5. In both cultures, these rules were taught
as the ways to live, to survive,
the ways to be in the world.

6. In time, we and the “others” learn our rules so well
that we no longer experience them as rules,
they become the lenses through which we view the world.
Except we don’t see our lens
and how it shapes what we see.
Instead, we believe we see the world
as it really is.

7. Neither we nor the “others”
experience our culture as an option,
as one of many possibilities.
Each of us experiences our culture as
the way things are or ought to be.
And then we meet.

Act II — Our Culture Encounters the “Other”: Loose and Tight, Liberal and Conservative, Pure and Conflicted, Tolerance and Purity Solutions

1. So now our culture encounters the “other.”
The “other” may have immigrated to our culture.
Or we may have conquered them.
Or they have may have once been invisible in our culture,
and now they have become prominent.

2. Through our cultural lens the cultural behavior of the “other” appears
strange
off
wrong
inappropriate.
Wrong language, dress, emotionality, skin color, rites and rituals, and so on.