Time Marches On: Edward T. Hall On Time (Part Eight)

Time Marches On: Edward T. Hall On Time (Part Eight)

Hall naturally examines the possible case of an American, with decidely rigid cultural perspectives on time, interacting on a local schedule in an unnamed foreign nation with decidely different, equally rigid culturally based aspects to time. He relates how time clashes culturally when five minutes of American tardiness might be equivalent locally to an hour's worth of minutes. In interactions with Chinese students in Australia, three hours lateness may at times be similarly interpreted cross-culturally. Hall posits that western time dictates eight time sets for punctuality and appointments: on time, five, ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty, forty-five minutes, and one hour all late or early.

This is contrasted specifically with Mediterranean Arabs in possession of three discernable time sets for the same purposes in: no time at all, now (or present), and forever (too long). I would posit these time sets have some influences among Gulf Arabs as well, especially in relationship to military logistics. Hall then concerns himself with informal perspectives on time; specifically he details awareness of the rapid or the dragging passing of time. He then discusses in detail time isolates described as: urgency, monochronism, activity and variety.

Urgency

Urgency is ascribed values contingent to base needs being psychologically and culturally determined, with a greater time urgency translating into a greater perception of time drag. Desperate needs, such as desire for success, immediate medical attention, or the observance of the withering of crops in need of rain are listed as examples where time appears to drag. Hall defines urgency not only as a cultural set but also as a pattern. Hall suggests that Americans possess higher tendencies to urgency than many of their European counterparts and especially more than many foreign nations. Hall posits that the locations of public toilets in the USA illustrates a cultural tendency to deny the existence of urgency.

Hall notes that public toilets are more often than not hidden away and implicates the result of periodic torture for those seeking to avail such facilities during the search for them. In this I have often felt the sorry state of public toilets in many nations is not the result of frequency of usage but a discordant inability to provide the necessary standards of regular cleaning and maintenance which increased frequency of usage requires. As public toilets are more easily found then increased cleaning and scrubbing schedules are then similarly appreciated but often equally unavailable.

Monochronism

Hall describes this as the process of doing one thing at a time which does not translate well into the ideas of multi-tasking or the expectation that one can or would willingly still do one thing at a time when efficiently multipled by three or four. He defines American culture as monochromatic and thus not easily accomodating terms of action, process, or decision making which require the attendance of diverse aspects or features concurrently. This would imply that westerners do tend to process time in similar elements exemplified by featureless black and white perspectives rather than spectral colour variations. The distinctions of time which Hall highlights refer to involvement in activity on either active or dormant phases with few or zero variations on these two underlying themes of activity.

Hall says just sitting, or contemplating, or ruminating, or repeatedly posing is not considered a bona fide activity in many cultures; cats please take note. Hall makes an exception for prayer in prayerful cultures and the identifiable postures connected to it. Hall notes that for many cultures, including those of the Navaho, Arabs, Japanese, and many of those of India, just sitting around on swivel bar stools and evidently doing nothing is not considered a form of dormancy.

Hall makes a determination of monochromatism as consisting of two forms; the ageric culture and the non-ageric culture. One which requires action first for "becoming later" in the ageric or one which requires no actions contingent on future action as in the swiveling of bar stools set (the non-ageric culture).

Variety

The passing of time as being distinguishable between short, long, and very long durations is determined by Hall to be a factor in boredom and he claims the degree of boredom relates to how fast time is perceived to be passing. The Korean perspective relates particularly in the cultural diet. Koreans invariably know what they will have for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, as there is little variety in the general traditional staples. But in many cultures there is no prior knowledge of the contents of meals from possibly one meal to the next, as the decision of what to prepare is not often made prior to preparation time. This is an example of the types of variety in life dependent upon various cultural values systems. However, Koreans demand more varieties in particularly the latest fashions, styles, models, and features dynamics of cell-phone technologies than virtually any other nation. It would appear a traditional aversion to variety in life at meal time is perhaps (over) compensated through a pernicious market in consumer products like cell phones.

Hall posits that with variety time passes more quickly and conversely that it passes more slowly with sameness. He makes the statement that imprisonment in a place devoid of light without a sense of the passage of time, or the distinctions between night and day will provoke disorientation and the "loss of one's mind". Hall also observes aging as a process of variety often only observed in the context of the observing of the aging of others rather than self. As for Hall's discussions on time, they age well, such distinctions retain relevancy on an anecdotal basis a mere forty-seven years after they were first penned.