Africa's educational systems were developed by colonial and missionary authorities as a means to create a trained labor force with respect for European social and moral superiority. With independence, African nations were faced with selecting new objectives for their educational systems. Among the educational aims emerging are fostering national…

For Kung hunter-gatherers and Fijian fishing people, healing is a central community ritual with significance beyond the cure itself. An enhanced state of consciousness, experienced most intensely by the healer, but also shared by the community, is at the core of Kung and Fijian healing. Although in contemporary Euro-American culture the spiritual…

Many recent studies and debates about East/West cultural differences suffer from major methodological and conceptual drawbacks: confused conceptions, arbitrary use of cultural terms, over-attribution to cultural effects, and ignorance of levels of analysis. A cross-cultural research framework for conceptualizing two or more societies is presented.…

Foreign Studies, an elective course for junior and senior students, is a study of selected Asian cultures, including the nations of China, Japan, and India, and of African cultures, including the nations of Nigeria, Ethiopia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Asia and Africa are studied from the American cultural viewpoint with emphasis…

This elective world studies course for 10th, 11th, and 12th grade students examines the problems and dilemmas of non-Western countries that are trying to preserve their own culture and national pride and yet attain the economic wealth of the West as represented by Europe and the United States. It deals with selected non-Western societies (the…

Studying about non-Western cultures not only helps children enjoy the differences that exist among people, but also prepares youth for meeting change in life. It is suggested that cultural awareness and appreciation by American pupils transfer to and affect the African's self-concept and image. Being a developing nation resembling American at a…

Using case studies of French-speaking West Africa and Southern Appalachia, this paper examines the role of traditional culture in developing regions by challenging current theories on that subject. The capitalistic and Marxist approaches that dominated well into the 1960s maintained that elimination of traditional social relations and values was…