Shame Cultures, Fear Cultures, and Guilt Cultures: Reviewing the Evidence

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

Eugene Nida’s distinction between “shame cultures,” “fear cultures,” and “guilt cultures” has become a foundational assumption of the “global Gospel” / “honor-shame” streams of missiology. It is periodically necessary to test such assumptions, particularly in the light of later developments within the disciplines of anthropology and sociology and the availability of empirical evidence. I argue here that the shame/guilt division is not clearly demarcated and that subsequent critique has cast doubt on its validity as a categorical concept. Missiology operating under its assumptions needs to reflect both the conceptual complexity and the limited empirical evidence for such a distinction.