WHO IS IT ?
Edward T. Hall was an anthropologist who made early discoveries of key cultural factors. In particular he
is known for his high and low context cultural factors. He has lived and worked with the Navajo and Hopi
nations on reserves in northwest Arizona, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
He developed the concept of “rich context” or “poor context” cultures essential to understanding
interpersonal relationships, the notion of proxemia that allows the integration of physical distance into
these relationships as well as those of “polychrony” and “monochrony” to describe the relationship to
time.
BEYOND CULTURE INTRODUCTION :
In Beyond Culture, written in 1976, Edward T. Hall advocates that everyone should seek to
overcome their cultural determinism, by becoming aware of the cultural dimensions of
themselves. s. The author takes up several concepts that he developed throughout his career
and explains them.
In each chapter of the book a theme is developed. Thus throughout the book Hall on the one
hand, he shows that culture is an essential element of the personality, fully integrated,
unconscious that people already possess, which is innate. So that he can later discover the
springs that flow directly from it. So it seems obvious to us.
On the other hand, it engages in a critique of Amerian education that prevents the development
of many of the human aspects necessary in the relationship to oneself and to others.
For this presentation I decided to choose the first chapter, entitled “The paradox of the culture” and the
