestors who carried risk-taking genes emigrated away (Credit: Getty Images)

What could explain these national differences in average personality? The reasons are likely partly genetic, perhaps to do with historic migration patterns. For example, people strong on traits related to risk-taking and openness might be more likely to migrate, so these traits are likely to be over-represented in regions that were historically on the frontier of exploration; conversely, an isolated population is likely to become more introverted and inward focused through the generations as bolder individuals are more likely to choose to emigrate.

A recent series of studies conducted with islanders resident in several isolated Italian archipelagos put these principles to the test. Andrea Ciani at the University of Padova and his colleagues found that islanders are less extraverted and open-minded, but more conscientious and emotionally stable, than their mainland neighbours located 10 to 40 miles away. This is likely because, over time, bolder more open-minded individuals have chosen to emigrate away from the islands.

Supporting this, a sample of recent emigrants from the islands to the mainland were found to score higher on extraversion and openness than the remaining islanders. Ciani's team also genotyped a sample of islanders and mainlanders and found that a version of a gene previously associated with risk-taking (the 2R allele of the DRD4 gene, which codes for a receptor for the neurotransmitter dopamine) was less common among islanders. The researchers said this suggests there is "some genetic basis for the observation that individuals in long-isolated communities exhibit a particular personality type".

Undoubtedly environmental factors also play a part: for instance, there's evidence that traits associated with extraversion and openness are lower in regions where risk of infection is greater, which makes evolutionary sense in terms of reducing the spread of disease. Experts have also speculated that differences in climate could influence regional differences in personality, such as cold regions with a lack of sunlight contributing to greater emotional instability.

Even population density could play a part. Recent evidence suggests that living in a crowded environment leads us to adopt a more future-oriented mindset, such as investing more in long-term relationships, perhaps in part as a way to deal with increased competition with other people; in other words, just the kind of approach you would associate with higher-trait conscientiousness.

Given how important personality traits are to life outcomes at the individual level - from wellbeing to career success - this issue of national differences in personality is arguably more than a lively conversation topic for a dinner party. Any cross-cultural differences in trait levels at the national level might contribute to, or at least reflect, international differences in such things as wealth, happiness, corruption, innovation, and health. Higher-trait neuroticism, for example, is strongly associated with numerous negative health outcomes, including mental health diagnoses like anxiety and depression, but also chronic physical conditions like heart disease and dementia. It stands to reason that in countries where average trait neuroticism is higher, citizens will be more vulnerable to physical and mental ill health.

Personality differences around the world might even have contributed to the emergence of different political systems. Last year, Joan Barceló at Washington University in St Louis compared countries' average personality trait levels with their political systems and found a correlation: countries with higher average trait Openness tended to have more democratic institutions, an association that held even after factoring out other relevant influences such as economic development. Although we can't conclude that more of this personality trait in a national population causes democracy (the causal direction could flow the other way, for example), Barceló believes this is certainly plausible and that part of the reason is that open-minded citizens are more motivated by self-expression and less by traditional values. His data seemed to back this up: differences in these motivations partly mediated the links between nations' average trait levels and their political institutions. "Societal personality differences may play a larger role in predicting a country's democracy than previously realized," he said.

At the very least, the findings on international differences in personality could be another reason for us to question our assumptions about other countries' attitudes and behaviours. As the personality psychologist Richard Robins commented in 2005, this line of research suggests that "in contrast to personality traits - which reflect actual differences in the way people think, feel and behave - stereotypes about national character seem to be social constructions designed to serve specific societal purposes."

In other words, your views on other cultures may say more about yourself and your own society, than the patchwork of personalities that actually exists across the world.

Join 800,000+ Future fans by liking us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Different nationalities really have different personalities

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Each country may have its own unique traits, behaviours, and attitudes - but they rarely match the national stereotypes.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Working in a global industry means communicating daily with individuals across borders, oceans and continents. It also includes traveling far distances to establish and further develop business relationships. We live in a culturally diverse world, where one of the keys to international business success is knowledge of the impact of cultural differences.

Bridging the culture gap can be challenging, but if you make a small effort to obtain a greater understanding of others' background and social norms it will be highly appreciated and it will make your business relationships more positive and successful.

Let's visit the world's continents, and see what you might want to avoid doing when dealing with or visiting a respective country.

1. In Western cultures, people are taught to look people in the eyes at all times; averting the eyes often signifies a lack of sincerity or confidence. In Japan on the other hand, constant eye contact is considered rude or even aggressive.

2. Business cards should be accepted with both hands as a sign of deference.

3. In Indonesia it is considered extremely rude to point with the forefinger. It is especially rude if the pointing is towards a person. When pointing the Indonesian uses his thumb.

4. In Thailand it is considered rude to cross your legs in company and to point your toes at another person. The feet, as the lowest part of the body, are given the lowest esteem and pointing a toe is demeaning to the person at whom the foot is pointed.

5. In the Philippines if someone is buying you a meal, the invitee orders first. The invited should order items equal to or below the cost of the invitee's meal.

6. In China It is considered polite to decline a gift when it is first offered and the giver is expected to offer it multiple times. Also gifts are generally not opened in the giver's presence.

7. In China and other Asian countries, it is considered impolite for a person to pour their own drink. Generally an individual will offer to pour a companion's drink and the companion, in return will pour the individual's drink.

8. In Bangladesh, the "Thumbs Up" gesture is considered an offensive insult.

9. Tipping is considered rude and is never done in Japan.

10. In German business dealings, moving your chair closer to the host is considered an insult.

11. In Russia prolonged direct eye contact may be considered aggressive or as invitation to more intimate relationships (especially with the opposite sex), so it should be avoided in business relationships.

12. In France, assuming that people speak English without inquiry may be found unpleasant; being able to greet in French and ask whether the Frenchman speaks English is highly appreciated.

13. Silence is golden throughout most of Scandinavia. Do not feel the need to fill any silence with conversation. Silence is often used as thinking time and the prelude to what will be said next.

14. In many European countries, punctuality is essential and any possible late arrival should be communicated in advance.

15. When doing business in the Middle East, handshakes are always used and can last a long time. Islamic etiquette recommends that one waits for the other to withdraw their hand first before doing the same. Always use the right hand. Do not be surprised if your hand is held while you are led somewhere.

16. In most Arab countries, it is considered polite and a sign of friendship for males to hold hands when walking. So don't be alarmed or offended if this were to happen, as it does not have the romantic connotations that it does in the West.

17. The Middle Eastern culture places more value on someone's word as opposed to a written agreement. A person's word is connected to their honour.

18. Meetings should not be made too far in advance as changes in personal circumstances may impact your appointment. Once an appointment has been made, confirm it verbally with the person you will meet a few days before. Punctuality is expected of foreigners.

19. In Arab countries displaying the soles of one's feet or touching somebody with one's shoes is considered rude.

20. In Iraq the "Thumbs Up" gesture is considered an offensive insult.

21. When visiting someone's home in Canada, the serving of coffee at the end of an evening is a signal that it is time for vsisitors to prepare to leave.

22. In the US it is considered impolite not to cover your mouth and nose when sneezing or coughing. When someone else sneezes, it is customary to say "Bless you". If someone says "Bless you" to you, it is customary to reply with "Thank you."

23. In the US, one should address those significantly older than them as Mr., Sir, Mrs., Ma'am, Ms. or Miss. For example, it may be considered rude to address someone by their first name unless they have invited you to do so. In a professional setting this especially applies, however many people will ask you to refer to them by their last name.

24. South Americans like to talk in close proximity to each other. North Americans, and others, may see this as an invasion of personal space.

25. In many parts of Africa there is a cultural tendency toward a more relaxed attitude to time and punctuality.

26. In the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, direct and frank communication is not the norm in most parts of the region as most Africans are uncomfortable with blunt statements.

27. In Ghana, asking a person to a social event implies that the person offering the invite will be paying for everything. Inviting a person out and then expecting them to pay for their own drinks or food is considered extremely rude.

28. In South Africa it is the custom to look someone in the eye whenever touching glasses for a toast. Varying superstitious results can follow should you not do so.

29. In Australia when riding alone in a taxi, it is considered polite to sit in the front passenger seat next to the driver.

30. Australians are known to use informal language, and therefore may refer to some foreigners as "mate" instead of using more respectful titles. An example of this is the former Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, thanking the head of the United Nations for his support in the East Timor Crisis in year 2000, with the phrase: "I owe you a beer".

Lauga is originally from Iceland, and is a Sales and Marketing Executive for MTS Logistics. Lauga has experience as a Sales Manager for a large fitness corporation in Oslo, Norway before she moved to New York in 2009 to pursue a Business Management degree at Berkeley.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Culture Clash: 30 Ways to Avoid Offending the Next Person You Meet - gCaptain

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
By Lauga Oskarsdottir, MTS Logistics Working in a global industry means communicating daily with individuals across borders, oceans and continents. It also includes traveling far distances to establish and further develop business relationships. We live in a culturally diverse world, where one of the keys to international business success is knowledge of the impact of cultural differences.

# data[].attributes.headline
How our friends see us and why that is different to our own self perception. 

# data[].attributes.subject
How our friends see us and why that is different to our own self perception. 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
If you're like most people, you've probably got a firm idea about your own personality - whether you're outgoing or shy, nervous or calm, and so on. But how far do you think other people's impressions of your personality match your own assessment?

Psychologists studying this question have found that most of us do have a degree of what they call "meta-accuracy". But at the same, we have some blind spots - there are certain things that lots of other people consistently think about us that we know nothing about. In fact, the more well-adjusted you are, the less insight you may have into what other people think.

One of the most thorough investigations of whether people know what others think of them was published in 2011 by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and Wake Forest University. Across several studies, Erika Carlson and her colleagues asked hundreds of undergrads to rate their own personality (the main traits like extraversion, but also other characteristics like honesty, funniness and attractiveness), and then to put forward friends and family who would also rate their personality. Finally, the participants estimated how they thought these other people would rate them.

One way to calculate what other people think of you is just to consider how you see yourself and use this as the basis for estimating what others think, under the assumption that if you think you're an extravert (or not), and so on, other people will too. But Carlson and her colleagues accounted for this, finding that even after factoring out what participants thought of themselves, there was a correlation between how the participants thought other people perceived them and how these people actually did perceive them - their 'public image'. In fact, the participants' estimates of what other people thought of them better reflected their 'public image' than the personality scores they'd given themselves.

The people around you may see you in a way you have never seen yourself (Credit: Getty Images)

The researchers said these results provide evidence for what they called true 'meta-insight' - it suggests we are able to look beyond our self-perceptions to figure out what other people think of us, and that we can do so with some success. This was also true when the procedure was repeated with strangers whom the participants had only chatted with for five minutes.

So you probably do have some idea what other people think of you, but later research suggests your insight is far from perfect, as a team of German psychologists showed in a study from 2013. Sixty-five students rated their own personalities through agreement with 37 statements (such as "I treat people fairly" and "I am lazy") and they also put forward several friends and family to rate their personalities on the same items (each student put forward at least three; one student invited 35 people to play this role!). Finally they estimated how they thought these other people would rate them.

Crucially, the researchers found there were some consistent judgments made by friends and family about the participants (such as that they all agreed the person was lazy) that were different from how the students rated themselves, and that were missing from the students' estimates of how they thought other people perceived them. The researchers called these gaps "blind spots" and they said the findings show that "the typical person is not aware of some of the unique ways in which he or she is consensually perceived by others."

The socially anxious among us might not be too surprised by this revelation - in fact, we probably spend a lot of time worrying about these blind spots. But actually it turns out that it's more psychologically well-adjusted folk who have the least insight into what other people think of them.
Self reflection
In a study published just this year, a pair of psychologists at Martin-Luther University in Germany asked students to form groups of four with their classmates, to rate their own personalities, those of their group members, and finally to estimate how their group members would rate them. The students also completed measures of their psychological adjustment, including questions about their self-esteem and items tapping signs of personality disorder.

The more psychologically well-adjusted students showed less insight into what other people thought of them - they relied more on what they thought of themselves when making these estimates, and this was especially true for classmates with whom they were better acquainted. In other words, the more emotionally stable and confident you are, the more likely it is that you just assume your friends see you how you see yourself (which if you're like most people, is in a positive light). This finding is consistent with the broader literature on depression that's shown people who are more depressed exhibit fewer self-serving biases - in other words, that they see the world more realistically.

You think your selfies show you at your best - but a recent study suggests you are the worst person to judge (Credit: Getty Images)

These blind-spots may be particularly prominent on social media. In today's world, we increasingly present ourselves to the world online, rather than in person, and psychologists have recently started investigating these new ways for us to misjudge how others might be perceiving us. Another study published this year looked at this issue specifically in the context of selfies - the photos that we take of ourselves frequently for the purpose of putting them online.

Nearly two hundred undergrads visited a psychology lab, took a selfie, and then had their photo taken with the same phone by a researcher. The students then rated how they thought they looked in the photos, in terms of attractiveness and likeability. The researchers at the University of Toronto found that the frequent selfie-takers among the students thought that they looked more attractive and likeable in their selfie than in the photo of them that the researcher took. But when a separate group of raters recruited online looked at the two sets of photos, they made completely the opposite judgment - rating the students as more likeable and attractive in the researcher photos than the selfies. Perhaps something to bear in mind next time you're about to upload your latest me-shot.

In light of all these findings, it seems that if you really want to know the complete picture of what other people think of you, you're best off asking them. So long as your friends and family are honest with you, you may discover you're not quite the same person you thought you were, at least not as seen through the eyes of others. On the other hand, if you're happy with yourself and how you think you come over, maybe it's best not to ask too many questions. Ignorance really may be bliss.

--
Dr Christian Jarrett edits the British Psychological Society's Join 600,000+ Future fans by liking us on If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called "If You Only Read 6 Things This Week". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital, Travel and Autos, delivered to your inbox every Friday. Facebook, or follow us on Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and Instagram. Research Digest blog. His latest book is Great Myths of the Brain.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why you can never tell what your friends really think of you

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If you're like most people, you've probably got a firm idea about your own personality - whether you're outgoing or shy, nervous or calm, and so on. But how far do you think other people's impressions of your personality match your own assessment?

# data[].attributes.headline
Can the way you walk reveal your personality?

# data[].attributes.subject
Can the way you walk reveal your personality?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
If you saw a man walk into a bar with a John Wayne swagger, you might assume that he's a confident, tough kind of guy. Or perhaps you'd have less polite thoughts. Either way, you probably wouldn't be able to help yourself from jumping to conclusions about his personality based on his gait.

Psychologists have been studying these assumptions for well over three quarters of a century, and their findings suggest that most of us do tend to make very similar interpretations of other people's personalities based on their walking style. After watching that wannabe cowboy walk into the bar, the likelihood is that you and I would agree about the kind of personality he has.

But how accurate are these assumptions? And what other kinds of characteristics can we read from someone's gait? Chillingly, the best person to ask may be a psychopath.

Let's look first at the research into gait and personality. One of the earliest investigations was published in 1935 by German-born psychologist Werner Wolff. He filmed five men and three women without them knowing, as they took part in a ring-throwing task while wearing overalls (to conceal other personality give-aways).

A John Wayne swagger makes people picture a certain personality (Credit: Getty Images)

Later, the participants watched back the films, which had been edited to hide their heads, and they made interpretations of each other's personalities based purely on their gaits.

The study features some quaint details - the sound of the recording reel had to be camouflaged with a ticking metronome, for instance. More importantly, Wolff found that his participants readily formed impressions of each other based on their gaits, and that there was often a lot of agreement in their judgments. For example, consider some of the descriptions given independently by the participants for "Subject 45":

"Pretentious, with no foundation for it."

"Somebody who wants to gain attention at any price."

"Conscious and intentional vanity, eager to be admired."

"Inwardly insecure, tries to appear secure to others."

"Dull, somewhat subaltern, insecure."

It seems amazing that the participants formed such similar impressions for this subject and others. Of course, with such a small sample and the possibility that the participants were picking up on other cues besides gait, there are problems with this early research (the participants also knew each other, although they were poor at recognising who was who from the videos).

US psychologists in the late 1980s found that there are broadly two kinds of walk (Credit: iStock)

Modern experiments are more sophisticated, not least because of digital technology that can transform a person's walk into a simple point-light display against a black background, with white dots showing the movement of each of their key joints. This strips out any other cues besides the motion of their gait.
Swing or sway
Using this approach, US psychologists in the late 1980s found that there are broadly two kinds of walk, which could be characterised by either a more youthful or older style of movement. The former involving a more bouncy rhythm, more swaying of the hips, larger arm swings and more frequent steps, while the latter was stiffer and slower with more leaning forward. Crucially, the gait did not necessarily correspond to the walker's actual age - you could be young with an old gait and vice versa. Furthermore, the observers assumed that people who walked with a younger style were happier and more powerful. This remained the case even when their actual age was made apparent by revealing their faces and bodies.

Such research shows again how readily and consistently people make inferences about others based on seeing the way they walk, but the study didn't address the question of whether these assumptions are accurate. For that, we must turn to a British and Swiss study published just a few years ago, which compared people's ratings of their own personalities with the assumptions other people made about them based on point-light displays of their walks.

Their results suggested again that there are two main walking styles, although this study described them in slightly different terms: the first was said to be an expansive, loose style, which observers saw as a mark of adventurousness, extraversion, trustworthiness and warmth; the other was a slow, relaxed style, which observers interpreted as a sign of emotional stability. But crucially, the observers' judgments were wrong - these two different walking styles were not actually correlated with these traits, at least not based on the walkers' ratings of their own personalities.
False impression
The message from all this research is that we treat a person's gait much like we treat their face, clothing or accent - as a source of information about the kind of person they are. It's just that, whereas the evidence suggests our assessments are rather good for faces, we tend to make false assumptions based on gait.

We tend to make false assumptions based on gait (Credit: iStock)

At least, that's the case for most of the judgements we make. But there is a rather more sinister way that we do make more accurate judgments about each other based on our walks - and it has to do with our vulnerability.

Some of the earliest findings showed that men and women with a shorter stride, smaller arm swing and slower walk tend to be seen as more vulnerable (note the similarity to the older walking style found in the personality research). A rather disturbing Japanese study, published in 2006, added to this by asking men to say how likely it was that they would chat up or inappropriately touch different female students who were depicted in point-light displays. Based purely on the women's gait, the men tended to say that they would be more likely to make uninvited advances towards the women with more vulnerable personality traits, such as being more introverted and emotionally unstable.

More worrying still, research has shown that imprisoned inmates with higher psychopathy scores are particularly accurate at detecting which people have previously been attacked in the past, simply from watching video clips of them walking down a hall. It seems that some of the inmates were fully aware of this ability: the higher scorers in psychopathy specifically stated that they paid attention to the people's gait when making their judgements. This tallies with anecdotal evidence. For example, serial killer Ted Bundy reportedly said that he could "tell a victim from the way that she walked down the street".

This entire field of research raises the question of whether you can adapt your walking style to change the impression you give. Some research suggests you can learn to walk in way that sends a message of invulnerability - faster with a longer stride and bolder arm movements - and that women instinctively adopt elements of this style when in less safe environments. But the psychologists who examined the personality profiles associated with those expansive and slow or relaxed walking styles say that it is by no means clear whether these particular gaits could be taught.

So it's probably not advisable to try too hard to make an impression. Otherwise it may just come across as a desperate attempt at the bravado of "Subject 45" - or that swaggering cowboy.
Dr Christian Jarrett edits the British Psychological Society's Research Digest If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called "If You Only Read 6 Things This Week". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital, Travel and Autos, delivered to your inbox every Friday. blog. His latest book is Great Myths of the Brain.
Join 600,000+ Future fans by liking us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and Instagram.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If you saw a man walk into a bar with a John Wayne swagger, you might assume that he's a confident, tough kind of guy. Or perhaps you'd have less polite thoughts. Either way, you probably wouldn't be able to help yourself from jumping to conclusions about his personality based on his gait.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
A 21-year-old woman has died after spending three nights in an outdoor "period hut", prompting police in Nepal to make their first ever arrest in connection with the illegal practice.

The tradition of chhaupadi, where menstruating women in Nepal are banished from their homes, is still widespread in remote and poorer parts of the country.

Parwati Budha Rawat was found dead on Monday morning after staying in a hut 100 metres from her home. She had lit a fire to stay warm while staying in the windowless "period hut" in Achham district, Sudurpashchim Pradesh, where temperatures drop to below 10C (50F) during the month of December.

Rawat, who had married 18 months earlier, was described as a happy young woman who loved children.

Her brother-in-law has been arrested in connection with her death, as police investigate whether she was forced to sleep in the hut. It is understood that her husband is currently working in India.

The tradition of chhaupadi, where women are forced to sleep in period huts, is illegal in Nepal but still practised by many communities, especially in the far west of the country. In January, a mother and two sons died in the Sudurpaschim region. Weeks later, a 21-year-old woman died from smoke inhalation while staying in a hut.

Chhaupadi was outlawed in 2005 and carries a jail term of three months and a fine of 3,000 Nepalese rupees (£21) against the culprit. Campaigners say the law is not enforced, however.

Over the past decade in Sudurpashchim Pradesh, 14 girls have died in Accham and one woman and two boys have died in Bajura.

According to the tradition, menstruating women are considered impure and must be separated from others in many aspects of life. Women are forbidden from entering the home or kitchen, or from touching other people, cattle, fruit or plants. Women practising the tradition may also have restricted access to water tapes and wells.

Opponents to chhaupadi recently began demolishing period huts to end the practice, but menstruating women have instead started to stay in makeshift tents.
Young woman dies in fourth 'period hut' tragedy this year in Nepal
"Although the supreme court made the law, the social construct is too strong to be dismantled," said Pashupati Kunwar, a women's rights activist based in Accham.

"Effective work has not been done in outlawing chhaupadhi - by anyone. If the Nepal government takes action and punishes the culprit then, perhaps, this tradition will come to an end. It is also imperative that the local governments should step up to protect the menstruating women via influencing their psychology."

Janak Bahadur Shahi, district police chief deputy superintendent, said: "This is indeed the first time that the police have arrested someone for a chhaupadhi case on the behalf of the victim."

The brother-in-law will be held for up to 25 days while Rawat's death is investigated.
Topics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Nepal makes first 'period hut' arrest after woman dies during banned custom

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A 21-year-old woman has died after spending three nights in an outdoor "period hut", prompting police in Nepal to make their first ever arrest in connection with the illegal practice. The tradition of chhaupadi, where menstruating women in Nepal are banished from their homes, is still widespread in remote and poorer parts of the country.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Updated September 11, 2019 07:24:11

It reads like satire: a magazine prints a glossy feature of a South Sudanese-Australian model underlining attitudes towards people of colour - with photos of another African-Australian model.

But it happened recently, when Who magazine illustrated an article about Adut Akech with a photo of Flavia Lazarus.

By now, you've probably heard about the story. You might have even read the magazine's apology, or the one from the PR company who supplied the file of images.

The flurry of activity that followed the incident traced a familiar pattern: more apologies; suggestions of an "administrative" error; TV host Kerri-Anne Kennerley denying it is a race-related issue.

We moved on.

But this isn't the first time publications have misidentified people of colour in Australia.

So why does it keep happening?

'This would've not happened to a white model'

Akech was quick to point out she didn't want to lambast Who, but she did want to draw attention to something she says "would've not happened to a white model".

"I've been called by the name of another model who happens to be of the same ethnicity, I find it very ignorant, rude and disrespectful towards both of us simply because we know that this doesn't happen with white models," she wrote in a statement on Instagram.

"I'm sure that I'm not the first person that's experienced this."

And as she promptly found out, she's not.

Another South Sudanese-Australian model, Duckie Thot, wrote in a comment: "This has happened to me too with another Australian paper ... it's really disrespectful and sad."

But it's not just fashion magazines, as actress and musician Zindzi Okenyo can attest.

In March, The Sydney Morning Herald printed her image next to a brief description of one-woman play, Grounded.

Except Okenyo wasn't the actress in the play. That role belonged to another performer: Emily Havea.

Okenyo, who is a presenter on Play School, says she was "angry" but "not surprised" when she first saw the photo.

"Although I never expect anyone to know me or my work, this particular publication had featured me multiple times and on top of that, the woman they should have been featuring had just received a four-star review from that publication for her one-woman show," she tells RN.

For artists of colour who have worked hard to gain a profile in their industry, she says "it's extremely disrespectful to be merely seen as another black face with another difficult name".

"If you aren't white, many doors are still closed and it's this kind of casual racism that is a major contributing factor," she says.

"Although there are many success stories now, the road is long and tiring as you try to knock down doors whilst constantly dealing with ego and defiance."

In 2014, when The Age announced, "Waleed Aly joins The Project", it printed an image of Nazeem Hussain.

"Well, we are kinda the same person," Hussain joked on Twitter at the time.

Of course, Australian media isn't the only home to misidentification of performers, models or TV personalities from diverse backgrounds.

In February, US Vogue came under fire when it misnamed two stars of Crazy Rich Asians.

Australian comedian Ronny Chieng, who plays Eddie Cheng in the film, drew attention to a similar error from celebrity magazine, People, on social media.

"Jae W Suh is not in this photo. I'm not Randall Park. And that's Tan Kheng Hua, not Michelle Yeoh," he wrote.

This happened less than a month after US Vogue printed Muslim-American journalist and activist Noor Tagouri's image with the wrong caption. Instead, it captioned her as Pakistani actress Noor Bukhari.

"Misrepresentation and misidentification is a constant problem if you are Muslim in America," she wrote on social media.

"And as much as I work to fight this, there are moments like this where I feel defeated."

Why does it keep happening?

There are any number of complicated factors at play - but Dr Sukhmani Khorana, cultural studies academic at the University of Wollongong, says we need to examine diversity in the media.

"Non-European people of colour are often essentialised in everyday life, as well as in realms like the arts and media. This means that they are assumed to be monocultural, one-dimensional, and devoid of individual characteristics," she says.

"Such stereotypes apply to expectations of behaviour and lifestyles, as well as phenotypes of what people look like (as opposed to the particular features of a person)."

Okenyo agrees.

"What happens when people post an article or a photo of a different non-white face than what is appropriate is that that person is essentially erased because you didn't take the time," she says.

"If you have the time to respect a person enough to feature them in your publication, extend your respects truly to that person."

The flow-on effects seem relatively straightforward: greater representation reduces the likelihood of essentialisation.

"The more variety of people of different ethnic backgrounds we see on the media, the better we are likely to get at recognising them as complex individuals with agency rather than tokens or representatives of particular cultures," Dr Khorana says.

In the UK, a Guardian investigation revealed that in 2018, there were "whole months" where "not a single BAME (Black, Asian and minority ethnic) person featured on the cover of our biggest-selling magazines".

We're yet to see a similar study in Australia, and without conflating fashion magazines with newsrooms, a brief glance at our journalism industry more broadly indicates it probably doesn't help that the average media employee is 27, Caucasian and male.

But Adolfo Aranjuez, freelance writer and editor of Metro magazine, points out there are no clear answers in Akech's case.

"Without excusing any of the parties who made the error, I do feel it does a disservice to the complexity of such situations to make a definitive call based on speculation. But I will suggest that it is perhaps less likely to happen to a white model, insofar as numbers are stacked in their favour," he says.

"Given they comprise the majority of models in Australia, the person responsible for captioning can't merely 'rely on a race-based assumption'; they'll need to go through the likely hundreds of possible names and faces.

"That is to say: because there are many more options, the captioner has a higher likelihood of getting it wrong, which would mean they're in turn more likely to be careful to avoid such an error. This level of meticulousness should be the standard regardless of race, however."

For Aranjuez, it isn't necessarily a "wake-up call" - but an ongoing reminder of the importance of quality control in publishing.

"This isn't the first time we've had race-related nor quality-control issues in the publishing industry. If anything, I'd more readily frame this as a 'stay-awake call'. We can't sleepwalk through the work we do and let ourselves be swept up in the content churn."

He sees this as an issue endemic to the industry at large, both in print and online.

"In the mad rush to get things out into the world, publications are no longer investing in quality-control measures such as fact-checking. I wonder, for example, how many staff members even had a look at the magazine's proofs before it was sent to print?" Aranjuez says.

For Okenyo, the "sloppiness around checking articles before they go to print" is exacerbated by ingrained bias.

"I wasn't surprised because this kind of thing happens a lot, it's part of being a non-white person in the world and it's very exhausting," she says.

"I aim to always walk through life addressing my own implicit bias - we all have them - and I try to remember, a closed mind is a wonderful thing to lose."

Whether it's examining the broader structural issues underlying misidentification of people of colour, or ensuring basic editorial standards are met in the industry - there's still a long way to go.

As Akech puts it: "Australia, you've a lot of work to do, and you've got to do better and that goes to the rest of the industry".

Topics: social-media, print-media, race-relations, community-and-society, fashion, arts-and-entertainment, melbourne-3000, vic, australia, united-states, united-kingdom

First posted September 11, 2019 07:00:00

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
From Waleed Aly to Adut Akech: 'Casual racism' in the media is 'a constant problem'

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
When a magazine illustrated a feature of her with an image of a different model, model Adut Akech said she was sure it'd happened to other people. She was right. Misidentification is a constant problem in the media - just ask Zindzi Okenyo, Ronny Chieng or Waleed Aly.

# data[].attributes.headline
What you probably don't know about the Amish 

# data[].attributes.subject
What you probably don't know about the Amish 

# data[].attributes.body
National Geographic. 05 Oct 2012

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Ways of the Amish

* The Amish have an unwritten code of conduct called the Ordnung.

* The Ordnung stresses the virtues of humility, obedience, and simplicity

* The Amish are strict pacifists and are strongly opposed to any form of violence.

* Their chief tenet is, "Be ye not conformed to this world."

* The Amish, like all Anabaptists, believe in adult baptism, as opposed to baptizing babies who cannot choose for themselves.

* When a member of the community violates the Ordnung, they risk being shunned by their family and community.

A Brief History

* The name "Amish" comes from Jakob Ammann, an early Swiss Anabaptist whose controversial teachings caused a schism in the Mennonite church in Europe.

* Ammann taught his followers to live non-resistant lives, care for the community, work the land, and follow the Bible literally. He believed strongly in the practice of excommunication.

* The Amish began immigrating to North America in the early 1700s, first settling in Pennsylvania. There are now over 250,000 Amish people living in over 28 states.

* After 1850, a schism developed between those who accepted elements of modernization, or the "new order," and the "old order," now referred to as the Old Order Amish Mennonite Church.

The Amish on Religion

* The Amish are Christians. Adult baptism and a lack of evangelism set the Amish apart from present-day Christianity.

* The Amish believe that each person must decide to be baptized on his or her own. Individuals generally decide to become baptized between 18 and 22 years old, after an 18-week instruction period, and are only then allowed to marry.

* Their baptismal vows make them accountable to the Church for their lives. If they stray from the Church, they face shunning. However, if they leave the community before baptism, they will generally not be shunned because the Amish respect the voluntary decision to join the church.

* Amish church services occur every other Sunday in members' homes, not in an actual church building. Areas with large Amish populations are divided into church districts and each family typically hosts church about once every year.

* It's thought that Amish religious services have been held in private residences since the 1500s, when the Anabaptists were being severely persecuted. Holding services in public settings was too risky for the Amish so they moved their services to more discrete settings.

Unique Customs

* The Amish have retained the custom of having faceless dolls, which appeal to their critical perspectives on pride and vanity.

* Land, which is traditionally kept within families, is usually passed on to younger sons rather than to older sons, or daughters.

Rumspringa

* When Amish children turn 16, they are encouraged to experiment and explore. For this limited time period, called Rumspringa, they are allowed to break the tenets of the Amish community.

* For many Amish teens, Rumspringa is just a token venture: going to the local movie theater, or driving lessons.

The Amish on War

* The Amish are pacifists and tradition dictates that they abstain from any acts of violence. They are also conscientious objectors, avoiding any involvement with the military.

The Amish on Photographs

* The Amish do not have their picture taken because they believe that photographs are "graven images." Some don't mind being photographed if their faces aren't shown.

* Although most Amish refuse to allow themselves to be photographed, some make a distinction between a photograph taken in a natural setting versus posing for one. These members of the Amish community don't have a problem with being filmed or photographed as long as it is apparent they aren't posing.

The Amish on Electricity

* Electricity is considered "worldly," and connects the Amish to the outside world, so most communities forbid it. However, recently, some communities allow a phone to be shared amongst a few households. The phone is forbidden to be inside the home and is instead kept in a shack or barn outside of the home.

The Amish on Education

* The Amish operate one-room parochial schools that are taught by teachers with an eighth-grade education.

* Although Amish families stop sending their children to school after eighth grade, the society itself acts as a vocational school. Children learn how to be farmers, homemakers, carpenters, and tradesmen. By the time they are teens, Amish girls know how to cook a full meal and boys understand farm operations.

The Amish and the Law

* The Amish believe in the separation of church and state.

* The Amish prioritize the Word of God over the rule of the government.

* One serious criticism of Amish groups has been for using internal church discipline to handle infractions that are in fact serious violations of the law. In 2009, Amish in Missouri drew criticism and faced charges for failing to report child abuse in their community. At the same time, not all Amish would take this approach, and many do report actual crimes when they occur.

The Amish on Music

* Amish do not play musical instruments because it is viewed as a means of self-expression, which would garner feelings of pride and superiority.

* Amish church songs derive from the Ausbund, the High German songbook, which has no musical notes. Tunes are passed on from generation to generation.

* The Ausbund, first published in German in 1564, is among the most seminal books to the Amish. It is regarded to be the oldest Protestant hymnal in continuous use.

* Ausbund songs invoke the martyrdom of their Anabaptist past, as many hymnals are said to have been written by men awaiting the death sentence during a time of intense persecution. Author Paul M. Yoder notes: "the dominant tone found in most of them is one of great sorrow, deep loneliness, or protest against the world of wickedness which was putting forth every effort to crush the righteous."

The Amish on Marriage

* The Amish are only allowed to marry once they are baptized.

* There is no exchange of rings in an Amish marriage.

* After a wedding, the groom begins to grow his beard.

* An Amish engagement is generally kept secret within the family until it is announced in a Sunday church service by the community bishop, usually four to six weeks prior to the wedding. The announcement is called "publishing the engagement."

* Once the engagement is made public, the engaged couple must personally hand-deliver wedding invitations to each potential guest.

* For most rural Amish communities, weddings are seasonal and take place in the spring or fall when harvest is over.

* It is Amish custom that the bride sews her own wedding dress.

* Strict Amish communities require the wedding dress to be blue, but some allow the bride to choose her own color. Shades of blue and purple are the most common colors for Amish wedding dresses.

* The bride's wedding outfit will become her Sunday church attire after she is married.

* It is general practice that an Amish woman will be dressed in her wedding dress, cape, and apron once she dies.

* Sometimes an Amish wedding celebration is used as an opportunity for matchmaking between teenagers who are over the age of 16 and are assigned specific seats before the evening meal in order to bring them closer together.

* A newlywed couple's honeymoon is generally spent visiting all their relatives on the weekends. This is when they collect the majority of their wedding gifts.

The Amish on Medicine

* Most Amish and Mennonite groups welcome the use of modern medicine, as nothing from the Bible explicitly restricts them from taking advantage of any modern medical services. The willingness to accept medical attention can vary greatly from family to family, however.

* Since the Amish don't have hospitalization insurance, they combine efforts and funding to cover medical expenses for any member of their community in need of financial assistance. Each community appoints a leader for their mutual aid fund.

The Amish on Transportation

* Although the Amish are allowed to use automobiles for select social and business functions, the church rules prohibit members from owning or driving a car.

* A motorized vehicle is considered "worldly" and a threat to the Amish community. Accessibility to cities and "English" lifestyles might tempt individuals to leave the community and abandon their faith.

* A large part of the closeness and survival of Amish communities lies in the fact that members are mutually dependent upon each other. Neighbors helping neighbors has been a long-standing bedrock of the Amish lifestyle. Many worry that the practical benefits of speed, efficiency, and power of the automobile would eliminate the need for one neighbor seeking the assistance of another neighbor.

* While they can't own cars, the Amish readily accept rides and even hire drivers to chauffer them.

Amish Demographics

* There are over 250,000 Amish people living in over 28 states.

* About two-thirds of the Amish live in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, but they continue to spread west, particularly into the midwestern corn belt.

* Every 20 years, the Amish population roughly doubles in size, largely due to an 80 to 90 percent retention rate of Amish children.

Amish Women

* Amish women cannot serve as bishops, preachers, or deacons.

* The standard for Amish women is to make family, church, and community needs a priority, even before their own needs. Accordingly, Amish women are responsible for managing the home, cooking, tending to clothing, and helping neighbors in need.

* Amish women take on a fairly subservient role with respect to their husbands. In public, women traditionally heed their husband's decisions.

Amish Fashion

* Amish clothing is plain and humble, harmonious with their simple and separated lifestyle. Amish clothing is homemade from simple fabrics and most commonly in dark colors.

* For men, straight-cut suits are void of collars, pockets, and ornamentation. Pants are void of pleats, cuffs and belt loops, as belts are not permitted.

* Unmarried men remain clean-shaven. Married men are required to grow their beards out, but mustaches are not allowed.

* Traditionally, Amish women wear long sleeves, full, solid-colored skirts, and aprons. Women wear their hair in a braid or bun covered by a small bonnet. They are not permitted to wear jewelry or patterned clothes.

* Specific Amish communities might dictate the exact length of a skirt or width of a seam.

The Amish on Outsiders

* The Amish, in general, are uncomfortable around non-Amish, or "English" people, although, as the Bible commands them, they are to be peaceful, meek, and different. They aim to co-exist peacefully with the outside world.

Joining the Amish Community

* Although the Amish do not seek to convert outsiders, several dozen people have joined the Amish. Some of those converted have become well-respected members of the community.

* A would-be convert is placed with an Amish family for a set amount of time to participate in daily activities and adapt to the household.

* To join the Amish, one must learn the Pennsylvania German dialect. One must also learn to leave behind modern luxuries like televisions, appliances, cars, and contemporary clothing. Many of the rules particular to certain churches are extremely difficult for someone from the outside to adopt.

* Even after moving in, attending church services, taking a job in the community, learning the language, and adhering to church practices, an outsider must still be voted in by the church.

Excommunication

* Members who are excommunicated and shunned are avoided by active members in all social and business activities. However, the offenders are always welcomed back to the community if they repent.

* Reasons for excommunication vary from owning an automobile to owning a computer; from drinking alcohol to the refusal to kneel during religious ceremonies.

* Members who refuse to shun the offending individuals risk excommunication themselves. Life-long friends and family members are also required to shun the wayward individual. Even parents must shun their own grown children. It is felt that by avoiding the transgressing individual, the faithful won't become defiled by their sin. Usually, the excommunicated member drifts away from the church and the Amish community.

* Amish practice shunning out of "tough love" in order to get a deviant person to see the error in his ways, change behavior, and re-affirm his commitment to the church.

* In Old Order Amish communities, there are cases where young people who have left the Amish faith are shunned, despite the fact that they did not join the Amish church.

Leaving the Amish Community

* Beginning in 2000, Mission to Amish People (MAP) has offered counsel to Amish individuals making an effort to integrate into "English" communities. Over the years they have developed services for the Amish and ex-Amish alike.

The Amish on Shopping

* Although the Amish grow a large amount of the food they consume, they also purchase food and other products in places such as salvage stores, Amish-run dry good stores, and even large supermarkets like Wal-mart.

* Most Amish communities have one dry goods store, that sells items like writing supplies, books, canning supplies, flashlights and candles. These stores are run by Amish or Mennonites and are usually in a small building on home property.

Barn Raising

* Barn raisings are a cherished tradition in the Amish culture. They symbolize acts of selflessness and assisting one's family, neighbors, and community.

* Barn-raising has had a significant impact on the Lancaster Amish community-each barn increasing the prosperity of the surrounding area. It is also a social event that strengthens the community bond, and brings the community together in times of crisis-rebuilding after fires and various other disasters.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
What You Probably Don't Know About the Amish

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Ways of the Amish * The Amish have an unwritten code of conduct called the Ordnung. * The Ordnung stresses the virtues of humility, obedience, and simplicity * The Amish are strict pacifists and are strongly opposed to any form of violence. * Their chief tenet is, "Be ye not conformed to this world."

# data[].attributes.headline
The six-class system dispelling myths of an egalitarian Australia

# data[].attributes.subject
The six-class system dispelling myths of an egalitarian Australia

# data[].attributes.body
ABC Radio National 29 Mar 2018

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
While most of us have an intuitive understanding of social class, we often struggle to define it beyond simple financial metrics, like how much money someone has in the bank.

The three-stratum model, which splits all of us into either the working, middle or upper class, is a mainstay of 20th century sociology.

It's a rigid structure, but a recent report out of the Australian National University posits a more nuanced approach to the way we define ourselves and where we sit on the social ladder.

The end result? Six social classes.

Australia might like to consider itself a classless society, but these new methods of social modelling tell a far more complicated story.

Social and cultural capital

Jill Sheppard, who co-authored the report Class, Capital and Identity in Australian Society with Nicholas Biddle, says recent studies of social class, particularly in Australia, have been one-tracked.

"Over the last 20 years or so, the easiest and most reliable way ... to measure class, was to just use occupation," she says.

"For example: do you have a blue-collar occupation or do you have a white-collar one? Do you do low-skilled manual labour or high-skilled manual labour?"

Dr Sheppard says this method, while easy to use and measure, ignores the more complex, social aspects of class.

As part of their research, Dr Sheppard and her team surveyed 1,200 randomly selected Australians, and asked them questions about their relative wealth, their pastimes, and the occupations of the people they regularly socialised with.

She says socialisation - what those around us think and feel - has long-lasting effects on how we manifest our class behaviour.

"What your parents did, where you're from, all these little things that leave little indelible marks along the way, ... [they] are really hard to shake off," Dr Sheppard says.

The new, six-class model that the ANU report proposes, based on a similar study in the UK, takes these complexities into account by measuring, along with savings and income (your economic capital), two other metrics: social capital and cultural capital.

Cultural capital, Dr Sheppard explains, is broadly defined as how you spend your free time.

"If you have the night off or away from the kids, what do you do? Do you go to see a movie? Or do you go and see the theatre or do you sit at home and play on Facebook?" she asks.

The activities are tabulated along a scale of relative prestige and used as an indication of education, socio-political access and spending habits.

Similarly, social capital is measured by prestige - but it's also contrasted by variety.

"We ask subjects the kinds of people that they know from a range of occupations. That is, 'what sort of jobs do your friends and family have?'"

"We're working on the basis that there is a difference between people who only socialise with people who do the same things as them, and people that have a broad range of social contacts."

If you mostly socialise with people who do the same things as you and those things rank lower on the prestige hierarchy (looking at Facebook vs. going to the opera, for example), then your overall score will be lower.

We asked your thoughts on the six classes to describe Australian society. Read the discussion below.

The six classes

While Dr Sheppard accepts that no demographic study can account for all of society's complexities, she believes the resulting six classes are as close to accurately representative as possible - at least in Australia.

"Six classes does a pretty good job of describing Australian society, both intuitively and statistically, based on the data," she says.

The precariat - Accounting for 13 per cent of the sample, the precariat comprises Australia's most poverty-affected citizens. They have the lowest mean household income, many are unemployed or claiming government aid and their social and cultural capital scores are the lowest.

Ageing workers - This class has the highest mean age of any of the classes (58 years) and counts for 14 per cent of the population. A large portion of this class are pensioned retirees and are the least likely, along with the precariat, to be engaged in gainful employment.

New workers - In contrast, almost half of all new workers, whose mean age is naturally younger, are employed fulltime. While the relative prestige of the occupations of people in this class is slightly lower than that of ageing workers, they are more financially successful and have better social and cultural capital scores over all.

Established middle - While reporting slightly lower fulltime employment rates compared with new workers, the established middle class "appear more entrenched and comfortable in their status than the new worker class." Due to more accumulated wealth, they also enjoy "greater advantages" overall than new workers.

Emerging affluent - The emerging affluent class reports higher income levels than the established middle but, interestingly, lower "wealth accumulation" (i.e. assets and savings).

Established affluent - The closest Australia has to an aristocracy, reporting the highest scores of social, economic and cultural capital of any class.

One of the most compelling aspects of the report's results, Dr Sheppard says, is the fact that the six classes seem to make intuitive and anecdotal sense.

The mythology

While we're starting to dismantle the idea that class is meaningless in Australia, we still like to think of ourselves as a society that's blind to these kinds of social divides.

"One problem is that lots of people have written really well about this issue in Australia," Dr Sheppard says.

"But they tend to be academics who don't have any incentive to make their work accessible - and while that work remains inaccessible, this sort of mythology can persist."

The idea of the Australian 'fair-go', and the notion that we're all egalitarian, is part of the mythos around Australian identity.

And Dr Sheppard believes this is, in part, related to a historical anti-British sentiment.

"We're like their rebellious daughter, who wants to kick back against everything we see in the United Kingdom," she says.

But it's not all bad news - there is one small thing in which Australians can take solace.

"There is good evidence to suggest we aren't as socially hierarchical as England," Dr Sheppard says.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Think Australia is classless? There's actually six of them

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Australia might like to consider itself a classless society. But new methods of social modelling tell a far more complicated story.

# data[].attributes.headline
No one wants to admit it, but there's a class system in Australia

# data[].attributes.subject
No one wants to admit it, but there's a class system in Australia

# data[].attributes.body
Business Insider 25 Feb 2014

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Egalitarianism is an article of faith in Australia. While the nation still faces issues of class, Australians tend to be uncomfortable about discussing these or acknowledging their extent. Interestingly, it has fallen to Australian authors such as Tim Winton and Christos Tsiolkas - as well as American writer David Simon, creator of the TV series The Wire - to wonder at and question the taboo.
"This is bullshit," the student muttered under her breath. The tutorial topic assigned for that week was class. I'd kicked things off by asking whether class existed in modern Australia, or whether it was a relic of 19th century Europe.

Struck by the student's response, I asked her to elaborate. She did:

Look, I went to a private school and my Dad's a CEO and most of his friends are business people. So I guess that's supposed to make me upper class? But class has nothing to do with it. Going to a private school was my parents' decision. And my Dad's friends are just his friends.

I suggested that the choice of school - not to mention the capacity to afford the fees - and her father's friendship network might have been shaped heavily by their class position. That wasn't to say there was anything wrong with it, but it did show how our lives are shaped by larger social and economic forces we don't control.

The student was having none of it. It was clear that she'd encountered the notion of class before and found it singularly unconvincing. In her world, everything was simply a matter of individual choice - choices that were unconstrained.

She didn't say it, but class seemed to be an excuse for people who made the wrong choices in life. Alternatively, it was a way to unfairly label people like her and her family who'd worked hard for their success, presenting their achievements as little more than the luck of being born into the right family.

Her response isn't surprising. Many Australians share her view. Part of the reason for this is that class is less visible than it once was.

Ready access to cheap credit has blurred class distinctions. When most people can afford the latest smart phones, wear Prada, get about in four-wheel drives and take overseas holidays, class seems like an irrelevance.

About the only time we hear the word "class" in public debate any more is when someone questions the wisdom of rewarding CEOs with multi-million dollar salary packages. In a culture that has internalised the mantra of "You Can Do Anything", this apparently constitutes the first salvo in a class war.

The only time we're happy to discuss class openly is when it can be viewed from the safe distance of the past or another country, as in shows like Downton Abbey. Class in this world is a simple matter of upstairs/downstairs.

It's about much more than money

But class has always been more complex than this view would suggest. As the late French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu argued in his book Distinction, class - and the reproduction of class - has as much to do with your tastes, the way you speak and comport yourself as it has to do with income levels.

Taking this broader view, class is as prevalent as it ever was. It's just that when we talk about class, we don't use the "C word". Instead, we use other less threatening terms - "bogan", for instance.

One definition of a bogan is someone who fails to conform to middle-class standards of taste, dietary habits, leisure activities, styles of dress and ways of speaking. You don't have to have read sociology or understand the political economy to notice such distinctions.

When, for example, Channel Ten launched the 2014 season of The Biggest Loser, which centres on the town of Ararat in Victoria's south-west, a theme running through the audience reaction on Twitter centred on class. Some of the uglier tweets included:

That's the entertaining thing about #biggestloserau We're laughing at them cos they're bogans.

FunFact My cousin used to own a $2 shop in Ararat he did a roaring trade, couldn't keep up with track suit & thong orders.

Hahahaha no money for your poor town unless you lose weight. No pressure. #biggestloserau

The crime of the contestants - and by extension Ararat - is that the show features people who don't conform to middle-class standards of health and well-being. Like the worst stereotypes of the working class that have been around since Karl Marx was a boy, they are assumed to be slovenly, poor and poorly educated, and lacking in taste and refinement.

Looking through the biographies of the contestants, you begin to notice that most are working class or lower-middle class. Along with a couple of students, the contestants are supermarket managers, a baker, nurses and what former US Secretary of Labor Robert Reich refers to as "in-person service providers". The few professionals who are on the show tend to be ones that, relative to other professions, are on the lower end of the income scale, such as nursing or teaching.

Of course, the class hatred expressed on Twitter at The Biggest Loser contestants is nothing new. But it's now wrapped up in messages about health and exercise. Income, occupation, residence and eating and activity habits are all part of what defines people's class.

At the other end of the spectrum to bogan is the hipster. Whereas bogans fail to conform to the lifestyle norms, values and tastes of the middle classes, a hipster cleaves to them closely to the point that they end up a parody of them. Hipsters trade on authenticity, individuality and a rejection of the mainstream. Sometimes this parody is ironic, while in other cases it is unconscious.

Please enable JavaScript to watch this video.

I have no doubt that these arguments wouldn't find much traction with my former student. Imbued with a heightened sense of choice, she would probably regard all this as people just being funny on Twitter about a TV show or, in the case of the hipster, simply a personal matter of style and taste rather than pointing to any deeper social reality.

Popular culture makes no sense without class

The problem with this kind of response is that if class truly does not exist in modern Australia, or has no bearing on shaping - not determining, mind, but shaping - one's behaviour and life chances, then large swathes of contemporary Australian culture appear completely random and utterly baffling.

Everything from plays (and movies based on the plays) like David Williamson's Don's Party and Emerald City, to novels like Helen Garner's Monkey Grip and Christos Tsiolkas' Loaded and The Slap, to comedies such as Upper Middle Bogan, The Castle, Kath & Kim and Ja'mie: Private School Girl are premised on the social realities of class.

All of these presume their audiences have some experience of social class. Ja'mie's behaviour is appalling, in large part, because she's oblivious to the privileged bubble in which she lives. The slap in Tsiolkas' book of the same name is based on differences in working- and middle-class attitudes to parenting and what constitutes appropriate discipline.

If class were not a lived part of people's everyday experience, these productions simply would not resonate with audiences in the way they do. They would just appear surreal, completely disconnected from Australian culture.

For those whose choices are more constrained, this is self-evident - a point that was underscored for me by another student in a different tutorial. Unlike the first group, the students in this tutorial had lower ATARs and lived in suburbs with lower incomes.

Once again, I kicked off the tutorial by asking if they thought class existed in modern Australia. They looked at me as if the answer were obvious: of course it did.

I asked one student why he was so certain. He replied simply:

I live in Frankston and work at Woolworths.

Christopher Scanlon does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.
This article was originally published on The Conversation.
Read the original article.
Follow Business Insider Australia on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
No One Wants To Admit It, But There's A Class System In Australia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Egalitarianism is an article of faith in Australia. While the nation still faces issues of class, Australians tend to be uncomfortable about discussing these or acknowledging their extent. Interestingly, it has fallen to Australian authors such as Tim Winton and Christos Tsiolkas - as well as American writer David Simon, creator of the TV series The Wire - to wonder at and question the taboo.

# data[].attributes.headline
Does your language shape how you think? 

# data[].attributes.subject
Does your language shape how you think? 

# data[].attributes.body
New York Times Magazine 26 Aug 2010

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Does Your Language Shape How You Think? (Published 2010)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The idea that your mother tongue shapes your experience of the world may be true after all.

# data[].attributes.headline
Food fault lines: mapping class through food chains 

# data[].attributes.subject
Food fault lines: mapping class through food chains 

# data[].attributes.body
Honi Siot 22 Sept 2017

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
How might the distribution of food chains intersect with the division of wealth in Sydney? Have a play on the map below. Are we missing something? Let us know and we'll add it to the map!
(The Source Bulk Foods, Vintage Cellars and Cha Time have since been included, thanks to your suggestions).
A term that first surfaced on Reddit and Twitter, the 'Red Rooster line' has since entered common vernacular as a dividing line which separates Sydney's west from its more affluent areas. The formula is simple: sketch the points of all the Red Roosters in Sydney and you get a surprisingly neat indication of the border of Western Sydney.

According to Bernard Salt - who is most famous amongst our generation for penning a scalding takeon the smashed avocado habits of millennials in The Australian - the suburbs that lie beyond the Red Rooster line constitute "a different world orbiting the city like an asteroid belt at a distance of 7km to 50km from the CBD." With a touch of anthropological flair, Salt asserts that: "Different people with different values inhabit different space."

Salt proudly dubs the Red Rooster line's inverse the 'Goat Cheese Curtain'; an area he describes by waxing lyrical about hipsters roaming in search of avocado and, well, goat's cheese. The curtain is drawn around 38 cafes that have been rated four out of five by at least 500 reviewers on Zomato, and its parameters stretch across from Haberfield to Bondi, and from Newtown up to the Rocks.

But there's more to the line than the simple opportunity to scoff at the café-dwelling habits of Sydney's hipster élite.

The concept of a border that splits Sydneydown class lines doesn't just exist online or in the musings of News Corp writers: the 'latte line', as it is also known, is a concept used in city planning. "If you are north of that line you are largely a 'have'," according to Geoff Roberts, the economic commissioner of the Greater Sydney Commission. "If you are south of that line, you are largely a 'have-not'... It's a concept that says employment, education levels, social disadvantage, all the things that make a city less productive and less liveable than what we would all desire, you can pretty much draw a line from the airport through Parramatta, just to the west of Parramatta up to the north-west sector."

The ramifications are clear in education too: HSC outcomes by school can be charted clearly on either side of the line.

The distribution of fast food outlets in cities is often cited as a typical indicator of socioeconomic class. A 2002 study of Melbourne by Reidpath and colleagues collected data on the number of fast food chains per postcode, testing McDonald's, Pizza Hut, KFC, Red Rooster and Hungry Jack's. When the results came in and the highest income postcodes were compared with the lowest income, the latter were shown to have two and a half times more fast food outlets per person.

So beyond drawing the lines around a 'hipster/suburbia' divide, what else can drawing maps around the distribution of chains in Sydney tell us about different parts of the city?

We took the liberty of drawing our own lines around Sydney and naming them in similarly alliterative ways. While most orient themselves neatly in clear blocks around the latte line, some afford the map-enthusiast greater specificity than others.

Our Google Maps adventures also revealed some more trivial patterns: the locations of Gelato Messinas and Bailey Nelson stores, for example, almost perfectly overlap - each existing in concentration around the gentrified and hipster inner city, while also ticking boxes in key shopping districts like Parramatta and Miranda, to ensure their scope just extends to more suburban parts of Sydney.

But from the 'Great Dessert Divide' - an easy way to map the city's gentrification - to the 'Harris Farm Hedge' - which carves the clearest picture of Sydney's richest regions - it becomes clear that residents of Sydney today are on footing that's far from equal.

Carving the chicken

If we take a look at the map below, we see that while the Red Rooster line divides Sydney clearly in two, other chicken outlets carve sections of Sydney off into more defined quarters.

The line drawn by El Jannah, which serves delicious Lebanese cuisine alongside its chicken, establishes an alternate gateway into Sydney's west.

This line is perhaps more accurate than the Red Rooster line, which in itself is controversial for encompassing the airport and the Inner West suburb of Summer Hill. El Jannah is at its furthest east in Bankstown, so offers a clearer geographical delineation. Moreover, the joint's ethnic twist is indicative of the demographic contained within its tasty borders.

As the Red Rooster line sweeps to the west, so the North is held neatly by a ring of Chargrill Charlie's. Venturing further north than Salt's Goat Cheese Curtain to encompass suburbs like Mosman and Mona Vale, this map encapsulates Northern Beaches affluence. On the weekend that this paper was produced, a Chargrill Charlie's was opened in Annandale. This venture means the Chargrill Charlie's line extends into the rapidly gentrifying Inner West for the first time, making this map one to watch.

The Great Dessert Divide

With the entrance of relatively new pastry purveyor Doughnut Time, we've seen the pastel green shopfronts become slowly more common, but only in a select area: three are in thecity, and the remaining four are in the Northern Suburbs, Northern Beaches, Inner West and Eastern Suburbs respectively, outlining a quadrilateral of relative financial comfort.

Bourke Street Bakery has an even more limited scope; its locations are mostly concentrated to a narrow corridor stretching from North Sydney to Eastgardens, and its one outlying Parramatta bakery makes sense when you think about Parramatta's extensive shopping district and developments. Bourke Street's various outposts delineate what is essentially the city centre and its surrounding trendy suburbs.

Contrast this with the city-outskirts favourite, Wendy's, whose closest store, bar the one kiosk in Moore Park Supa Centa, is 15 kilometres away in Sylvania; Wendy's once had more stores open around Sydney, but many have since shut since they were not financially viable.

Doughnut Time is principallyconcentrated in the city and Inner West, speaking to its status as an overpriced, gimmicky, gentrifying trend; it has also targeted more affluent areas like the Northern Beaches and the Eastern Suburbs where such a store might find success.

Wendy's, on the other hand, reliably traces the western side of Sydney, a territory untainted by gentrification - for now.

The Harris Farm Hedge

To consider the 'Harris Farm Hedge' - the portion of Sydney where you can find upscale supermarket Harris Farm Markets with its aesthetic store layouts, broad range of protein snacks, 'imperfect picks' section, and the option to fill your own jar of fresh milk - is to acquire a picture of class in Sydney that's more insightful than dwelling on the simpler 'hipster' demographic indicated by the Goat Cheese Curtain.

Stretching as far north as the Chargrill Charlie's map, but reaching substantially further west, the Harris Farm Hedge fits quite snugly into the part of Sydney that has been sectioned off as home to those who are the 'haves' of society, according to the latte line's followers.

Out of all the maps, the Harris Farm Hedge is the only border which encompasses all 10 of Sydney's richest suburbs (Point Piper, Vaucluse, Bellevue Hill, Mosman, Hunters Hill, Northbridge, Woollhara, Double Bay, Paddington and Balmain). Given that six out of these ten are Eastern Suburbs locations, it's only fitting that the East is the region with the highest concentration of Harris Farms - you can find a whopping three separate stores very close to one another in Bondi.

This clear division of food suppliers along class lines evokes the concept of 'food justice': the idea the dominant food system - from production to distribution and consumption - often upholds inequalities that exist in wider society. In line with this, research has repeatedly focused on how healthy food options tend to be less available in neighborhoods home to residents with lower incomes. Recognising this, proponents of food justice demand that: "disadvantaged communities benefit as much as or more than privileged people from efforts to strengthen local, healthy food systems."

The proliferation of Harris Farms in this shapemakes sense; it is logical that the most expensive and wealthy areas of Sydney would be the go-to for expanding an upmarket grocery store. However, when considering notions like food justice, the fact that certain goods and services are restricted to bubbles where wealthier classes reside smacks of their potential to perpetuate structural inequality. Harris Farm's distribution is an example of the market in action, but is the market just?

Steakhouse Square

Operating in near perfect inversion to the 'Harris Farm Hedge' lies what we have identified as the 'Steakhouse Square'. Though we're taking slight liberty with the square form, many of Sydney's most prolific steakhouse chains can be found here.

Rashay's, whose restaurant name originates from a combination of its founders' names, Rami and Shannon, started in Liverpool, and since then has spread as far up as Penrith and as far east as Eastgardens. However, 16 of the 18 Rashay's restaurants sit within the map's red polygon (Liverpool alone is home to three Rashay's stores), excluding the city and Eastgardens, which we've treated as outliers.

Outback Steakhouse and Hog's Breath, or Hog's Australian Steakhouse, occupy pretty much the sameterritory; if we had to guess, we'd say their distribution corresponds mostly to areas of Sydney with larger middle class families, away from the 'café culture' and hipsterism of the city and its surrounds; these restaurants, while not necessarily more affordable than your average chain restaurant, are often spacious and able to accommodate larger groups of people.

Beyond that, it's hard to draw more meaningful conclusions, since it's such a large expanse - our question is, what is it that stops them from expanding north-eastward?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Food fault lines: mapping class through food chains

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
How might the distribution of food chains intersect with the division of wealth in Sydney? Have a play on the map below. Are we missing something? Let us know and we'll add it to the map! (The Source Bulk Foods, Vintage Cellars and Cha Time have since been included, thanks to your suggestions).

# data[].attributes.headline
20 amazing words that don't exist in English 

# data[].attributes.subject
20 amazing words that don't exist in English 

# data[].attributes.body
Insider 10 Oct 2019

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
It seems like there's a word for everything, but as it turns out, there are a lot of terms missing from the English dictionary that perfectly describe many common aspects of everyday life.

From very specific emotions to awkward situations, languages like German and Portuguese can describe certain scenarios we've all experienced perfectly, while the English vocabulary falls short.

Keep scrolling to see which words are popular in other languages that just don't translate to English.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
20 amazing words that don't exist in English - but really should

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It seems like there's a word for everything, but as it turns out, there are a lot of terms missing from the English dictionary that perfectly describe many common aspects of everyday life. From very specific emotions to awkward situations, languages like German and Portuguese can describe certain scenarios we've all experienced perfectly, while the English vocabulary falls short.

# data[].attributes.headline
These death-defying human towers build on Catalan tradition

# data[].attributes.subject
These death-defying human towers build on Catalan tradition

# data[].attributes.body
National Geographic 31 July 2019

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Catalonia is known for its sea-side markets ( la boqueria), gothic architecture -- championed by Antoni Gaudí -- and sparkling white champagne ( cava). The territory boasts its own language ( Catalun), flag, and governing body ( Generalitat). But perhaps the most dramatic display of Catalonian culture comes from the people themselves, who literally and figuratively band together to build human-towers ( castells).

"The human tower is a metaphor for the Catalonian identity," says Montserrat Rossell Xicola, a journalist and producer of the film Castells, created by Autobahn, a London-based production company. Xicola grew up in the Vallès Oriental region of Catalonia and always admired castells Her brother temporarily competed though she never participated herself.

Observers say the practice is symbolic of togetherness, the elimination of class differences, and Catalonia's welcoming atmosphere, Xicola says. "You can step on your boss in a human tower, you cannot do it outside this."

"It's a very important cultural heritage in our country," she says.

Castells are constructed by Catalans of all ages, who stack themselves on top of each other by climbing up backs and shoulders. The practice was first documented in 1801 as a cultural activity and became a competition in the 1980s. Declared an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2010, castells are recognised as having a "rich cultural diversity" and significance within Catalonia.

There are currently between 60 and 70 castell teams ( colles) in Catalonia, some of which appear at large, bi-annual competitions in Tarragona, Spain. The teams are awarded points based on how high they can build their towers without falling. The most ambitious castells stretch ten levels high, each level the height of a person. In 2018, 42 teams competed at Tarragona.

"So little people know about [Castells] outside of Catalonia," says Pedro de la Fuente, co-filmmaker of Castells. "We felt so lucky to be not only witnessing it but filming it. It's equivalent to going to Egypt to see the pyramids or going to Peru to see Machu Picchu."

"Castells" a film by Pedro and James.

For some practitioners building castells is a demonstration of nationalism. Nationalistic interpretations surfaced after the 1975 death of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco. Franco banned many inherently Catalonian and Spanish practices during his rule from 1939 to 1975, such as speaking the Catalun language, waving the Catalonian flag, and observing Catalonia's national holiday, Diada. Likewise, Franco threatened castells, allowing only one of the teams to practice.

"When you're coming out of a dictatorship, you have nothing," says Pablo Giori, a historian based in Barcelona. "They were looking for new things and [found] new things in the festivities of the towns. They were really connected with this idea of experience, that everyone became part of it."

Giori, a native of Argentina, began studying castells 11 years ago, after moving to Barcelona. Originally captivated by the structures themselves, he says he realised that "the human towers were not the most important thing. The most important thing was this idea of community, this idea of a nation."

When he talks about nationalism, Giori is not referencing a specific political party, not all members of castells uphold the same political affiliations, but an intimate connection within Catalonia's civil society. Historical hardships, like economic crises, motivate the people to support each other, he says.

"When you have problems, the best way to find a solution is by having a strong community," Giori adds.

Large castells contain five main levels. The base is called the pinya, followed by the folre, the manilles, the tronk, and the pom de dalt. The tronk is the vertical structure in the centre of the castell that holds the most weight. The strongest men make up the bottom of the tronk, followed by stronger but lighter women. A small child known as the enxaneta climbs to the pom de dalt.

"We saw it as a poetic reflection of the society," says James Worsley, co-filmmaker for Castells. "You have the elders holding the weight of the younger community on their shoulders."

The enxaneta is usually a girl between 7 and 10-years-old. One teenage participant told Worsley that she started castelling when she was only 4-years-old. She must be light, nimble, and at times, fearless.

As the enxaneta begins her ascent, a hush falls over the crowd. The silence lends itself to different emotions: excitement, that she may succeed; fear, that she may fail; and "a sense of importance in the air," de la Fuente says. "Something special."

"You don't know where the tower is going to end. You don't know how many people she's going to climb," he adds. "There's an emotional thing."

Emotions peaked in 2006, with the death of enxaneta Mariona Galindo, who suffered fatal injuries after falling from a castell. Since the incident, colles implement safety precautions like requiring children to wear helmets and providing a net during rehearsals.

Women and children were not included in colles until 1980s. Since their addition, castells have become lighter and grown taller.

But there may be a physical limit to castell's growth, Giori says. Already at ten levels, the people must brainstorm how to increase their influence horizontally across Catalonia while being unable to rise vertically.

"At some point, you can't make it bigger and bigger every year," Giori says. "There is a physical limit.

They have to find another motivation for doing human towers."

For now, their cultural bond is enough to keep building.

"It's a very close-knit activity," de la Fuente says. "You have people who are going to be breathing in your face, and you're going to be grabbing hold of other people's bodies. When they do this, it's almost like they become one."

The Short Film Showcase spotlights exceptional short videos created by filmmakers from around the world and selected by National Geographic editors. We look for work that affirms National Geographic's belief in the power of science, exploration, and storytelling to change the world. To submit a film for consideration, please email sfs@natgeo.com. The filmmakers created the content presented, and the opinions expressed are their own, not those of National Geographic Partners.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
These Death-Defying Human Towers Build On Catalan Tradition

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Catalonia is known for its sea-side markets ( la boqueria), gothic architecture -- championed by Antoni Gaudí -- and sparkling white champagne ( cava). The territory boasts its own language ( Catalun), flag, and governing body ( Generalitat).

# data[].attributes.headline
How our surroundings affect the way we think and feel 

# data[].attributes.subject
How our surroundings affect the way we think and feel 

# data[].attributes.body
ABC 10 Sept 2015

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
From busy city streets to pockets of nature, the places we live in not only shape our feelings but also the decisions we make. Sunday Extra meets Colin Ellard, a cognitive neuroscientist investigating the relationship between place and mind.
At some level, Colin Ellard believes, everybody knows that where you are influences what you do and how you feel. Certain kinds of shapes are instinctively more appealing than others. Humans have predictable behaviours in public spaces, and reap tremendous benefits from exposure to nature. But there's a lot more that we can learn from the field of psychogeography, which, Ellard explains, 'is the study of the relationship between the places that we move through in our everyday life and the effects that those places have on our minds'.

'It encompasses things like the ways that an urban streetscape might affect your feelings, your emotions, what kinds of things it might make you do, how it might affect the way that you pay attention to your surroundings, remember things and make decisions,' he says.

The term psychogeography emerged in Paris in the 1950s, when it was closely associated with the work of Guy Debord and his colleagues in the avant-garde Situationist International movement. In that context, the psychogeographer's practice involves drifting around cities, an act in which one must 'drop their usual motives for movement and action ... and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounter they find there'.

As a cognitive neuroscientist working at Canada's University of Waterloo, however, Ellard pushes this theory into the realm of experimentation. His research involves everything from measuring responses as subjects walk through real-life cities, to monitoring gazes and movements as people interact with simulated environments created with virtual reality tools.

'It's a wonderful time to be doing this work, because every day it seems there are new tools that are available for us to very precisely measure the relationships we're interested in,' he says.

'[We conduct] experiments right on the street where we can measure things like people's stress levels, their brain waves, their eye movements, to other kinds of experiments in our laboratory, where we can build virtual spaces, we can build virtual streetscapes, virtual building interiors, and get a bit more control over the relationship between person and place in order to study it.'

Some of our responses to our surroundings are influenced by experience, knowledge and culture, Ellard says. Others, such as responses to curves, are more intuitive-and may even be written into our genes.

'I think many people have had the experience of looking at a beautiful curved walkway or curvature in a piece of architecture and responding to that on a visceral level, as opposed to something that's very sharp and angular, that we might not feel as inclined to approach as we would something with curves,' Ellard says.

Another example is the concept of 'the duality of prospect and refuge' that often comes up in discussions of environmental psychology.

'The idea is basically that we like to be in positions where we have some feeling of protection, or refuge, but at the same time we can see what's going on around us; we have a vista in front of us,' he says.

'That's something that transcends even human beings. Any animal, if you look at studies of habitat selection, shows a preference for locations where they can see and not be seen. It makes biological sense in the way that you might consider having protection from predators, being able to see opportunities for foraging.

'It makes a bit less sense with human beings, because typically when we're enjoying a nice public square we're not worried about being crept up on by predators, at least not literally, and yet those same contingencies act on us, to push us towards locations where we have both prospect and high refuge. That has been seen in all different kinds of human cultures, and different kinds of people with different personalities.'

One part of Ellard's work that has drawn particular interest from city planners and architects is his research into how people respond to views of nature. It's a question with practical applications that go beyond aesthetics. 'Sometimes we think of the parklands in a city as maybe being like the dessert-get everything else right and then we can build these nice green spaces,' he says.

'But there's more and more evidence that exposure to those places has really profound effects on everything from things like our levels of cortisol, which is a stress hormone, to things like the way that we pay attention to the world, the way that we think, and the way that we feel.'

Ellard and his colleagues are working to unfold 'what it is about those natural views that produces these marvellous physiological and psychological responses'.

'We know that even a relatively modest exposure, like sitting on a bench in a small urban parkette, can have as profound an effect on your psychology as being immersed in a deep forest,' he says.

'The idea is to design cities in such a way that as many people as possible have ready access to these natural environments. Ideally, within about a five-minute walk of where you live, you should be able to get to some view of nature.'

At least some of these positive impacts are connected to patterns that are present in natural images, Ellard says, raising the question of whether a computer-generated park could have the same beneficial effect on public health as a real one.

'We've had some success doing that ... so there are prospects for being able to produce some of the health-giving effects of natural imagery without actually using nature,' he says.

'But my suspicion is that in the long run we're going to discover that the most economic and effective way of producing these kinds of effects is to include natural elements in cities.'

Listen to the interview on Sunday Extra.

Sunday Extra is RN's live Sunday morning broadcast, looking to the week ahead and also incorporating Ockham's Razor, Background Briefing, and First Dog on the Moon.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How our surroundings affect the way we think and feel

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From busy city streets to pockets of nature, the places we live in not only shape our feelings but also the decisions we make. Sunday Extra meets Colin Ellard, a cognitive neuroscientist investigating the relationship between place and mind. At some level, Colin Ellard believes, everybody knows that where you are influences what you do and how you feel.

# data[].attributes.headline
Lancaster County Amish teen find fame of TikTok

# data[].attributes.subject
Lancaster County Amish teen find fame of TikTok

# data[].attributes.body
Pennsylvania Real-Time News 24 Sept 2019

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
LANCASTER, Pa. (AP) - Rebecca Fisher never expected her first video on TikTok, a mobile-only video-sharing app, to go viral.

"I wasn't going to post anything [on the app], but then I saw [Pennsylvania] was trending," the 14-year-old Amish girl said.

Her first video, which featured Fisher educating viewers on how to properly pronounce Lancaster (read: LANG-kiss-ter not Lang-KAS-ter) has racked up over 430,000 views since being posted in early July.

It has received more than 22,000 "likes," plus more than 1,300 comments and 1,600 shares.

Since this first video, Fisher has posted at least 21 other 15-second videos to her account, @AmishBek, raking in over 1 million views, 38,800 likes and over 12,200 followers, as of the deadline for this story.

Fisher's videos are unapologetically Amish.

In one of her videos, she speaks in Pennsylvania Dutch. In another, she records her backyard - barn in view - as rain pours down. One video begins with Fisher stating "I am absolutely not Mormon" in response to the many comments questioning her faith. She goes on to say she is "absolutely Amish." Then, she furrows her brows.

"Well, not exactly," she adds.

Fisher's parents, Aaron and Barbie, left the Amish church Rebecca was 3 years old. The family says it holds all the Amish values and dresses in the traditional outfits.

"We consider ourselves Amish," Fisher says in the video. "I'm still Amish. I still have Amish blood."

Since her first video, Fisher has collected over 1,000 comments, many of them questioning her upbringing or attempting to explain why the young Amish girl is on the app.

Fisher said she often feels like she's stuck between worlds: the Amish shun her and the "English" gawk. And now, with the onslaught of comments, her identity is being debated on a much larger scale.

"No hate, but Amish are not allowed to have phones," commented one person.

"Guys, the Amish go through a period where they can have modern day things ..." commented another.

Another person attempted to explain Fisher's faith, "You must be Mennonite or River Brethren to have that phone."

Fisher stands firm in her identity as an Amish girl.

She said she doesn't respond to the messages that are "telling me what I am and what I'm not," as they aren't worth the energy.

The juxtaposition of a young Amish girl on TikTok draws interest - and views. A video featuring Fisher pulling her dark hair back into a bun received 135,100 views; a dark and blurry video of Fisher's friends playing near a campfire only received 11,600.

Fisher said she has realized which videos draw in a larger crowd and has plans to take full advantage of that as she continues to make videos.

While Fisher appreciates the attention she's received on TikTok, she would have preferred to receive more views on her YouTube channel.

At the beginning of July, Fisher bought a smartphone with the intention of filming daily "vlogs" - or video logs - of her day to post on YouTube.

It's something she's wanted to do for years, her father said.

When she's not watching YouTube channels "Jack and Gab" and "Jess and Gabriel," Fisher reads up on what makes a successful YouTube account and takes down notes.

"You want your viewers to be able to trust you, that you're not going to put out clickbait that you're not gonna put out a stupid video just to get more views," Fisher said.

So far, she has only posted two videos: "My Story" and "Am I Amish."

In both, she talks about the struggle of living in between the Amish and the English.

The videos have collected just over 1,000 views.

She also mentions her family's food bank distribution center, Blessings of Hope, and how viewers can help the nonprofit.

Fisher's parents see her interest in pursuing YouTube and TikTok as a positive thing.

"It's about reaching out and being a blessing," said Fisher's father, Aaron.

And that's what Fisher tries to do in her videos: be a blessing.

"I like to hide messages in my videos - not bluntly say something, but just kind of hide it in there so [viewers] still get the message," she said.

It might seem as if Fisher is pushing against her Amish heritage by embracing technology. But the Amish don't necessarily reject technology - instead, emerging technologies are evaluated by whether they can be adapted to fit the Amish values, said Charles Jantzi, professor of psychology at Messiah College and researcher of Amish adolescents and social media.

Fisher and her father see community outreach as a core value of their faith and she's found a unique way to adapt YouTube and TikTok to fit that value.

"Amish have to think outside of the box to be inside of their box," Fisher said.
Story by Abigail King, Lancaster Online

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Lancaster County Amish teen finds fame on TikTok video app

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
LANCASTER, Pa. (AP) - Rebecca Fisher never expected her first video on TikTok, a mobile-only video-sharing app, to go viral. "I wasn't going to post anything [on the app], but then I saw [Pennsylvania] was trending," the 14-year-old Amish girl said.

# data[].attributes.body
Amishworkshops.com 16 July 2019

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Christina, an eleven-year-old Old Order Amish girl from Michigan, was kind enough to sit for a series of photographs while her mother, Mary, pinned up her hair. Like most Amish females, she has never cut or trimmed her hair.

# data[].attributes.body
National Geographic Jan 2017

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This story appears in the January 2017 issue ofNational Geographic magazine.

Shadrack Nyongesa's appointment with the knife was set for shortly after dawn.

Since the previous morning, the uncircumcised 14-year-old from the Bukusu tribe in western Kenya had been jingling a pair of feathered cowbells against metal braces lashed to his wrists. As he pumped his arms and danced on a dirt yard under a mango tree outside his father's house, older friends and relatives paraded around him brandishing sticks and guava branches and singing songs about courage, women, and alcohol.

In the afternoon Shadrack and his entourage made a ritual visit to the home of a maternal uncle, who gave him a cow, but not before slapping him in the face and barking that he looked like a sissy, not someone ready to become a man. The boy, who had asked to undergo sikhebo, the Bukusu circumcision ceremony, could not hold back tears. But he looked more angry than afraid, and when he returned to his father's house, he jingled the chinyimba bells with new vigor and danced with the brio of a bravura showman.

By sundown the party had swelled to more than 50 guests. Men sitting in lantern-lit huts dipped long, reedlike straws into a communal pot of busaa, the corn beer specially brewed for the occasion. At half past nine the crowd formed a circle around the pearly blue guts of a freshly slaughtered cow. One of Shadrack's paternal uncles sliced open the bloated stomach with a knife. He carved two strips of tissue, then scooped out a handful of greenish, half-digested food. He approached his nephew with his arm cocked.

"No one in our family has ever been afraid!" he shouted. "Stand firm!" Flashlights played on Shadrack's face as he stared into space with the miserable stoicism of a plebe on his first day of military school. And then, in a moment that impressed even people who had seen it many times, the uncle flung the foul porridge at his nephew's chest and zealously began to spread it on the boy's face and head. He placed the collar of cow gut around Shadrack's neck and slapped him hard on both cheeks.

"If you fidget or cry out, don't come back," the uncle said. "Cross the river, and keep going. You are a soldier now. If someone pokes you in the eye, you do not blink!"

For the omusinde- one who is not circumcised-there was now no turning back.

For hours that night, Shadrack danced in the eye of the busaa-fueled revel called the khuminya. Elders counseled him on what it meant to be a man, offering moral precepts, explaining the importance of respecting elders and women, and issuing practical advice including an admonishment to steer clear of married girls. He had been given flour, chickens, and small sums of money. His worthiness had been taunted, his resolve questioned. Around midnight he was finally allowed to lay his leaden arms and dung-crusted head down for a rest. He rose at 2 a.m. An hour later he was again doggedly jingling the chinyimba bells and dancing in what seemed the throes of adrenaline. The relatives and friends-some of them pie-eyed from the homemade beer-sang out, "The sun is about to get up! Can you smell the knife? The dawn is almost here!"

As I stood waiting for the sun to rise over the Great Rift Valley and the climax of Shadrack's passage to manhood-a passage crucial to William, his father, whose standing in the community was at stake-I couldn't help but think of my own father, who had died in June at the age of 91, and my 17-year-old son, Oliver, who at that moment was asleep 7,000 miles away, in New York City. Actually, probably not asleep. Probably lying awake in bed with his laptop on his chest, watching sports documentaries and Hollywood movies bootlegged off sketchy websites.

It was impossible to imagine two roads more different for a pair of boys heading toward essentially the same destination. Both Shadrack and Oliver had been masculinized in the womb by a prenatal bath of testosterone. Both were in the midst of a momentous transition, morphing under a fresh influx of the powerful hormone into physically mature men: body hair, defined muscles, bigger shoulders, burgeoning sexuality, an appetite for risk, potentially elevated levels of aggression. Both were coming to grips with behavioral tendencies and patterns that had been programmed by millions of years of evolution.

But Shadrack was entering manhood in a culture in which the roles of men and women are still slotted along traditional lines and boys are guided by a ritual that goes back at least 200 years (and immemorially in some neighboring tribal cultures). Oliver, on the other hand, is approaching manhood in an American culture that is lurching toward a gender-neutral society, one that has moved so far from anatomy-based definitions of men and women that the U.S. Departments of Justice, Education, and Defense in 2016 affirmed antidiscrimination policies that recognize a person's self-assigned gender identity, regardless of the sex ticked on a birth certificate.

Unlike Shadrack, Oliver cannot rely on the traditional roles of men and women for an idea of what it means to be a man. In the name of equality, gender stereotypes have been turned inside out or repudiated. There's nothing startling or unorthodox to him about female cops or male nurses or about a father who stayed home microwaving stockpiles of breast milk while mom went to an office as the prime provider. Oliver's mom still outearns me and, by the way, has amassed a vastly larger number of Instagram followers.

Nor are there, in our milieu, rituals or overt rites of initiation that would clearly mark Oliver's transition from boy to man. Manhood, in other words, is something he pretty much has to figure out for himself. Sometimes I see him casting about for what it means, looking askance at the example I set because, as he says, "you cross your legs like a girl." And sometimes when he's under duress, feeling pressure to perform-quizzes, papers, grades, competition on a basketball court, a time trial on a rowing machine-I can also see him cultivating a sort of stoicism, related in a milder way to what was slapped into Shadrack. Oliver is shy, careful not to show the depth of his feelings lest he appear unmanly. He gave up the flute because he was the only boy in the section. He crosses his legs ankle to knee. His icons of manhood are Michael Jordan and George Clooney. For his 15th birthday, he asked for a suit.

Scientists and scholars can't offer him, or any of us, much clarity. The questions surrounding manhood and its kindred concepts of manliness and masculinity have been embroiled for centuries in politically inflected debates about culture and biology. Anthropologists and sociologists generally come down on the side of culture, believing that manhood is something societies construct. "Men" are made, not born, argues Michael Kimmel, a professor of sociology at Stony Brook University: "Manhood is not a manifestation of an inner essence ... [it] does not bubble up to consciousness from our biological constitution; it is created in our culture. In fact the search for a transcendent, timeless definition of manhood is itself a sociological phenomenon-we tend to search for the timeless and external ... when the old definitions no longer work and the new ones are yet to be firmly established."

Some feminist scholars and scientists have argued that gender differences are fabrications and so-called male traits are no more intrinsic to boys than the blue Onesies snapped onto male newborns in the hospital. No doubt that's the case for many gender stereotypes about differences in male and female intelligence, nurturing instincts, rationality, emotions. But like most parents who have raised a boy and a girl, I have to wonder if there isn't something more than cultural socialization behind behaviors that seemingly appeared without any conscious priming from mom and dad, or anyone else. I'm thinking of Oliver's very early zeal for throwing balls around-Nerf balls, tennis balls, ball-shaped agglomerations of masking tape. In the streets of Paris we once played catch with a chestnut. By the same token, might there have been something deeper than cultural socialization behind his sister, India's, penchant for staging elaborate sotto voce conversations between her dolls? Long before she went off to preschool, she would hold a doll in either hand and pass hours whispering doll dialogue like an interpreter in the middle of a treaty negotiation.

"Women and men do not have interchangeable minds," notes Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker in his book The Blank Slate. Consistent with the selection pressures of having to compete for resources and mates, studies going back decades suggest males do better on mental tasks that involve rotating an object. (Girls have advantages in other problem-solving skills.) Boys tend to be more physically aggressive-more likely to engage in what's called "rough-and-tumble play." As Joe Herbert, emeritus professor of neuroscience at the University of Cambridge, notes, boys will play with dolls, but chances are the dolls will be getting into a fight.

Some aggressive behavior can be linked to testosterone levels, which, starting around age 10 and peaking in the late teens, are typically more than 10 times higher in boys than in girls. One revealing study published in 2013 in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience correlated risktaking behavior with testosterone levels in adolescent boys and girls. The kids in the study could win money by clicking a pump that inflated balloons. But if the balloons exploded, as they were programmed to do randomly, the players would forfeit their winnings. The researchers found that increased testosterone levels were associated with risktaking in both boys and girls. But the boys preferred the thrill of balloon explosions, even though it cost them cash, while the risktaking girls with relatively elevated testosterone levels were more interested in retaining their earnings.

Perhaps one of the clearest examples of how biology underlies many elements of masculinity and thus is a factor in the cultural construction of manhood is a rare genetic condition called androgen insensitivity syndrome. Babies are born with a Y chromosome and therefore biologically male, but their bodies can't process testosterone and so default to the female phenotype. They have features and traits of a woman, smooth hairless skin, minimal body odor, a rudimentary vagina. They feel themselves to be women. But with internal testes instead of ovaries and a uterus, they can't give birth. The syndrome, Herbert notes in his book Testosterone, is "a glaring demonstration that testosterone is at the root of what we call 'masculinity.' "

And so at first light, on the impetus of both Bukusu cultural imperatives and what scientists say is upwards of 1,200 nanograms per deciliter of testosterone coursing through an adolescent male's bloodstream, Shadrack headed north on foot for the nearby Chwele River. He was surrounded by more than 30 men and boys, and a few cheeky girls who hadn't yet been shooed away. Songs flowed as the company jogged along red clay roads and fields of corn and sugarcane. At a quarter to seven, Shadrack's bells and the metal wrist braces were removed. The boy stepped out of his tan shorts. He walked naked down a grassy bank to what was more a swamp than a river. His uncle followed. Hidden in the reeds, Shadrack washed off the cow slime. When he emerged, he was covered with dark gray mud. A sprig of special grass was plastered to his head like the crest of a northern lapwing.

Now the company headed south back to Shadrack's father's house, moving almost at a gallop along a different route to thwart any possible witchcraft by persons of ill will. They sang the anthem of Bukusu-land, the famous sioyayo circumcision song that insults the rival Kenya tribe of the Luo, whose traditional entry to manhood entailed removing some of a boy's teeth instead of his foreskin. "Those who fear circumcision should go to Luo-land."

A huge crowd-men, women, girls, boys-was waiting at the compound. Shadrack marched into the yard and stood over a piece of cardboard. He faced west, symbolically overseeing the sunset of his boyhood. Still the showman, Shadrack put his left hand on his hip and thrust his right hand above his head as if he'd been studying the victory celebrations of Usain Bolt. The circumciser crouched at his groin. The operation was over in seconds. Shadrack did not blink or flinch or let on that he felt any pain. In fact, when the circumciser blew a whistle signaling the surgery was done, and Shadrack's aunt and mother and other women were ululating in joy, Shadrack began to prance about.

Shadrack's father, his uncle, and others rushed up to inspect the job, bending in for a close-up view as if they were double-checking the numbers of a winning lottery ticket. Shivering, perhaps in shock, Shadrack sat down as women wrapped him in colorful shawls.

He would spend the next four days convalescing. Traditionally, new initiates in this community are sequestered for four months with a guardian who will teach them how to hunt, build a hut, tan a hide, and become warriors fierce enough to repulse attacks from cattle raiders and stage raids of their own. Though some young Bukusu males still learn these skills, Shadrack would be going back to school when classes resumed in September. "You can be fierce in school," says Simiyu Wandibba, a Bukusu professor of anthropology at the University of Nairobi. "You can repackage traditional virtues to suit today's life."

Already Shadrack was being treated with new respect; already he was entitled to a new set of patriarchal privileges. No longer would he be dispatched to fetch water from the river or collect firewood or sweep the family compound. Women preparing his meals now would consider his preferences. With a hut of his own in the family compound, he would no longer sleep in his mother's house or sit at her feet listening to her stories. And come December, in accord with the old ways, there would be a khukhwalukha ceremony when the traditional period of transition from omusinde to omusani would be complete, and the 14-year-old would be formally presented to Bukusu-land as a full-fledged man.

It's hard to watch a Bukusu circumcision ceremony without being whipsawed by a mix of admiration and dismay. Dismay because the kids are ... well, kids. I saw five circumcisions in a week, and some of the omusinde were even younger and looked less ready for the ordeal than Shadrack. Is a boy of 10, tempted by the promise of new privileges and pressured to conform, really free to make the decision to undergo this painful and potentially dangerous surgery? And what was done to Shadrack and the others is hardly the extreme of what cultures do to make men of boys. Mardudjara aboriginal boys in Australia are expected to swallow their own foreskins after the cut. Sambia mountain boys in Papua New Guinea push sharp sticks into their nostrils to make their noses bleed and have to swallow semen after oral sex with young men. Satere Mawe boys in the Brazilian Amazon insert their hands into gloves filled with bullet ants (Paraponera clavata) whose neurotoxic sting is said to be among the most agonizing in nature.

It's worth asking: Why? The disquieting answer, of course, is to prepare for war. As anthropologist David Gilmore notes, where resources are scarce and the collective welfare uncertain, "gender ideology reflects the material conditions of life." Boys are "tempered" and "toughened" so they may fulfill the classic duties to procreate, provide, and protect that men have performed for millennia. Whether it's marshaled to ward off the aggression of other males or to capitalize on weakness, violence is the leitmotif of manhood in countless cultures. To judge from video games, action movies, hockey brawls, UFC fights, and homicide rates in America, violence enthralls men even where material conditions of life are not dire.

What could break the cycle that equates manhood with toughness and stoicism? What might change in men who in their fear of violence-or fascination with it-end up fostering more of it?

Dismay aside, I found it hard not to grudgingly admire a culture that gives boys such an unambiguous path to manhood. The steps are clearly marked. The knife and the cut undeniably make the whole business real. "The blood connects us to our ancestors," one of Shadrack's uncles told me. Shadrack's male privileges may entitle him to the supper he prefers, but they also come with obligations and responsibilities, and by some lights the abuse in the ritual may actually help teach the boys not to respond in kind. "If you've literally had cow shit thrown at you, you know you can take whatever life throws at you," says Daniel Wesangula, a Bukusu journalist.

Add to that the support from bakoki, the brotherhood of boys who have been circumcised at the same time and belong to the same age-group. "Bakoki are lifelong friends," Wesangula says. "They will carry your casket and dig your grave. If you are acting deviant, parents will send a bakoki to put some sense into you."

It might be for the lack of meaningful manhood rituals that Oliver's school recently invited a youth theater group to perform a play called Now That We're Men. Among the questions on the program: "Who is harmed when [sexual slurs] are thrown around constantly in middle and high school hallways? What is it like to participate in a culture where the most popular video games on the market today award points when players (mostly young males) rape and kill women?"

If my son is uncertain about what it means to be a man, I suppose I'm partly to blame for passing along the tradition of unstructured self-discovery that I inherited from my father, who did not buttonhole me for mortifying talks about birds and bees, or show me how to knife a wild hog, or concoct the Connecticut atheist's equivalent of a bar mitzvah. I don't know what passed for rituals that ushered me from boyhood into whatever it is I embody now, with a roster of half-baked competencies and a list of things I still can't do. Rewire a lamp. Shuck an oyster.

In my father's final months last spring, I asked him if he had tried to prepare me for manhood, and when he looked baffled, I asked him if he thought his father had done anything to set him up. More bafflement. I imagine his manhood came courtesy of the U.S. Navy. Toward the end, he couldn't remember at noon what medical procedures had been performed on him at 11:45 a.m., but he could recall all the shipmates he served with during World War II. He was 19 when he crossed the Pacific on an oceangoing tug. He navigated by sextant, boxed with fellow sailors, and off Okinawa fired his sidearm at a kamikaze. He sailed into Hiroshima Bay two months after the atomic bomb and saw the starkest consequences of men at war, an experience that inspired him to compose a poem that was published in October 1945 in the New York Herald Tribune. It earned him $12, his first wages in a long career as a writer. Protect. Provide. I found a photocopy of the check in his files after he died.

Absent rituals, I think manhood in my family must be a code of values, transmitted mostly by example. My father once explained to one of my college roommates, whose family had a ranch in Wyoming, why he didn't need a gun to protect his family. In a line that now seems not just the high-water mark of a certain kind of liberal idealism but looms as central to my father's idea of manhood itself, he said: "The day I reach for a gun instead of a lawyer, there will be nothing left to defend." That seems almost quaint now in an age when man-boys are trotting to class at the University of Texas with pistols in their pants. And I wonder if there is a manhood ritual artful enough to convey the values my father saw in the two artists who shaped his sensibility-the humorist Robert Benchley and the great trumpeter Louis Armstrong-both of whom he revered for their "humor, decency, and joie de vivre."

I don't know how useful it is for Oliver to know there are a million definitions of what it means to be a man or that he is free to choose his own, to figure out on his own what it takes for a boy to qualify. I hope he grasps the responsibilities manhood entails and rejects the inequities it perpetuates and understands what part is biology, what part culture, what's estimable and worth conserving, what cries out for change. I hope he becomes a man however he manages to define it and expects no special dispensation for fulfilling that vision of himself. He too has a bloodline of ancestors, somewhere out there in the dust. He could do worse than to set his compass by the polestar of humor, decency, and joie de vivre.

Chip Brown wrote aboutSherpas in Nepal in the November 2014Geographic. Pete Muller's photos ofSierra Leone's Ebola outbreak are in the July 2015 issue.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This story appears in the January 2017 issue ofNational Geographic magazine. Shadrack Nyongesa's appointment with the knife was set for shortly after dawn. Since the previous morning, the uncircumcised 14-year-old from the Bukusu tribe in western Kenya had been jingling a pair of feathered cowbells against metal braces lashed to his wrists.

# data[].attributes.headline
"My culture is not your f***ing prom dress"  

# data[].attributes.subject
"My culture is not your f***ing prom dress"  

# data[].attributes.body
The Conversation 7 May 2018

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Yet again a dress has sparked a furious debate over cultural appropriation in the US, this time after a high school graduate wore a qipao, a Chinese-style dress, to her prom. Twitter-user Jeremy Lam set off the current debate with a tweeted comment after seeing a photo taken at the prom: "My culture is NOT your goddamn prom dress." Last year it was Karlie Kloss wearing a kimono for a Vogue cover. Only in America.

The responses to Lam's tweet have included ethnic slurring, calls for tolerance, sympathy for Lam as the oppressed minority, sympathy for the girl in the prom dress, and claims and counter-claims about the status and meaning of the dress in question, the qipao (pronounced "chee-pow"). Is it "a sacred garment" as some have claimed, or, as the girl in the photo responded, is it just "a f***ing dress"?

With thousands of young Chinese-Americans attending high school proms each year, this is unlikely to have been the first time a qipao has served as a prom dress. The problem for Lam and his many "likers" is that in the tweeted photo of a prom in Utah last week, the girl wearing the red embroidered qipao is "white". Her name is Keziah Daum and she joins venerable company. Among famous qipao-wearers of the Western world are Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, Nicole Kidman and Anne Hathaway.

In the course of this brouhaha, some odd statements have been made about the qipao. Lam himself bizarrely describes its origins as lying in a shapeless garment made for Chinese women to wear when they were doing housework. In its more shapely final form, he advises, it was a "symbol of activism" and an expression of "gender equality".

Amy Qin was not much closer to the mark when she wrote in The New York Times: "In its original form, the dress was worn in a baggy style, mostly by upper-class women in the Qing dynasty, which ruled China for more than 250 years, until 1912."

There is indeed a view that the qipao (literally "banner gown") directly evolved from the clothing worn by women of the Qing ruling class, the Manchus, or Banner people. But the relationship is tenuous.

Author provided

The origins of the dress

The word qipao did not make an appearance until the 20th century and was one of a number of words used to refer to the garment. Among those, the most familiar in the English-speaking world is the Cantonese cheongsam (literally "long garment"). Like many other signs of Cantonese culture in the greater Chinese diaspora, this one is gradually being buried under the weight of Mandarin usage, but it is a reminder that there is more than one way of talking about things in Chinese, and more than one set of attitudes.

Author provided

It was in Shanghai that the qipao took definitive shape. A browse through fashion features in the Chinese press in the 1920s reveals a mix of elements in various novel designs before the familiar dress appeared. The familiar, figure-hugging dress with its mandarin collar and long side splits finally emerges in the late 1920s. Its status was cemented when the newly established Nationalist government recognised it as formal dress in 1928.

In the longer term, the dress has proved to have an ambivalent position in the Chinese cultural landscape. Historically it was more likely to be worn by a call girl than by an activist. During the Mao years it faded from popularity before disappearing altogether, having become a symbol of bourgeois decadence. In China today it is often worn by the bride to her wedding banquet, but is perhaps most commonly used as a uniform for female staff in stores and big hotels.

As long as champions of the qipao are calling for the importance of understanding its history before putting it on (and Lam does just this), its complex design origins and historical social status are relevant to the debate.

Questions of identity

New and revised values can certainly be attached to cultural objects and from this perspective the debate itself is more interesting than its subject. The twittering started in America, but soon enough embroiled mainland Chinese, Hong Kongers, Taiwanese and Singaporeans. Faultlines emerged between people in these various categories. One mainland Chinese person tweeted, "qipao is not a Chinese 'traditional' dress at all. I can't stand these Americans calling it 'sacred' to the Chinese culture. What are you talking about lol."

The Chinese-Americans have proved themselves not all daunted. They have all studied Identity 101: "It's an asian-american thing," tweeted Roses-are-red, "... because we're specifically taught that we gotta hide our chinese identity and assimilate to white culture and then some white chick with a shallow appreciation of chinese culture gets to wear a qipao and suddenly it's ~cool and quirky~"

Such visceral reactions from both sides suggest that Chinese-white relations constitute only one of many factors shaping attitudes to Chinese culture in the USA. Chinese migration from the mainland is remaking what it means to be Chinese-American. This latest debate is a sure sign that the process is creating anxieties for many.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'Not your prom dress': why a Chinese dress set off a cultural debate about identity and history

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Yet again a dress has sparked a furious debate over cultural appropriation in the US, this time after a high school graduate wore a qipao, a Chinese-style dress, to her prom. Twitter-user Jeremy Lam set off the current debate with a tweeted comment after seeing a photo taken at the prom: "My culture is NOT your goddamn prom dress."

# data[].attributes.headline
The Dos and Don'ts of Cultural Appropriation

# data[].attributes.subject
The Dos and Don'ts of Cultural Appropriation

# data[].attributes.body
The Atlantic 20 Oct 2015

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Borrowing from other cultures isn't just inevitable; it's potentially positive.

Sometime during the early 2000s, big, gold, "door-knocker" hoop earrings started to appeal to me after I'd admired them on girls at school. It didn't faze me that most of the girls who wore these earrings at my high school in St. Louis were black, unlike me. And while it certainly may have occurred to me that I-a semi-preppy dresser-couldn't pull them off, it never occurred to me that I shouldn't.

This was before the term cultural appropriation jumped from academia into the realm of internet outrage and oversensitivity. Self-appointed guardians of culture have proclaimed that Miley Cyrus shouldn't twerk, white girls shouldn't wear cornrows, and Selena Gomez should take off that bindi. Personally, I could happily live without ever seeing Cyrus twerk again, but I still find many of these accusations alarming.

At my house, getting dressed is a daily act of cultural appropriation, and I'm not the least bit sorry about it. I step out of the shower in the morning and pull on a vintage cotton kimono. After moisturizing my face, I smear Lucas Papaw ointment-a tip from an Australian makeup artist-onto my lips before I make coffee with a Bialetti stovetop espresso maker a girlfriend brought back from Italy. Depending on the weather, I may pull on an embroidered floral blouse I bought at a roadside shop in Mexico or a stripey marinière-style shirt-originally inspired by the French, but mine from the surplus store was a standard-issue Russian telnyashka-or my favorite purple pajama pants, a souvenir from a friend's trip to India. I may wear Spanish straw-soled espadrilles (though I'm not from Spain) or Bahian leather sandals (I'm not Brazilian either) and top it off with a favorite piece of jewelry, perhaps a Navajo turquoise ring (also not my heritage).

As I dress in the morning, I deeply appreciate the craftsmanship and design behind these items, as well as the adventures and people they recall. And while I hope I don't offend anyone, I find the alternative-the idea that I ought to stay in the cultural lane I was born into-outrageous. No matter how much I love cable-knit sweaters and Gruyere cheese, I don't want to live in a world where the only cultural inspiration I'm entitled to comes from my roots in Ireland, Switzerland, and Eastern Europe.

There are legitimate reasons to step carefully when dressing ourselves with the clothing, arts, artifacts, or ideas of other cultures. But please, let's banish the idea that appropriating elements from one another's cultures is in itself problematic.

Such borrowing is how we got treasures such as New York pizza and Japanese denim-not to mention how the West got democratic discourse, mathematics, and the calendar. Yet as wave upon wave of shrill accusations of cultural appropriation make their way through the internet outrage cycle, the rhetoric ranges from earnest indignation to patronizing disrespect.

And as we watch artists and celebrities being pilloried and called racist, it's hard not to fear the reach of the cultural-appropriation police, who jealously track who "owns" what and instantly jump on transgressors.

In the 21st century, cultural appropriation-like globalization-isn't just inevitable; it's potentially positive. We have to stop guarding cultures and subcultures in efforts to preserve them. It's naïve, paternalistic, and counterproductive. Plus, it's just not how culture or creativity work. The exchange of ideas, styles, and traditions is one of the tenets and joys of a modern, multicultural society.

So how do we move past the finger pointing and coexist in a way that's both creatively open and culturally sensitive? In a word, carefully.
1. Blackface Is Never Okay
This is painfully obvious. Don't dress up as an ethnic stereotype. Someone else's culture or race-or an offensive idea of it-should never be a costume or the butt of a joke.

You probably don't need an example, but U.S. fraternity parties are rife with them. Sports teams such as the Washington Redskins, and their fanbases, continue to fight to keep bigoted names and images as mascots- perpetuating negative stereotypes and pouring salt into old wounds. Time to move on.
2. It's Important to Pay Homage to Artistry and Ideas, and Acknowledge Their Origins
Cultural appropriation was at the heart of this year's Costume Institute exhibition, " China: Through the Looking Glass," at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. There was a great deal of hand-wringing in advance of the gala celebrating the exhibition's opening-a glitzy event for the fashion industry that many expected to be a minefield for accidental racism (and a goldmine for the cultural-appropriation police).

Instead, the red carpet showcased some splendid examples of cultural appropriation done right. Among the evening's best-dressed was Rihanna, who navigated the theme with aplomb in a fur-trimmed robe by Guo Pei, a Beijing-based Chinese couturier whose work was also part of the Met's exhibition. Rihanna's gown was "imperial yellow," a shade reserved for the emperors of ancient Chinese dynasties, and perfectly appropriate for pop stars in the 21st century. Rihanna could have worn a Western interpretation, like this stunning Yves Saint Laurent dress Tom Ford designed for the label in 2004, but she won the night by rightfully shining the spotlight on a design from China.
3. Don't Adopt Sacred Artifacts as Accessories

When Victoria's Secret sent Karlie Kloss down the runway in a fringed suede bikini, turquoise jewelry, and a feathered headdress-essentially a "sexy Indian" costume-many called out the underwear company for insensitivity to Native Americans, and they were right.

Adding insult to injury, a war bonnet like the one Kloss wore has spiritual and ceremonial significance, with only certain members of the tribe having earned the right to wear feathers through honor-worthy achievements and acts of bravery.

"This is analogous to casually wearing a Purple Heart or Medal of Honor that was not earned," Simon Moya-Smith, a journalist of the Oglala Lakota Nation, told MTV.

For this reason, some music-festival organizers have prohibited feather headdresses. As The Guardian points out, it's anyone's right to dress like an idiot at a festival, but someone else's sacred object shouldn't be a casual accessory. ( Urban Outfitters, take note.)
4. Remember That Culture Is Fluid
"It's not fair to ask any culture to freeze itself in time and live as though they were a museum diorama," says Susan Scafidi, a lawyer and the author of Who Owns Culture?: Appropriation and Authenticity in American Law. "Cultural appropriation can sometimes be the savior of a cultural product that has faded away."

Today, for example, the most popular blue jeans in the U.S.-arguably the cultural home, if not the origin of the blue jean-are made of stretchy, synthetic-based fabrics that the inventor Levi Strauss (an immigrant from Bavaria) wouldn't recognize. Meanwhile, Japanese designers have preserved "heritage" American workwear and Ivy League style by using original creations as a jumping-off point for their own interpretations, as W. David Marx writes in Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style:

America may have provided the raw forms for Japan's fashion explosion, but these items soon became decoupled from their origin ... More importantly, the Japanese built new and profound layers of meaning on top of American style-and in the process, protected and strengthened the original for the benefit of all. As we will see, Japanese fashion is no longer a simple copy of American clothing, but a nuanced, culturally rich tradition of its own.

Not to mention the ne plus ultra for many American denim-heads.
5. Don't Forget That Appropriation Is No Substitute for Diversity
At Paris Fashion Week earlier this month, the Valentino designers Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli sent out a collection they acknowledged was heavily influenced by Africa.

"The real problem was the hair," wrote Alyssa Vingan at Fashionista, pointing out that the white models wore cornrows, a style more common for those with African hair, "thereby appropriating African culture."

In a recent video that went viral, the African American actress Amandla Stenberg offered an eloquent discourse on the complex cultural context of cornrows. But the real problem at Valentino was not the hair; it was the conspicuous absence of women of color on the runway. Lack of diversity is an issue for the entire industry, but the problem was particularly visible at Valentino, where the designers talked the talk of multicultural acceptance:

"The message is tolerance," Piccioli told Vogue, "and the beauty that comes out of cross-cultural expression."

If that's the point, the faces on the catwalk-regardless of their hairstyle-should reflect it.
6. Engage With Other Cultures on More Than an Aesthetic Level
"What would America be like if we loved black people as much as we love black culture?" asks Stenberg in the aforementioned video, a particularly salient point in an America coming to terms with an epidemic of police violence against young black men.

The rapper and TV personality Nicki Minaj echoed the message in The New York Times Magazine, in reference to Miley Cyrus, who criticized Minaj's comments about being overlooked for the Video Music Awards because of her race.

''Come on, you can't want the good without the bad," Minaj said. "If you want to enjoy our culture and our lifestyle, bond with us, dance with us, have fun with us, twerk with us, rap with us, then you should also want to know what affects us, what is bothering us, what we feel is unfair to us. You shouldn't not want to know that.''

Cherry-picking cultural elements, whether dance moves or print designs, without engaging with their creators or the cultures that gave rise to them not only creates the potential for misappropriation; it also misses an opportunity for art to perpetuate real, world-changing progress.
7. Treat a Cultural Exchange Like Any Other Creative Collaboration-Give Credit, and Consider Royalties
Co-branded collaborations are common business deals in today's fashion industry, and that's just how Oskar Metsavaht, the founder and creative director of the popular Brazilian sportswear brand Osklen, treated his dealings with the Asháninka tribe for Osklen's Spring 2016 collection.

Francisco Piyako, an Asháninka representative, told Quartz the tribe will get royalties from Osklen's spring 2016 collection, as well as a heightened public awareness of their continued struggle to protect land against illegal loggers and environmental degradation.

In return, Metsavaht returned from his visit with the Asháninka with motifs and concepts for Osklen's spring 2016 collection: Tattoos were reproportioned as a print on silk organza; the striking "Amazon red" of a forest plant accented the collection; and women's fabric slings for carrying children reappeared in the crisscross shape of a dress. Metsavaht's photographs of the Amazon forest, the Asháninka, and wild animals also appeared on garments, as well as Osklen's website.

"Sharing values, sharing visions, sharing the economics, I think it's the easiest way to work," Metsavaht said. "This is the magic of style. It's the magic of art. It's the magic of the design."

And it's a magic that I'd be happy to appropriate for my closet.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
wave of shrill accusations of cultural appropriation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
reach of the cultural-appropriation police

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
african american actress amandla stenberg

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Dos and Don'ts of Cultural Appropriation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Borrowing from other cultures isn't just inevitable; it's potentially positive.

# data[].attributes.headline
13 Amazing Coming of Age Traditions From Around the World 

# data[].attributes.subject
13 Amazing Coming of Age Traditions From Around the World 

# data[].attributes.body
Global Citizen 21 July 2016

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
13 Amazing Coming of Age Traditions From Around the World

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Here are thirteen of it the world’s most diverse coming of age traditions that celebrate the transition from childhood to adulthood.

# data[].attributes.body
CNN Business 5 May 2010

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Amish businesses have a 95% success rate at staying open at least five years, according to research.

# data[].attributes.body
YouTube. 13 May 2014

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Ohio Amish Barn Raising - May 13th, 2014 in 3 Minutes and 30 seconds

# data[].attributes.body
The Young Centre @2020

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Amish men and women usually assume traditional and well-defined gender roles. Husbands carry the primary responsibility for the financial well-being of the family. Wives typically devote themselves to housekeeping and motherhood. As in most families, gender roles in Amish marriages vary by personality; there are shades of dominance from husband to wife across a wide spectrum, with many variations. In nonfarm families, typically the husband is the primary breadwinner, but in cases where a wife owns a business, she may provide most of the family income. When husbands work at home, there is often considerable sharing of roles-women assisting in the barn or shop, and men in the garden or around the house.

Women with young children almost never hold full-time jobs outside the home, although some manage at-home stores, greenhouses, or bakeries. In some communities, single women or those whose children are grown operate their own businesses.

Amish women share in household decision-making and child discipline, even as they affirm the man's role as the religious head of the home. Although the father serves as the spiritual head of the home, mothers are very active in nurturing the spiritual life of children. The husband is responsible for religious matters related to the church and the outside world.

Networks of extended families provide a strong sense of identity in Amish society. The family provides a dense web of social support from cradle to grave. Adult sisters may gather once a month for a "sisters' day," a frolic that mixes work and fun while harvesting vegetables, cleaning house, or making quilts. Family members help one other during emergencies, fires or floods, and, of course, when a death occurs.

The Amish do not have retirement homes. The elderly normally live in an apartment in the home of one of their children or in a Grossdawdy Haus, a small adjacent house. Esteemed for their wisdom, the elderly find meaning and dignity as they assist their adult children. Surrounded by droves of grandchildren, they pass on the wisdom, joys, and secrets of Amish life to the rising generation.

Additional information

See chapter 11, "Gender and Family," in Donald B. Kraybill, Karen M. Johnson-Weiner, and Steven M. Nolt, The Amish (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013).

See chapters 5 and 6, "Parenting" and "Teen Culture," in Richard A. Stevick, Growing Up Amish: The Rumspringa Years,2nd ed. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014).

John A. Hostetler and Gertrude Enders Huntington, Amish Children: Education in the Family, School, and Community, 2nd ed. (New York: Harcourt Brace and Jovanovich, 1992).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Amish men and women usually assume traditional and well-defined gender roles. Husbands carry the primary responsibility for the financial well-being of the family. Wives typically devote themselves to housekeeping and motherhood. As in most families, gender roles in Amish marriages vary by personality; there are shades of dominance from husband to wife across a wide spectrum, with many variations.

# data[].attributes.body
DW

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Japan's young and charismatic environment minister has announced that he will be taking paternity leave from the end of January, making him the first male member of a Japanese cabinet to take time off for the birth of a child while simultaneously promoting the government's campaign to encourage couples to have more children.

Shinjiro Koizumi, a 38-year-old rising star of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, told reporters that he hopes his decision will encourage other new fathers to also take time off to help in raising new-born children.

"I want to take a total of two weeks off flexibly, making exceptions for important public duties," Koizumi said. According to the Japan Times, his wife, TV presenter Christel Takigawa, gave birth to a baby boy on Friday.

"The number of government workers taking childcare leave will not increase unless the government changes not only employment systems, but also the workplace atmosphere," Koizumi added in a subsequent meeting at the ministry to discuss reforms to Japan's notoriously demanding work culture.
Encouraging others
"I hope my decision will encourage other people to not hesitate to take child-care leave," said Koizumi. "My biggest wish is that the day will come when our society no longer deems a politician's child-care leave as news."

Read more: Is Japan's after-work drinking culture a thing of the past?

Koizumi is widely considered a future Japanese prime minister, in part because his father, Junichiro Koizumi, was also prime minister. He said he intends to monitor developments at his ministry by working from home, but that he will still go to his office when required for the next three months after the birth.

His announcement was applauded by other members of the government, with Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga echoing the hope that Koizumi's paternity leave will encourage more men to be involved in raising their children.

"As a young politician in the government, I think Koizumi will be very conscious of trying to push Japanese society forward and that he thought this would be a good opportunity to demonstrate to other fathers that they should not be shy about taking paternity leave," said Makoto Watanabe, an associate professor of communications at Hokkaido Bunkyo University.

Read more: Leave-work-early campaign kicks off in Japan

"There is still tremendous social and workplace pressure on men not to take paternity leave, so he is clearly trying to change that attitude."

"It's the same in my office; nobody wants to be the first father to take time off out of concern about what other people will think or say."

Japanese law grants generous provisions for parental leave, including up to one year off from both parents and a further six months if a place at a nursery is not available for the child. The reality, however, is that social pressure means that very few people take the leave to which they are entitled.
Back at the office
Many company employees are quickly back at their desks because they feel guilty that their colleagues are expected to do their work while they are away and that they are being "disloyal" to the company. Workers give similar reasons for not taking all the paid holidays to which they are entitled every year.

A fraction over 6% of Japanese fathers took paternity leave in 2018 and, of the total, more than 70% took less than two weeks off. The government recently announced the ambitious target of having 13% of new fathers take paternity leave in 2019.

"I think Koizumi is emerging as the leader of the younger generation in Japanese politics and is very aware of how his words and actions can have an impact on society here," said Hiromi Murakami, a professor of political science at the Tokyo campus of Temple University.

"There is so much pressure for new fathers not to take time off so he's trying to set an example that even a busy member of the cabinet can take time off," she said. "But I'm afraid it's still going to take a long time to change attitudes."

The national government and local authorities have implements numerous initiatives designed to encourage more people to have children, including subsidies for families with three children or more and the opening of more kindergartens, but the national birth rate is still declining.

Just 864,000 babies were born in Japan in 2019, the lowest annual figure since records were first compiled in 1899 and down by 54,000 births from the previous year.

Read more: Japan's freelancers go rogue, shun salaryman tradition
Record number of deaths
And with deaths at a post-war high of 1.376 million in 2019, the Japanese population contracted by a record 512,000 individuals. By 2019, estimates indicate that the population of Japan will have shrunk to 88 million, down from a peak of 124 million in 2018.

Watanabe says that no matter how many politicians try to the government's campaign to raise the birth rate, ordinary people face a fundamental problem.

"Politicians are wealthy; most ordinary Japanese are not," he said. "I think that most Japanese people love children and would like to have a big family, but the basic problem is that it's just too expensive for them to have one or, at most, two children. That's sad, but it's also worrying for the future of the nation."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Japanese minister wants to set an example by taking paternity leave | DW | 17.01.2020

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Japan's young and charismatic environment minister has announced that he will be taking paternity leave from the end of January, making him the first male member of a Japanese cabinet to take time off for the birth of a child while simultaneously promoting the government's campaign to encourage couples to have more children.

# data[].attributes.headline
Australia Then and Now: 30 Years of Changes

# data[].attributes.subject
Australia Then and Now: 30 Years of Changes

# data[].attributes.body
McCrindle 2018

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Click here to download the infographic.

Australia is a nation in transition. In the span of a generation, Australia's population has increased by more than half. Demographically we are ageing, with an average age 7 years older than it was 3 decades ago, but with a life expectancy 7 years greater than it was in 1984.

Our growing population is being achieved not only through this increased longevity, but also through record births- more than 300,000 per year. This is more than 25% higher than the peak of the original post-war baby boom. Yet as significant as this natural increase is, the largest source of our population grow immigration, with significant shifts in the Top 5 countries of birth. In 1984, the Top 5 countries of arrival were all European (and New Zealand) while today both China and India are in the Top 5 with Vietnam and the Philippines not far behind.

While the population has increased by 51% since 1984, the workforce has increased by 81%. Three decades ago the average full time worker took home just under $19,000 per year in a time when the average house price was less than $150,000. Today annual earnings exceed $73,000 with the average house price in most capital cities exceeding $520,000. From an employment perspective, the Australian workforce has transitioned from industrial in 1984 to professional today. The largest industries by workforce were all industrial in 1984 while today professional, scientific, technical, IT and the financial sectors make up the biggest employers along with mining and utilities.

In 1984 almost 2 in 3 Australians were married while today less than half are. And the "never married" proportion has increased from 1 in 4 to 1 in 3. From a religious perspective, Christianity is still the religion of more than 3 in 5 Australians, down from 3 in 4 in 1984. Meanwhile the "no religion" proportion has doubled and the "religion other than Christianity" numbers have increased from 265,600 to 1.68 million today.

In addition to these demographic changes, the shifts in our national identity are significant. Certainly the old affections run deep however there is a recognition of Australia as a cultural hub, a technology exporter, a fashion destination, a small business nation and a nation hosting iconic events.

It seems that Australians are comfortable in their own skin- embracing of this sunburnt country with all its iconic landmarks, yet proud of the cultural achievements and our diverse cities. There's an understated confidence that welcomes the world to this unique landscape, yet has the posture to proudly list off our cultural achievements.

There is a depth to our reflections on 21st Century Australia. The iconic language and Australiana is retained and reinterpreted with a new sophistication, and without the cringe. Our cultural identity is also being interpreted beyond the beach or sport. Multiculturalism has come of age in Australia. You can tell because there is little self consciousness and even less tokenism expressed. Rather the cultural mix is in our national DNA, it's part of our lifestyle- it's who we are. The fact that more than 1 in 4 of us weren't born here seems unremarkable- as though it has always been thus. Many comments celebrated the richness of our lifestyle that comes through the input of so many cultures.

Amidst massive national and global change, the Aussie spirit is alive and growing in the 21st Century. What it means to be Australian has morphed to meet the challenges and diversity of our changing times. Australians hold strongly to an identity and "Aussie values" yet these are more sophisticated and mature, and represent our place in a world of global interactions.

For more information

If you found this article interesting, download our free McCrindle Insights Report for more information on the trends shaping the future of Australia.

For media commentary contact us on 02 8824 3422 or at info@mccrindle.com.au.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Australia Then and Now: 30 Years of Change - McCrindle

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Click here to download the infographic. Australia is a nation in transition. In the span of a generation, Australia's population has increased by more than half. Demographically we are ageing, with an average age 7 years older than it was 3 decades ago, but with a life expectancy 7 years greater than it was in 1984.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
South Island, New Zealand - Gary Harding's body is a living testimony to his indigenous New Zealand heritage.

Ta moko, cultural tattoo artwork, adorns Harding's face and body, forming a visualisation of his Maori "whakapapa" or genealogy, his role in the community and his life's journey.

"I enjoy when someone asks questions, then I have the opportunity to share and educate them, rather than just staring and making assumptions," he told Al Jazeera.

For generations ta moko was outlawed, and later adopted by Maori gangs, which led to widespread discrimination and a stigma that made finding work and social acceptance difficult.

But its image is slowly changing, as a new generation embrace ta moko, and more and more companies, including service industries, government sectors and even political parties abandon their exclusion policies.

New Zealand's indigenous Maori were renowned as skilled hunters, warriors and artists. They were also famous for traditional performances including the fearsome Haka.

Before colonisation brought western techniques, tribal designs were carved into the skin with a chisel made of bone; the incisions coloured with ash or other natural substances.

Different tribes had their own distinctive artistic styles to adorn various parts of the body including the back, chest and limbs. The most sacred were reserved for the face.

While men often wore full face designs, women wore tattoos known as kauae on their lips and chin.

Suppression

New Zealand was colonised in 1840 and a suppression act in 1907 outlawed the teaching and practice of Maori culture.

For generations ta moko became scarce.

"My grandparents would get caned for speaking the language at school," Harding said, adding that ta moko became something that was only seen among tribal elders or in old photographs.

Harding teaches Maori culture to juveniles in detention.

By the 1970s, Maori language and arts began experiencing a resurgence, but many Maori gangs adopted ta moko as part of their insignia.

Many young people join criminal groups because they feel disconnected from their indigenous heritage and are searching around to make that connection, ending up in the wrong place, he said.

With the young offenders he strives to instil pride in their ancestry and a sense of self.

"There's a clear difference between a gang tattoo - that might be designed to be intimidating - and cultural markings," Harding told Al Jazeera.

He also coaches a youth rugby team.

A few months ago, when he arrived for a meeting with fellow coaches in the Australian city of Melbourne, Harding said he was refused entry into a restaurant amid snide comments.

Non-Maori often do not understand the tattoos' importance.

"People like myself have to go through these scenarios so society can become more aware," he said, adding that his attempts to explain the cultural significance of his facial tattoos were met by more "ignorant" remarks from the restaurant worker.

"People can walk around in a burka or their cultural dress," he said. "What's the difference between me walking into a place and wearing my culture on my face?"

Asserting identity

Harding was one of the first in public service to wear facial tattoos.

After his mother died in 2016, he went to his employer - the New Zealand government's child protection service - and told them that on the following Monday he would be arriving with a full facial design.

"I sat down with my boss and explained the importance to me, my mother and my family," he said. "I didn't ask, I told them this is what's happening and they accepted it. It was big step."

In September, Air New Zealand changed its polices to allow all staff including cabin crew, to display ta moko.

"It reinforces our position at the forefront of the airline industry in embracing diversity and enabling employees to express individuality or cultural heritage," said the airline's chief executive Christopher Luxon in a statement.

It's our birth right - our identity. I'm not gonna let anybody tell me how to be Maori.
Lisa Isherwood

Rawiri Barriball changed the face of the country's military in 2017 when he was granted permission to become the first naval officer to receive his facial markings.

Women have also blazed a trail towards renewed acceptance of the kauae.

Last year, Naaia Mahuta became the first female MP to sit in parliament with a chin tattoo and a female television news anchor was the first to read the news with ta moko last month.

Harding's mother, a well-respected school teacher, wore her kauae proudly long before it was common or widely accepted.

"On her death bed she asked me to receive mine - passing the mantle of bearing the family's history," he said.

"It was quite special for me to be able to receive mine from the same artist in the same living room that she received hers and the same place where she passed away. It was very spiritual."

Lisa Isherwood, who runs a sustainable farming project in Turangi, was one of the first in her family to receive ta moko and her children have followed in her path.

"It's our birthright - our identity," she said, adding she faced much opposition even from within her family.

"I'm not gonna let anybody tell me how to be Maori."

She explained the meaning of each design.

"This shows I am the firstborn and a worker of the land," she said. Another symbol resembling a hammerhead shark signifies her training in Maori weaponry.

She now plans to receive a skin carving as her ancestors once did.

Spiritual connection

Clyde Peri has been a ta moko artist since 1996.

He first learned Maori wood carving, and was later accepted for training in ta moko techniques.

"Every piece starts with a prayer to connect with the ancestors and ask for their blessing and guidance - the designs come from them," he told Al Jazeera.

This is followed by a conversation about the person's life story, achievements, bloodline and what has inspired them to receive the ta moko.

"I'm like a medium - they are already wearing their story," he said as he worked on a piece at the Tatt Datt studio in Melbourne. "I just need to make it visible. It's a spiritual connection."

Ta moko is always drawn freehand, and Peri said he does this while speaking to the person so he can draw from their emotion and energy.

Peri's ancestors were also ta moko artists. On the wall is a picture of one of his forefathers who used the ancient skin carving technique rather than needles. Deep groves form a tribal pattern on the man's face.

Peri, who has lived in Melbourne for 21 years, said most of his customers are from the city's large Maori community.

But some non-Maori also request Peri's designs - a practice that has been met with controversy over the years.

"The meaning is the same to me," Peri said. "I use the chance to educate them about what it means."

British singer Robbie Williams was one of the first to receive a Maori tattoo design from a tribal elder who supported his request.

Peri uses the same process, asking the client about the loved ones they want to represent and their own life journey.

But facial ta moko remain the most sacred and are usually received later in life.

Makere Kupenga, 30, wears a large ta moko representing her mother and sisters on her back. She also has smaller designs behind her ears, but no kauae on her chin and lips.

"It is a heavy weight to carry my family's full whakapapa history," she said. "But I will receive the kauae when I feel I am ready and worthy."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'My culture on my face': New Zealand's Maori assert identity

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
South Island, New Zealand - Gary Harding's body is a living testimony to his indigenous New Zealand heritage. Ta moko, cultural tattoo artwork, adorns Harding's face and body, forming a visualisation of his Maori "whakapapa" or genealogy, his role in the community and his life's journey.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size

Dan Graham had a "standard" view of what his wedding would look like: "I'm from the [NSW] Central Coast, I was imagining a 'rainforest-y' area, quite casual."

But when the podiatrist proposed to his now wife, marketing manager Nandita Reddy, he realised things would probably be a bit different.

Daniel and Nandita appear on the new SBS show, Marry Me, Marry My Family.

"I'm the first person in my household to get married and I knew for my parents it would be important to have a traditional Indian wedding," says Reddy.

"But I was happy to take it easy and I actually wanted to do a 'not Indian' wedding and mix in the cultural elements. It was Dan who was like, 'No, I want to do an Indian wedding.'"

Graham and Reddy appear in the new SBS show Marry Me, Marry My Family, which premieres on Tuesday night. The show follows cross-cultural couples as they plan their big days, contending with expectations from their families and communities.

In the end, the pair settled for two wedding ceremonies: a full traditional ceremony for more than 400 (to which Graham says he brought 10 guests, "eight of whom were my family") but also a ceremony for 230 with a mix of Indian and western traditions.

"Central Coast culture is not vegetarian and alcohol free," Graham laughs. "So the idea was, if that's your religion and what you want to do, that's available, but if you're not, we've got you covered."

Sydney wedding planner Jennifer Kennedy from JK & Co Events says cross-cultural weddings are extremely common and usually less drama than people expect.

"I find both sides get involved and have a deeper appreciation and respect for each others' families, religion, and upbringing," she says. At the end of the day, she believes, "there is no right or wrong".

Kennedy says the key is often taking a bit of extra time to explain what is going on to everyone involved, recalling a recent pair of ceremonies she organised for a bride with Hindu faith and a Catholic-raised groom.

"We had the Catholic wedding a week earlier, followed by a traditional wedding reception. The bride called it her 'white wedding' and felt blessed to be able to wear a white wedding gown.

"The ceremony rehearsal in the church was needed in order for the families to know what to do, where to stand, what to say. If you're Christian and you've attended church and weddings you take it for granted ... but for someone who has never entered a church, it's quite overwhelming. Especially for the father who had to walk his daughter down the aisle."

Respecting the other person's cultural background - whether you're the one getting married, in the bridal party or even just a guest - is going to make things much easier: "Giggling and not taking it seriously can easily make the other family, whose religion it is, feel angry or upset."

Although Graham says he was originally concerned some of his party wouldn't be able to last through the long ceremony, some of which was in Sanskrit ("I didn't even know what was going on," Reddy says), he was pleasantly surprised.

"It went for four hours but the only complaint I heard was it was a bit cold ... even my mates who I was worried wouldn't be particularly accepting of other cultures seemed to love it."

For Reddy, who notes she feels lucky her family are "quite liberal", the best advice she can give other couples attempting a cross-cultural wedding is to "compromise where you can".

"At the end of the day, just keep focusing on the fact that it's about you," she says. "You might have to battle with your family, but you have to remind them it isn't about what society thinks or wants: it should be about their child and their partner."
Marry Me, Marry My Family airs Tuesday 8.30pm on SBS.

Mary Ward is Deputy Lifestyle Editor of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
'You might have to battle, but it isn't about what society thinks'

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Dan Graham had a "standard" view of what his wedding would look like: "I'm from the [NSW] Central Coast, I was imagining a 'rainforest-y' area, quite casual." But when the podiatrist proposed to his now wife, marketing manager Nandita Reddy, he realised things would probably be a bit different.