Core symbols in south african intercultural friendships

Abstract

Focus group discussions among Afrikaner, British, Coloured, Asian and Black groups in South Africa were held in which respondents discussed intercultural friendships. Groups were asked to suggest core characteristics for friendships, to describe instances in which they managed cultural differences, to describe rule violations which would necessitate the termination of the friendship, and to make recommendations for appropriate and satisfying friendship conduct to persons from different cultural groups. Afrikaner discourse about intercultural friendship centered upon themes of Pride in Cultural Identity and Decorum, British themes were Individualism and a Future Orientation the themes for Coloured respondents were Flexibility and Relationship Orientation, Asian themes were Responsibility for Actions and Openness, while Black themes were Honor, and Compassion. The core symbols were interpreted in the political and social context of transition in 1992. A positive relationship between level of sociocultural power in South Africa and the intensity and salience of the ethnic identity emerged in that groups with greater sociocultural power expressed the most negative ascriptions about members of other groups, as well as expressed preferences for their own group or individual norms for the intercultural friendship. While dialectic tensions in group and individual orientations were evident in the discourse of friends from all groups, group members with higher sociocultural power criticized Blacks as looking too much toward the past instead of the future.