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Are You Dealing with Cultural Diversity at Home?

Steps to help couples deal with cultural differences.

Maintaining a good relationship involves special challenges when you and your partner come from different cultural backgrounds. Your differences may help make your relationship exciting and expose you to many experiences that you would not otherwise have had.

But cultural differences can also cause stress for couples. You and your partner may not observe the same rituals, traditions, and holidays. You may have different ideas about the role of men and women, family relationships, raising children, or other issues.

The key to dealing with such challenges is to make a sincere effort to understand and respect each other’s backgrounds. This will help you and your partner build bridges between your cultures and focus on what you have in common instead of on your differences.

Cultural differences can take many forms. You and your partner may not have been born in the same country or grown up speaking the same language. You may belong to a different race, religion, or ethnic group. Or you may come from different social classes and have different expectations about where you will live. You may come from the same cultural group but disagree about the role religion should have in your life. You may want to observe traditional customs, such as preparing all foods a certain way, while your partner does not feel the same way. Easter, Passover, Christmas, and Hanukkah, times that families are supposed to come together can be particularly tense and awkward.

Cultural differences in relationships are becoming more and more common for several reasons:

  1. The world is becoming more global. It is increasingly common, at school, work, and in our communities, to meet people from other cultures and countries.
  2. People travel and move to new communities more frequently than in the past, which exposes them to others of different backgrounds.
  3. Changes in laws and attitudes have led to a growing acceptance of relationships between people of different races, religions, or ethnic groups. For example, on June 12, 1967, proscriptions against interracial marriage were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

Since 1980, the number of individuals of African descent marrying someone of a different ethnicity or race has increased from 5 to 18 percent. Thirty-nine percent of Hispanics born in America have a spouse of a different ethnicity or race and 49 percent of Asian newlyweds have a spouse of a different ethnicity or race.

Bernie Almanzar/Unsplash
Source: Bernie Almanzar/Unsplash

Marriages among people of different faiths are also becoming more common – in 2010, 45 percent of existing marriages in the U.S. were interfaith ones. Two-thirds of married people between the ages of 36 and 45 are in an interfaith marriage. A 2015 Pew Research Center survey showed that members of certain religious groups are more likely than others to be with someone of their faith, whether they are married or living together in a romantic relationship. For example, more than three-quarters of U.S. Hindus (91 percent), Mormons (82 percent), and Muslims (79 percent) who are married or living with a partner are with someone of the same religion. But this is less common among Jews (65 percent), mainline Protestants (59 percent), and religiously unaffiliated people (56 percent). In 2010, 45 percent of all existing marriages were interfaith.

Dealing with cultural differences as a couple

Managing a long-term relationship is not easy—42 to 45 percent of first marriages in the U.S. end in divorce. Cultural differences between the partners can add another challenge. However, these steps can help you deal with cultural differences as a couple:

  • Acknowledge your differences. Talk with your partner about your differences and how they may affect your relationship. Differences that do not matter now could become much more important later — for example, if you decide to have a child or a parent gets sick.
  • Talk about what you have in common. You and your partner need more than love in order to build a strong relationship. You need shared interests, values, and dreams. Have frequent conversations about your similarities to make sure you agree on what holds you together.
  • Create joint activities based on shared interests. If you both like sports, try to play tennis or golf together. If you both love to read, join a reading group together. Doing things together creates a bond based on shared experience.
  • Learn about your partner’s culture and pay attention to how your partner feels about it. Ask your partner about the history and values of the culture. What are the traditions about food? Are some foods forbidden? Do others have to be prepared in a certain way? Be sensitive to your partner’s ambivalence to aspects of the culture or religion.
  • Learn your partner’s language. Languages are more than a way of communicating—they are keys to the values of a culture. A lot of meaning can get lost in translation. Learning your partner’s language can help you understand him/her better.
  • Talk to a priest, rabbi, minister, or other clergymen. If you plan to get married, it can be helpful to get counseling. Many clergies have been trained to counsel couples from different religious backgrounds. To maximize the chances of a positive experience, find out if he/she is open to intermarriage before you make the appointment.

Communicating openly and honestly

Bridging cultural divides requires honesty and open communication. The earlier you talk about these issues, the less likely they will cause difficulty later in the relationship.

  • What are the most important values of the culture? Which of these values matter most to you as individuals and as a couple?
  • What are the major rituals, traditions, and holidays of your religions? Why are they important? Which, if any, will you celebrate as individuals or as a couple?
  • How does each culture view dating, marriage, and sex before and after marriage? Do you agree with these?
  • How do people in each culture communicate? Is hitting an acceptable way of communicating anger? Are some subjects forbidden in conversation?
  • What are the traditions about drinking? Is heavy drinking a part of the culture? Is alcohol forbidden in your religion?
  • What roles have men and women traditionally had in the culture? How do you and your partner see your roles in your relationship? How will housework be divided? Will both of you work if you have children?
  • What role does the family play in the culture? How much time are adults expected to spend with their parents and grandparents? Are parents or grandparents expected to live with you when they are elderly or infirm? Are you expected to offer financial support to family members? If you have different ideas about this, how will you handle these?

Many of these issues will not emerge as problems until both partners are committed to the relationship and have been together for some time. And, of course, cultural differences are not responsible for all difficulties you may have as a couple. Some problems have other causes such as different temperaments or concerns about money. However, the more you understand about the cultural differences between you, the more you will be able to sort out what is cultural and what is individual. Mutual understanding of the differences between you, both cultural and individual, increases your empathy for each other, strengthens your bond and deepens the emotional intimacy of your relationship.

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