Additional Culture Suggestions

Armenian! I’m working on getting the owners of this fine establishment to help create the overviews. :)
https://www.tota.world/article/2306/

Armenia is a great recommendation, and that sounds promising! We already have a few Armenian-focused articles, also, so it seems like an obvious choice.

Malaysian : )

Armenian and Malaysian are now in our culture list. :)

Brain science cultural. This is an area of rapid expansion in the arena of science today but the history of the brain, and the different cultures that believed what the brain represented as an extension of self, drives deep into the heart of various ancient cultural behaviors. It is a bit peripheral to objective cultural labels but crosses all the boundaries of the world. What did the ancient Armenian’s believe with respect to the brain and the self, how about the Japanese? The Mayans or the Incas? When did science start realizing what the brain represented - is the grey matter all of who we are? Today brain science is its own culture based on empirical and repeatable data, but we still do not understand why we are what we believe we are. The ancients were not tangled up in science, they used all types of subjective views on what we were and how we were supposed to be based on cultural norms.

Not sure how you add this but articles to follow as soon as I can get to it.

Chris: that sounds like an absolutely fascinating subject (and one I contemplate often)…how does imprinting affect brain development? How do different philosophical/cultural/linguistic influences effect brain function, even perception…? It also seems important to consider the fundamental methodology of such study itself, and how it might taint results (is it a broad or narrow sample? Is it trying to prove a specific premise? How are the inherent subjective aspects being accounted for? Etc). I am generally plagued by such concerns whenever I study a culture in particular…

One of my favorite takeaways from this project has been the chance to glimpse worldviews very different from the materialist philosophy I grew up with. I think we lose a lot of meaning when we focus too much on the physics and chemistry of our existence, as useful and interesting as they can be. I agree that theories of consciousness might fit better as a topic than a culture in our current system, though we plan to expand into lifestyle-based cultures as well. It could also make a fascinating group! Either way, I’m looking forward to reading more about it. :)

I would absolutely love to read an article (or a series of articles) on the subject of how different cultures view the brain’s relationship to the self or how those views affect culture and visa versa. Modern science seems to place nearly all of what we consider “us” inside the brain, wherein the ancients didn’t seem to hold it in such high regard. There is evidence that the ancients performed brain surgery, implying that some at least appeared to understand the importance of the brain as an organ, but did they understand the correlation between behavior and the brain? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/1000-years-ago-patients-survived-brain-surgery-but-they-had-live-with-huge-holes-in-their-heads-180948185/

Honestly, if I had more time I would start researching this entire field immediately.

I think Basque culture would be a really fun addition. Their language is unrelated to any other as far as we know.

Great idea Isaac!

lost boys of Sudan, (two countries) Congo, syria, cuba

Good suggestions, Craig! Cuba is listed as a culture already. For Congo, we do have the culture of Kongo people listed, but that is somewhat different than the Republic of the Congo. And Sudan is another tricky case. It seems both nations are very culturally diverse. Do you think it would be best to have Sudanese and South Sudanese cultures?

Syrian and Basque are now set up and in our system. :)

…it has occurred to me that both the Metis and Romani would be fascinating (and potentially controversial) inclusions. Regardless, it can become difficult trying distinguish between modern “nationalities” and historically distinctive cultural identities…?

Hi Kirk! Those are both great suggestions, but I’m not certain we have enough authoritative sources to represent those cultures well, particularly the Romani. If you or anyone perusing this thread have suggestions or leads there, please share!

French Canadian! A subset of Canadian, and 100% different…. Thank you, I’m just now learning about this site! It’s quite nice!

Thanks for the suggestion, Denise! I’ll add that culture now. It will get an icon next week.

Tongan! I have lots of Polynesian friends who would benefit and enjoy from content about their culture :)

…@morrisonl: I wholeheartedly agree (as I write this from Kea’au on the Big Island). This is precisely the reason why we have included ‘Oceania’ as a continental distinction in our metadata: to help enable more accurate representations of Pacific Island culture(s): “Tongan” is a cultural distinction regularly encountered hereabouts…and “mahalo” to you, because every such suggestion is one step closer to representing the amazing breadth of culture that still exists on this planet… I routinely find such revelation both humbling and compelling: however, the most difficult portion of this Sisyphean task (as far as it seems to date) is compelling members of a given culture to speak for themselves (in their own voice), for we do not necessarily wish the role of of ‘anointed expert’ upon our endeavors, but rather that of ‘facilitator’… far too much history is based upon “interpretation” and far too little upon actual “cultural experience” it seems to me…? Regardless: thank you for the suggestion!

Luke, Tongan has been added to TOTA’s culture page. Thanks for the suggestion!

Slavic cultures? Cossack, Hussites, slavic vikings, systema, feathered hussars, soldiers of God, paganism, etc

Hello Sean! We have several cultures represented that are part of the broader Slavic family, but we could certainly use more. I will look into what resources we have and try to add a few.

To follow up: Czech and Bulgarian cultures are now represented on TOTA! Expect to see content for these added over the coming weeks and months, and of course we always encourage our members to contribute as well!

I can’t seem to find my culture, Estonia. Am I missing something or is it just not here yet?

Hello, Aleksandra! You aren’t missing anything, we simply haven’t added Estonia as a culture yet. I’ll talk to our team and have a page created for it soon.

I appreciate you looking into this matter so quickly, thank you!

Estonia has been added as a culture, thank you for the suggestion! Expect to see finishing touches and new content over the next week or two, and of course we always welcome contributions from our members. :)

Ones that I have found in my family history over the years are the lesser-known cultures of Kashubia, Gottschee, and Slovenia.

Finland is missing and would love to see it added

Eva, we do have the Finnish culture, although it’s not (yet) part of our Compare Cultures tool. Check out: https://www.tota.world/?cultures=109

Marlee, thanks for the suggestions. We’ve added Slovene and Kashubian to our culture database; we’ll add content for those cultures as we can, but if you have any information you can contribute, please do. At this time, we’re going to wait before adding the Gottschee culture, as it’s so small that it will be a good while before our team can locate content for it. If you have cultural information on Gottschee, please do let us know and we’ll add the culture so you can add the information.

Hi, thank you for this beautiful idea, I have two suggestions: Indian Ocean culture and the concept of convivencia we foster at the House of Wisdom. Wamr wishes

Hello Khal! Thank you for the suggestions and kind wishes. The House of Wisdom is one of our team member Isaac’s favorite subjects! Are you part of an organization working to spread those ideals? If so, we’d love to hear more from you about it!

I also agree that it would be good to include more cultures from around the Indian Ocean—perhaps from a diverse nation like Indonesia.

Lebanese

I would like to know more about Colombian culture and history, including the mixing of Spanish colonists with natives.