Hi Tom,

Quote Originally Posted by Tom Odom View Post
That is the central core of cultural understanding--the mindset. That's why I harp on 2 base rules---you have to have the mindset. Even the best linguist in the world is useless and may in fact be harmful without that mental framework. I have talked this issue with SF and FAOs and others; I believe the selection process has to include some form of adaptabilty measurement.
Well, the process that we (Anthropologists) use is fairly well documented - I touch on it in that article of mine in vol. 7 of SWJ. You can train for that mindset since it is pretty rare in most cultures, but the training, at least as we do it, can have some fairly unexpected consequences.

Tom, your point about linguists is well taken. Sapirs' discussion of the relationship between Language, Culture and Personality is well worth looking at in that regard. Without the flexible mindset, any translations will be transliterations which loose a lot of the actual meaning. BTW, another good book to add to the list in this area is Edward T. Hall's The Silent Language. It deals with proxemics - basically body language and how that is used in different cultures to shift meaning.

On the issue of adaptability training, I've often felt that the best "training" I ever got for doing fieldwork wasn't from school, but through training in improvisational acting. One of my friends in the theatre community used to train RCMP people for undercover work, and he would run them through improv training and then plop them down in a city with no money, luggage or ID, except for an emergency coin to make a phone call (if they used it, they failed). They had to report back to a particular location after 72 hours, at which point they would be debriefed and scored. The only person who ever scored 100% walked in wearing a $1000 suit, with another $6000 worth of luggage and a lot of cash.

Quote Originally Posted by Tom Odom View Post
Where I have faulted the Dept of State in the past is their "adaptability" measures are really focused on how adaptable applicants are to a European/US centric environment centered on class structures and associated definitions of what constitutes "higher culture." In many ways the OSS and then the CIA followed the same path in selection and recruitment with he major exception that the OSS/CIA has always been willing to head hunt among the military, especially for covert operations.
Well, it does make sense for State to focus on that - think about Heinlein's "Pie with a fork" story. What has always amazed (amused) me is that they concentrate on the surface of "high culture" without going deeper. They, and other foreign service groups, are actually trying to train people in a pseudo-aristocratic mindset from the late 19th century. I used to find this absolutely hilarious, since it was so obviously merely a surface understanding of that particular sub-culture.

Marc