Showing papers on "Cultural analysis published in 2003"

The Cultural Nature of Human Development

Abstract: 1. Orienting concepts and ways of understanding the cultural nature of human development 2. Development as transformation of participation in cultural activities 3. Individuals, generations and dynamic cultural communities 4. Child rearing in families and communities 5. Developmental transitions in individuals' roles in their communities 6. Interdependence and autonomy 7. Thinking with the tools and institutions of culture 8. Learning through guided participation in cultural endeavours 9. Cultural change and relations among communities

Cultural Ways of Learning: Individual Traits or Repertoires of Practice:

Abstract: This article addresses a challenge faced by those who study cultural variation in approaches to learning: how to characterize regularities of individuals’ approaches according to their cultural background. We argue against the common approach of assuming that regularities are static, and that general traits of individuals are attributable categorically to ethnic group membership. We suggest that a cultural-historical approach can be used to help move beyond this assumption by focusing researchers’ and practitioners’ attention on variations in individuals’ and groups’ histories of engagement in cultural practices because the variations reside not as traits of individuals or collections of individuals, but as proclivities of people with certain histories of engagement with specific cultural activities. Thus, individuals’ and groups’ experience in activities—not their traits—becomes the focus. Also, we note that cultural-historical work needs to devote more attention to researching regularities in the variat...

Cultural capital in educational research: A critical assessment

Abstract: In this article, we assess how the concept of cultural capital has been imported into the English language, focusing on educational research. We argue that a dominant interpretation of cultural capital has coalesced with two central premises. First, cultural capital denotes knowledge of or facility with “highbrow” aesthetic culture. Secondly, cultural capital is analytically and causally distinct from other important forms of knowledge or competence (termed “technical skills,” “human capital,” etc.). We then review Bourdieu’s educational writings to demonstrate that neither of these premises is essential to his understanding of cultural capital. In the third section, we discuss a set of English-language studies that draw on the concept of cultural capital, but eschew the dominant interpretation. These serve as the point of departure for an alternative definition. Our definition emphasizes Bourdieu’s reference to the capacity of a social class to “impose” advantageous standards of evaluation on the educational institution. We discuss the empirical requirements that adherence to such a definition entails for researchers, and provide a brief illustration of the intersection of institutionalized evaluative standards and the educational practices of families belonging to different social classes. Using ethnographic data from a study of social class differences in family-school relationships, we show how an African-American middle-class family exhibits cultural capital in a way that an African-American family below the poverty level does not.

Cross-cultural behaviour in tourism : concepts and analysis

Abstract: Preface Introduction Concepts of cross cultural behaviour in tourism: Culture Social contact Values Rules of social interaction Perception Satisfaction Methods for cross cultural analysis in tourism Principal components and factor analysis for cross cultural analysis Structural equation modelling for cross cultural analysis Applications of cultural analysis in tourism: Cultural analysis: marketing and management implications: Conclusions Index

Universals and Cultural Differences in Recognizing Emotions

Abstract: Moving beyond the earlier nature-versus-nurture debate, modern work on the communication of emotion has incorporated both universals and cultural differences. Classic research demonstrated that the intended emotions in posed expressions were recognized by members of many different cultural groups at rates better than predicted by random guessing. However, recent research has also documented evidence for an in-group advantage, meaning that people are generally more accurate at judging emotions when the emotions are expressed by members of their own cultural group rather than by members of a different cultural group. These new findings provide initial support for a dialect theory of emotion that has the potential to integrate both classic and recent findings. Further research in this area has the potential to improve cross-cultural communication.

Choice and self-expression: a cultural analysis of variety-seeking.

Abstract: Three studies examined whether the tendency to seek variety in choices depends in part on cultural assumptions of choice and uniqueness. Study 1 showed that people from different cultures where different assumptions of choice and uniqueness dominate show different levels of variety in their choice rule use. Study 2 primed participants with magazine ads highlighting different representations of uniqueness dominant in individualist versus collectivist cultures to show the influence of cultural meanings of uniqueness on the variety-seeking tendency. Study 3 manipulated the motivation to display variety to demonstrate that variety-seeking in the United States partly hinges on cultural meanings of choice as self-expression. Variety-seeking in choice rule use was eliminated when participants had the chance to self-express through choice listing. The research illustrates the role of cultural assumptions in the variety-seeking tendency.

Geographies of Gender, Sexuality and Race: Reframing the Focus on Space in Sport Sociology

Abstract: This article returns to an earlier discussion on `sport and space' that began in a 1993 special issue of the International Review for the Sociology of Sport. In this article I initiate a discussion and debate that aims to move spatial inquiry beyond a focus on `place' in order to more clearly link the relation between identity and the spaces through which identity is produced and expressed. Reframing the focus to include a broader cultural analysis enables sport sociologists to more closely examine the geography of social relations. In particular, this article considers how relations of gender, sexuality and race are produced, negotiated and contested in social space. This discussion is largely situated in the work of French theorist Henri Lefebvre and contextualized in the recent `spatial turn' in sport sociology.

The Macro-Environment and Work-Family Conflict Development of a Cross Cultural Comparative Framework

Abstract: Using data from focus groups in five countries (China, Hong Kong, Mexico, Singapore, and the United States), we identified macro-level influences on the work-family interface across the countries. ...

Social Class and Cultural Mobility: Reconfiguring the Cultural Omnivore Thesis

Abstract: This article explores the idea of `cultural mobility' both as a way of thinking about the polarizing logic of class relations and practices in contemporary society and as a means by which the debate over the cultural omnivore might be advanced. The concept of cultural mobility refers to the differential capacity to engage with or consume cultural goods and services across the entire spectrum of cultural life, an ability which is itself premised upon an unequal, class-related distribution in cultural competence. Cultural mobility, then, is the ability to move at will between cultural realms, a freedom to choose where one is positioned in the cultural landscape. I argue that the concept provides fertile ground for exploring possible interconnections between a number of diver-gent strands in current social theory which have largely developed independently of each other. At the same time much of this theoretical effort remains divorced from concrete research agendas. Using data collected as part of a major st...

The Body, Dance and Cultural Theory

Abstract: This monograph builds on earlier work to formulate a systematic approach to the sociology of dance (Thomas 1995, 1997). It makes connections between the burgeoning interest in the body in social and cultural analysis and a variety of dance forms and practices. The ‘body’, in movement and stillness, is the primary mode of representation and expression in Western theatre dance in particular. Social and cultural analysts of the body, however, as Part 1 demonstrates, tended to pay scant attention to this situated aesthetic embodied practice. This was in sharp contrast to other artistic and cultural fields, which social and cultural theorists drew on, to explore the construction and production of representation and difference in relation to the body (Pollock 1988; Wolff 1995; Betterton 1996). The book integrates the sociology of the body and dance studies by engaging with ideas about the body in contemporary cultural theory in these two fields. Semiotic, feminist, postmodernist and poststructuralist approaches to the body and dance are situated in relation to debates between foundationalist and social constructionist perspectives. Drawing on dance ethnography (Desmond 1997; Browning 1995), it proposes that dance forms and practices are embodied forms of cultural knowledge that can offer a rich set of resources for investigating the complex issues confronting the study of the body in society. Chapters 3-7 present close readings of a series of dance case studies to examine dance as a social and/or aesthetic bodily practice, which challenge the emphasis on social constructionism and representation in contemporary body studies. The author uses her ethnographic and analytic research on dance as evidence in chapters 3, 5, 6 and 7 in particular. By drawing on dance analysis, the book offers social and cultural criticism a rich and relatively uncharted terrain for studying and conceptualising expressive bodies.

The adaptive nature of culture

Abstract: Some have argued that the major contribution of anthropology to science is the concept of culture. Until very recently, however, evolutionary anthropologists have largely ignored culture as a topic of study. This is perhaps because of the strange bedfellows they would have to maintain. Historically, anthropologists who claimed the focus of cultural anthropology tended to be anti-science, anti-biology, or both. Paradoxically, a segment of current mainstream cultural anthropology has more or less abandoned culture as a topic. It is particularly ironic that in spite of a growing awareness among evolutionary anthropologists that culture is critical for understanding the human condition, the topic of culture has fallen out of favor among many “cultural” anthropologists. 1,2

Culturally Competent Psychotherapy

Abstract: To provide effective psychotherapy for culturally different patients, therapists need to attain cultural competence, which can be divided broadly into the 2 intersecting dimensions of generic and specific cultural competencies. Generic cultural competence includes the knowledge and skill set necessary to work effectively in any cross-cultural therapeutic encounter. For each phase of psychotherapy--preengagement, engagement, assessment and feedback, treatment, and termination--we discuss clinically relevant generic cultural issues under the following headings: therapist, patient, family or group, and technique. Specific cultural competence enables therapists to work effectively with a specific ethnocultural community and also affects each phase of psychotherapy. A comprehensive assessment and treatment approach is required to consider the specific effects of culture on the patient. Cultural analysis (CA) elaborates the DSM-IV cultural formulation, tailoring it for psychotherapy; it is a clinical tool developed to help therapists systematically review and generate hypotheses regarding cultural influences on the patient's psychological world. CA examines issues under 3 domains: self, relations, and treatment. We present a case to illustrate the influence of culture on patient presentation, diagnosis, CA, and psychotherapeutic treatment. Successful therapy requires therapists to employ culturally appropriate treatment goals, process, and content. The case also demonstrates various techniques with reference to culture, including countercultural, cultural reinforcing, or culturally congruent strategies and the use of contradictory cultural beliefs. In summary, developing both generic and specific cultural competencies will enhance clinician effectiveness in psychotherapy, as well as in other cross-cultural therapeutic encounters.

Diversifying (and Politicizing) Sport Psychology through Cultural Studies: A Promising Perspective

Abstract: The central purpose of this paper is to speculate on the ways that sport psychology researchers, educators, and practitioners can use a cultural studies perspective to enhance their research and applied work. At base, cultural studies critiques and challenges existing norms and practices and examines how these practices affect people in their everyday lives (Hall, 1996a). Although cultural studies has been notoriously difficult to define (see Storey, 1996), most cultural studies projects deal with the interrelated issues of (a) social difference, (b) the distribution of power, and (c) social justice. In this paper, cultural studies is first defined, incorporating sport-related examples wherever possible. Next, key concepts in cultural studies including power, privilege, and praxis are explored. We then discuss how sport psychology scholars and practitioners might promote an “athletes-as-citizens” (Sage, 1993) model of service provision in the applied setting.

Cultural Traits: Units of Analysis in Early Twentieth-Century Anthropology

Abstract: The basic analytical unit used by E. B. Tylor, Franz Boas, Clark Wissler, A. L. Kroeber, and other early anthropologists interested in cultural transmission was the cultural trait. Most assumed that such traits were, at base, mental phenomena acquired through teaching and learning. The lack of an explicit theoretical concept of cultural trait meant that the units varied greatly in scale, generality, and inclusiveness among ethnographers. Efforts to resolve the difficulties of classification and scale were made but were largely unsuccessful. The history of the concept of cultural trait reveals not only the roots of modern theoretical difficulties with units of cultural transmission but also some of the properties that such a unit needs to have if it is to be analytically useful to theories of cultural evolution.

Anthropology & mass communication : media and myth in the new millennium

Abstract: Anthropological interest in mass communication and media has exploded in the last two decades, engaging and challenging the work on the media in mass communications, cultural studies, sociology and other disciplines. This is the first book to offer a systematic overview of the themes, topics and methodologies in the emerging dialogue between anthropologists studying mass communication and media analysts turning to ethnography and cultural analysis. Drawing on dozens of semiotic, ethnographic and cross-cultural studies of mass media, it offers new insights into the analysis of media texts, offers models for the ethnographic study of media productio and consumption, and suggests approaches for understanding media in the modern world system. Placing the anthropological study of mass media into historical and interdisciplinary perspectives, this book examines how work in cultural studies, sociology, mass communication and other disciplines has helped shape the re-emerging interest in media by anthropologists. A former Washington D.C. journalist, Mark Allan Peterson is currently Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. He has published numerous articles on American, South Asian and Middle Eastern media, and has taught courses on anthropological approaches to media t at he American University in Cairo, the University of Hamburg, and Georgetown University.

Critical cultural policy studies

Abstract: Critical Cultural Policy Studies: A Reader brings together classic statements and contemporary views that illustrate how everyday culture is as much a product of policy and economic determinants as it is of creative and consumer impulses.

Unpacking the local: A cultural analysis of tourism entrepreneurship in Murter, Croatia

Abstract: In recent years, there has been a paradigmatic shift articulated by the 'cultural' turn of tourism geography. Within the cultural analysis of economic relations the embrace of complexity and diversity has become essential to broadening our understanding of tourism development processes. This paper seeks to engage with local cultural perspectives, which inform these 'new' ways of theorizing tourism. This study focuses on small-scale tourism entrepreneurship in the village of Murter in the Balkans set against the backdrop of economic transition in a post-war environment. It is argued that the role of local values is critical in the re-emergence of tourism as a key economic sector and the shaping of small enterprise culture. The analysis utilizes an 'insider' perspective as a key positioning element in the discussion.

The Sociological and Anthropological Study of Globalization and Localization

Abstract: This article sketches the development of the topic of globalization and localization within sociology and anthropology during the last 20 years and summarizes research findings. Subsequently, a number of topics for further enquiry are outlined. It is argued that the mapping of global cultural flows is still at an impressionistic stage and will be supplemented by systematic procedures. This will lead - as the contributors to this publication show - to a more differentiated assessment of global cultural homogenization. The article tackles the problems of cultural convergence, non-western globalization and alternative modernities. Cultural exchanges that circumvent `the West' have not yet received sufficient attention. A cross-culturally valid notion of modernity may help in conceptualization. Finally, the question whether humanity is gaining or losing in the globalization process calls for further investigation.

What is the context? A reply to the Gray-Johnston debate on strategic culture

Abstract: Can cultural analysis tell us anything significant about strategic outcomes? This question has provided the focus for strategic culture research since it was first introduced as a concept by Jack Snyder in 1977. Nearly 25 years on, we appear no closer to establishing a consensus on what strategic culture is and what it can tell us. In terms of theory and methodology, the concept of strategic culture remains underexplored. As Colin Gray notes, ‘any scholarly work on strategic culture is granted importance because of its rarity’. Hence the recent debate in RIS between Gray and Alastair Iain Johnston should be seen as significant.

The New Economy: A Cultural History

Abstract: In this article I look at some cultural aspects of the economic frenzy of the 1990s, a period often labelled ‘the new economy’. The focus is on the ways in which processes of culturalization became an important part of production, in such fields as e-commerce and ‘the experience economy’. How was culture packaged and marketed in new ways, for example in the production of symbols, images, auras, experiences and events? I explore how the technologies of imagineering, performance, styling and design came to play important roles in this process. Other important traits of this development are discussed in a comparison with earlier examples of the emergence of ‘new economies’: the aesthetics and practices of speed, the cult of creativity, ‘the catwalk economy’ and the importance of public display and performance, as well as the importance of ‘newness’.

Ethnography and Case Study: A Comparative Analysis

Abstract: The purpose of the present paper is to describe the unique characteristics of ethnographic and case study research. The central difference between ethnography and case study lies in the study's intention. Ethnography is inward looking, aiming to uncover the tacit knowledge of culture participants. Case study is outward looking, aiming to delineate the nature of phenomena through detailed investigation of individual cases and their contexts. Some practical and theoretical applications of case study research are described. The comparative analysis of ethnography and case study is developed with illustrative examples from education, psychology, and sociology. ********** A recurring theme of student questions in our graduate classes on qualitative research methodologies involves the differences between types of qualitative research. We describe ethnography, case study, narrative, phenomenology, and action research as qualitative frameworks that use common data collection methods but are distinguishable according to individual characteristics. Nevertheless, the distinction between these qualitative approaches is not so apparent. The most poorly understood term seems to be 'ethnography'. Ogbu, Sato and Kim (1997) attribute the confusion and the misuse of the term 'ethnography' to the sudden rise in the employment of ethnographic methods as a fad in educational research. Regardless of the reason for the confusion, the most difficult distinction for our students is that between 'ethnography' and 'case study'. Ethnography centers on culture (but so can a case study); case studies investigate an instance of some phenomenon in depth, in order to shed light on the phenomenon (but some ethnographies seem to do this, too). In an ethnographic study, the researcher does in-depth investigation of a unit--be it a tribe, a street gang, or a classroom. In a case study, the researcher may study one individual, but the 'case' may also be a tribe, a street gang, a classroom, or a society. The terms ethnography and case study are used almost interchangeably in many social science research journals. Taft (1997), in fact, discusses ethnography as a case study method (p. 74). In view of the confusion between these terms, we will attempt to explore the various aspects of ethnography and case study, to elaborate on their boundaries, and to offer a distinction between them. Ethnography Ethnography is defined concisely by Fetterman (1998) as "the art and science of describing a group or culture (p.1)." Goetz and LeCompte (1984) say that ethnographies are "analytic descriptions or reconstructions of intact cultural scenes and groups ... (that) recreate for the reader the shared beliefs, practices, artifacts, folk knowledge and behaviors of some group of people" (p.2). Ethnography describes the behaviors, values, beliefs, and practices of the participants in a given cultural setting. However, as Wolcott (1985) writes in his classic article on ethnographic intent, description is not enough to constitute ethnography because "Culture is not lying about, waiting patiently to be discovered; rather, it must be inferred from the words, and actions of members of the group under study ... (p. 192)." Ethnography involves cultural analysis. Analyzing a culture means not simply recounting behaviors and events, but inferring the cultural roles that guide behaviors and events. The intention of ethnography is to capture the everyday, the unwritten laws, conventions and customs that govern the behavior of persons and sub-groups within a culture. Patton (1990) sets a more ambitious challenge for ethnography. He claims that an ethnomethodologist needs to "elucidate what a complete stranger would have to learn to become a routinely functioning member of a group, a program, or a culture" (p. 74). In order to accomplish this goal, Patton argues, the researcher should not be satisfied with in-depth interviews and observations but should perform "ethnomethodological experiments" that "violate the scene" or purposely "shake up" the taken for granted behaviors in that culture, in order to illuminate the roles that lie beneath behavior. …

Cultural studies as praxis: (Making) an autobiographical case

Abstract: This autobiographical essay ‘takes cultural studies personally’, drawing on experience, identity and the personal to indicate how and why the author is proponent of and is working on developing a model of cultural studies as social justice praxis despite the constraints academia in general and of the university as an institution in particular. The paper travels roughly from the author’s student and teacher days in Sierra Leone through his graduate student days in Canada to his current role as university teacher in the USA. He selectively concentrates on his experience as a teacher of literature (and African multi-role utilitarianism), education and cultural studies (using one of his cultural studies courses and students’ questions about the utility of cultural studies as example), his shifting and overlapping racial/ethnic identities (African/black) and the politics of identity, and his thoughts on the place of theory in cultural studies and a black approach to theory (black ambivalent elaboration) as con...

Rupturing Public Relations Metanarratives: The Example of India

Abstract: In keeping with the trend of international-intercultural public relations practice, research in this area has also been mostly top-down, "outside-in," or etic in nature. This study combines a cultural analysis approach with ethnographic fieldwork in an attempt to move away from the culturally constituted metanarratives of the 4 models and practitioner roles of public relations, and it provides an "inside-out" or emic analysis of the cultural context of public relations in India. In doing so, it is able to foreground some of the assumptions that underlie these metanarratives, assumptions that are not always congruent with the Indian cultural context. Overall, this study emerges as a critique of unquestioning global applications of public relations metanarratives in culturally diverse settings.

Using cultural geography to engage contested constructions of ethnicity and citizenship in Sydney

Abstract: Much of the critique of the 'cultural turn' erroneously assumes that politics and representation are mutually exclusive. An examination of constructions of ethnicity and citizenship in two Sydney case studies demonstrates the deeply politicized nature of representations. Case study materials are drawn from anti-mosque politics and from discourses surrounding a suburb associated with Indo-Chinese-Australians. Representations are both expressive and constitutive of citizenship. Cultural minorities are compelled to engage in representational battles. Media research and cultural studies theory indicate that audience empowerment offers strategic political promise. Suggestions for empowering cultural minorities in their representational battles, and a research agenda, are articulated.

Cultural analysis, cultural studies, and the law : moving beyond legal realism

Abstract: Cultural Analysis, Cultural Studies, and the Law is a field-defining collection of work at the intersection of law, cultural analysis and cultural studies. Over the past few decades the marked turn toward claims and policy arguments based on cultural identity—such as ethnicity, race, or religion—has pointed up the urgent need for legal studies to engage cultural critiques. Exploration of legal issues through cultural analyses provides a rich supplement to other approaches—including legal realism, law and economics, and law and society. As Austin Sarat and Jonathan Simon demonstrate, scholars of the law have begun to mine the humanities for new theoretical tools and kinds of knowledge. Crucial to this effort is cultural studies, with its central focus on the relationship between knowledge and power. Drawing on legal scholarship, literary criticism, psychoanalytic theory, and anthropology, the essays collected here exemplify the contributions cultural analysis and cultural studies make to interdisciplinary legal study. Some of these broad-ranging pieces describe particular approaches to the cultural study of the law, while others look at specific moments where the law and culture intersect. Contributors confront the deep connections between law, social science, and post-World War II American liberalism; examine the traffic between legal and late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century scientific discourses; and investigate, through a focus on recovered memory, the ways psychotherapy is absorbed into the law. The essayists also explore specific moments where the law is forced to comprehend the world beyond its boundaries, illuminating its dependence on a series of unacknowledged aesthetic, psychological, and cultural assumptions—as in Aldolph Eichmann’s 1957 trial, hiv-related cases, and the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent efforts to define the role of race in the construction of constitutionally adequate voting districts. Contributors. Paul Berman, Peter Brooks, Wai Chee Dimock, Anthony Farley, Shoshanna Felman, Carol Greenhouse, Paul Kahn, Naomi Mezey, Tobey Miller, Austin Sarat, Jonathan Simon, Alison Young

Culture and its Transfer: Ways of Creating General Knowledge Through the Study of Cultural Particulars

Abstract: Two perspectives of scientific inquiry-both making use of the notion of culture-are analyzed from the perspective of how general knowledge is being constructed by each. It is demonstrated how cross-cultural psychology has made use of traditional psychology's inductive emphasis on comparisons of samples (and generalization to populations). Crosscultural psychology has been a part of general and differential psychologies. In contrast, the cultural psychology that has developed in parallel with cross-cultural psychology on the basis of anthropology and developmental psychology has been built upon the notion of systemic causality, and on the basis of developmental assumptions. There is overlap in the practical work of cultural and cross-cultural psychologists-cross-cultural evidence can be used in cultural-psychological theorizing. Both disciplines share the focus on interdisciplinary cooperation, and are haunted by the usual limits on inductive inference that plagues all contemporary social sciences. Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. This article is available in Online Readings in Psychology and Culture: http://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/orpc/vol2/iss1/7

E-commerce and cultural values

Abstract: Introduction to Social and Cultural Research in Information Systems Psychology of Thai Family Business and Its Influences on Organizational Structure The Adoption of Information Technology by Thai Agricultural Cooperatives: A Response to Government Policy The Influence of Thai Culture on Requirements Engineering Process Information Systems Implementation in Thailand - A Cultural Analysis EIS Development in Thailand Using Prototyping Approach: A Government Organization Case Study e-Commerce and Its Challenges for Globalization - A Social Perspective e-Commerce in Thai SMEs Online Advertising: Is It for the Thais? The Culture Awareness Model for Development and Implementation of IS

The Culture of Race, Class, and Poverty: The Emergence of a Cultural Discourse in Early Cold War Social Work (1946-1963)

Abstract: Through a primary source historical analysis, this article discusses the emergence of a cultural discourse in the early cold war (1946-1963) social work literature. It traces the evolution of social work's cultural narrative in relation to social scientific perspectives, changing race relations, and increasing welfare caseloads. Social work scholars originally employed their cultural discourse to account for racial and ethnic difference and eventually came to examine class and poverty from this viewpoint as well. This cultural framework wrestled with internal contradictions. It simultaneously celebrated and problematized cultural difference and foreshadowed both latter twentieth century multiculturalism as well as neo-conservative thought. ********** In the introduction to their 1958 edited volume, Social Perspectives on Behavior, Herman Stein and Richard Cloward suggested, "If we are to develop, now and in the future, our characteristic method in psychosocial study, diagnosis, and treatment, knowledge of group and cultural patterns must match our not inconsiderable knowledge of personality organization" (Stein & Cloward, 1958, p. xiiii). The writers, two faculty members at the New York School of Social Work, largely echoed the sentiment of their peers. Increasingly, early cold war (1946-1963) social work scholars argued that an understanding of culture was integral to the study of psycho-social phenomena and the amelioration of social problems. Although elements of a cultural perspective were present in earlier social work thought, cultural narratives gained new ground in the early cold war years or the period spanning from the close of World War II in 1946 until the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963. This development mimicked larger trends in the social sciences. In response to Nazi racism and a mounting civil rights movement, mainstream social scientists rejected biologically-based explanations of racial and ethnic difference and instead turned to the prospect of an environmentally produced "culture" to account for racial, ethnic, and--eventually--class characteristics. Postwar social workers largely followed suit. Like social scientists, social workers initially applied this cultural lens to questions of race and ethnicity, but soon came to examine class, poverty, and welfare use from this vantage point as well. Historians generally maintain that psychological perspectives dominated early cold war social work thought (Curran, 2002; Herman, 1995; Leiby, 1978; Patterson, 1986; Trattner, 1994). These authors are correct in their claims, yet their psychiatric focus obscures postwar social work's simultaneous concern with cultural issues. Existing scholarship examines the origins of cultural narratives in the social science literature and its impact on policy making (Bell, 1982; Katz, 1986, 1989; O'Connor, 2001; Rainwater, 1970; Rainwater & Yancey, 1967), while a fewer number of authors investigate postwar social work's adoption of a cultural discourse in its discussion of the African-American family (Solinger, 1992; Kunzel, 1993). Nevertheless, historians have generally not explored the rise of a cultural discourse in the early cold war professional social work literature. To address this research gap, this paper asks: How did the postwar professional social work community respond to the growth of a social scientific cultural framework and how did it integrate this intellectual stance into its professional vocabulary? Through a primary source analysis of social work texts, journal articles, and technical reports, this article traces the origin and emergence of a cultural discourse--meaning scholarly, expert narratives on culture--in the social work literature. It situates and tracks the evolution of social work's cultural discourse in relation to developments in the social sciences, changing race relations, an increase in the welfare caseload, and the political milieu of early cold war America. …