General Instructions:

Cultural Applications assignment, runs weeks 4 and 5-NO separate week 4 conference. Samples available under content>week 4. Rubrics from the syllabus are also reiterated under content>syllabus. Note that the samples are not perfect, and are meant to give a general idea of what a completed assignment might look like.

OPTION 1-CHANGE THE WORLD

You receive a letter in the mail. The letter is from the American Psychological Association(APA), and it grants you unlimited funds to visit any country in the world you want, and set up a project there. It could be educational, health related(including awareness, etc).

 Examples of previous projects by students have included such varied projects as a teen prevention program in two states, a midday meal program for schoolchildren in Africa, a counseling center for victims of a natural disaster in Asia, and more. Next, write up your project and post directly into this conference.

So please choose a country and a project. You may refer to the sample as an illustration of what is expected. The sample is not perfect, but meant to give an idea of what the project can look like.

Put the title in the main conference(Universal mental health support by 2020 in Country A, Model schools in the desert, No more homelessness for children in Country B, etc)

Instructions

Structure the project with the following sections:

1. Title: This should be short and to the point: identify the target population, the focus of the project, and the country/region. 
2. Background of the project: This should be one paragraph. 
3. Purpose of the project: This is the point of the study—why you are doing it (one paragraph). 
4. Method: Here, you will describe the participants, the instruments/measurement methods/resources used, and the process: in other words, the target population, methods, and procedure (one paragraph each for participants, instruments/resources, and process).
5. Outcome and rationale: What do you hope to achieve in this project, and how, specifically, will the project make a difference in the living conditions of your target population? Take into account the socio-cultural context (one to two paragraphs).

 Please note that this has to do with improving the lot of people with the focus on the psychology of human beings(so for eg. saving animals, though a good cause, does not necessarily mean what we are looking for here, and we are not in political science class, we are psychological scientists choosing to improve the state of the world’s well-being) from any part of the globe. Also, the country you choose needs to be described in respectful terms-so although there are problems that need to be solved, this is not a reason to blame people, or berate cultures different or unfamiliar to our usual socio-cultural conditions. Some ideas of what psychologists are doing in different parts of the world are also provided(via a clickable link on humanitarian heroes from the APA) under Content>Dr H supplement>change the world(which also has the sample assignment).

At last, add at least two references in APA style.

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OPTION 2-UNITY AND DIVERSITY

In this exercise, we will explore our lives as members of ourselves in a cultural context. This is a change from the standard universal vs. specific(compartmentalized) and ‘evolutionary vs. situation specific’ outlooks of previous decades in the field. The newer trend is to try to look at individuals as shaped by the immediate cultural surroundings(localized) and ALSO as influenced by the larger circle of culture(global and unified). In this outlook, the two trends can be seen to co-exist, instead of being pitted against each other, allowing for a more rounded view of cultural influence.

ASSIGNMENT: 

This assignment has two parts, each related to the global and local theoretical aspects of culture, also known here as the 

diversity and unity aspects. Part 1 below(local) is to be answered in this conference section. A second part is open for the global/universal aspects below as well. Please try to put both into one conference post, and give it a catchy title for fun, with a hint of the diversity and unity angles(Irish brew and Firecrackers, Hawaiian Hula and High school graduation, etc). 

Part 1: Local theories: Diversity: post below:

1 a. Share with the class(compulsory): Family/particular heritage and customs that you share with a small group/other person (particular festivals, anniversaries, special event, etc): This points out the uniqueness of your socio-cultural identity and we will call it the sharing of diversity, the local effects of culture.

1. b(optional/not graded, but you can share if you feel inclined). Share with the class something about your family history, or even ancestry, if you wanted to follow the links and do some genealogy research of your own(up to you, I am just giving you the option). Share something about about the cultures that you descended from, that  your parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles told you about.

Part 2: Global aspects of cultural influence: 

In this section, we look at ourselves in the global aspect, what are the more universal aspects of culture that have influenced us. Here, for example, you can share customs/celebrations that are also shared with the majority of persons from your culture(July 4 for e.g. in the USA; high school graduation, etc). This refers to the other part of your identity in terms of the underyling commonalities of major cultures: the global aspect of culture.