Cultural Poles

Before you get annoyed by people from a foreign country and think of bombing their territory, become aware of the differences in thought and learn to avoid misunderstandings.

This map was destined to visualize differences in culture and habits of thought in the east and the west with a focus on the most powerful nations of both regions: China and the USA. On this map "east" means countries with Chinese culture (China, Korea and Japan), "west" means Europe, North America and most countries of the British Commonwealth.

Western Culture is still based on the culture of the ancient Greeks, but was very much influences by Christian monotheism. Whereas the main pillars of Chinese thought are Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism.

Culture is a collective phenomenon which always derives from the social milieu and never from the genes. You should distinguish culture from human nature on the one hand and from personality of the individual on the other.

How to use: the navigation is based in the chapter-numbers. You can either follow them from "01" to "16" or start wherever you like and look for the footnotes that lead you to a thematically related chapter. Since every chapter holds an enclosed information you can also skip form one chapter to another without any specific order. If you hold the map towards backlight you will see how the chapters are connected to each other.