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Understanding Cultural Contexts and Their Relationship to Resilience Processes

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Youth Resilience and Culture

Part of the book series: Cross-Cultural Advancements in Positive Psychology ((CAPP,volume 11))

Abstract

Social-ecological systems are neither culturally neutral nor do they operate at single levels. Instead, they operate at multiple levels that span local contexts and broader global ones. It is, therefore, understood that conceptualisations of resilience, along with the mechanisms that support competent adjustments to adversity, are relative to, and shaped by, the often intersecting cultures that define social ecologies. In this chapter, we consider some of the ways in which both macro- and micro-cultural contexts promote cultural guidelines for everyday living. These processes include, but are not limited to cultural scripts, national identities, and broad value systems. We then comment critically on the limitations implicit in these processes for explaining resilience mechanisms. Finally we consider how individuals’ active navigation of the various cultural contexts they traverse, and critical engagement with their cultural heritage and capital, supports a co-constructed process that facilitates resilience. Against this backdrop of complexity, we conclude by cautiously defining culture as socially-constructed and socially-shared ways-of-being-and -doing.

This chapter refers to findings generated by the Pathways to Resilience Project, South Africa. The authors gratefully acknowledge this project’s funding by the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Optentia Research Focus Area, Faculty of Humanities, North-West University, Vanderbijlpark, South Africa

    Linda C. Theron

  2. Resilience Research Centre, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada

    Linda Liebenberg

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  1. Linda C. Theron
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  2. Linda Liebenberg
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Correspondence to Linda C. Theron .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Optentia Research Focus Area, North-West University, Vanderbijlpark, South Africa

    Linda C. Theron

  2. Resilience Research Centre, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

    Linda Liebenberg

  3. Resilience Research Centre, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

    Michael Ungar

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Theron, L.C., Liebenberg, L. (2015). Understanding Cultural Contexts and Their Relationship to Resilience Processes. In: Theron, L., Liebenberg, L., Ungar, M. (eds) Youth Resilience and Culture. Cross-Cultural Advancements in Positive Psychology, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9415-2_2

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