The Arts in Schools - Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation

where there are 'books on the shelves, parents who listen tomusic and visit the theatre'. 1 This is the sense in which weare apt to refer to people as being 'cultured'. This view ofculture is inadequate for a proper understanding of culturaleducation. The arts are only one aspect — albeit an importantone — of the life of any community. To talk of itsculture is to connote the whole network of habits, beliefs,customs, attitudes and forms of behaviour which hold ittogether as a community. Even to talk of the culture of asociety is misleading insofar as each section, group, or classwithin a society has varying cultural forms and values. Thislarger view of culture suggests three features of the culturesof industrial societies which need to be taken into accountin education: those of diversity, relativity and change.48 Diversity Modern industrial societies are diverse in their cultures.'Culture' is not the same as 'nationality'. To possess British,French or American nationality provides little guide to aperson's cultural identity. Britain, for example, does nothave, and never did have, one single, common culture. Italways has been a patchwork of overlapping cultures: arich mixture of regional, racial and class differences — differencesin language, values, religion, political and culturalinterests. There may be a dominant culture but it would bewrong to take it now for the British culture.49 Relativity A second feature of modern industrial societies is the relativityof their cultures. Children are not born with a cultureas they are born with brown eyes. They are born into aculture and for as long as they live in it they are underpressure to live by it. Cultural differences in language, dress,behaviour and religion often reflect profound differences inways of seeing the world and interpreting its meaning.Events which may be steeped in significance within oneculture may have no significance in another.50 Change Advanced industrial cultures are also in a continuous state ofchange. Indeed, the word 'culture' implies organic growthand development. 2 Individuals who inherit cultural ideasand values also contribute to them, evaluating and changingthem. Cultures evolve. The most striking line of evolution inthe past 20 years or so has been towards an unprecedentedmixing of cultures across and within national boundaries.51 Impli- The idea that arts teaching is a simple matter of passing oncations 'the cultural heritage' is a misleading simplification. Incontrast to the diverse, relative and evolutionary nature ofculture as it actually exists, a picture is conjured up of a37