Student 18

This picture of my family eating “Kamayan” explores the relationship between knowledge and culture because the cultural perspective a person uses will impact how they interpret knowledge. “Kamayan” means “by hands” in Tagalog, and is when a meal is eaten without utensils or plates and instead with hands. In some cultures, eating with your hands is disrespectful, but in the Philippines it is a privilege and very normalized in Filipino households. But one’s opinion on eating with your hands is altered depending on what is accepted in each person's culture.

The understanding of this concept is analyzed through cultural perspectives and how those bias’ of what is deemed “normal” changes based on the culture. The significance of “Kamayan” in Filipino culture begins in the wars where the Filipino military needed to be fed quickly and efficiently. Now in the post-war Philippines, it is an everyday practice and can even be seen in Filipino immigrant households today, like my own.

In other Asian cultures, it is common to eat with your hands, but in European cultures, it may be seen as taboo or against the “norm”; it is the relationship of knowledge and culture and how they work together to help build perspective on topics and concepts around the world. It is not just the correlation of the two, but how they work together as people create opinions and ideas about the world. Culture and knowledge don’t just have a relationship, but in a way, they are one.

This Bataan Death March Honorary Medal explores the relationship between knowledge and culture because cultural dimensions shape the way that knowledge gets interpreted to history. This object links to the AoK’s History and Natural Sciences. In my IBDP History of the Americas HL class, I wrote my IA about the Bataan Death March and conducted a personal interview with the son of a Death March survivor. During this process I was able to make connections between how the history books told the story of the Japanese invasion of the Philippines during WWII, and then how the first person perspective shaped the story. In doing so I was given the opportunity to see firsthand how culture affects the way that knowledge is perceived and then passed down and told.

The second hand sources talked about the event in a holistic view where people and motives were generalized into groups and their respective nations. In an American textbook, the focus is shifted onto the American men and women who were involved, despite the event being on Filipino grounds. However in the interview, it was focused on the feeling and environment during those exact moments.

The impact of culture on knowledge can be evaluated through the cultural dimensions of an individualistic society vs. a collectivist society. American culture is connected by its individualist societal traits, so it would make sense that when evaluating a historical event, the lens is based on the American people involved. The Philippines however, is a collectivist society and when interviewing a first person source, the knowledge of the event is switched to not just about the person being interviewed but the other people involved and the collaborative effort to survive.

Although connections in the information itself can be made, the perspective shaped by the culture that is capturing the knowledge changes the focus of the event. As a result of the American lens, the focus is that this was an event of WWII, but in the Filipino lens, this wasn’t just an event in history but instead the beginning of a survivor's legacy that would be translated into her children, grandchildren, and generations to come.

My childhood diary explores the relationship between knowledge and culture because culture shapes how knowledge is able to be expressed, especially in the perspective of a child growing up in a culture in which she was not allowed to be as vocal about opinions and thoughts about the world. This connects to the core theme of the knower because it requires a reflection of why I used a diary when I was a child. Even if I was unable to completely dissect that concept when I was younger, being an IB learner with the knowledge I have now in regards to the TOK course, I am able to now. In Filipino culture, it is common to be more traditional in regards to how you’re supposed to view the world. Being a first born generation American-Filipino in an immigrant household, there was a constant fight between how I knew I should express my opinions and how I wanted to.

My diary became my escape from how I felt I needed to express myself and I would write everything that came into my mind. It was a way to digest knowledge while still abiding by the cultural barriers I was meant to follow. This relationship was necessary to satisfy the role in which I was meant to play in my household.

Across many cultures this relationship is present. People are required to express how they feel or their opinions in a way that can be justified in the values and beliefs of their respective culture. Some choose to suppress that need for expression, and others choose to indulge in that expression but in private through one-on-one conversations or a journal.

Some people don’t feel those cultural pressures but even then, the relationship between culture and knowledge is still present. In that case, their culture doesn’t suppress their thoughts and therefore they are able to share knowledge in a way that is presentational and public. But that relationship of cultural molding the expression of ideas and knowledge is still present.