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TOPIC: ISSUE208 - "The way people look, dress, and act reveals their attitudes and interests. You can tell much about a society's ideas and values by observing the appearance and behavior of its people."
WORDS: 582 TIME: 00:45:00 DATE: 2010-3-28 下午 03:08:14
As far as I concern, the speaker's assertion seems to oversimplify this issue. Admittedly, to some extent, the appearance and behavior of individuals in a society reflect personal taste and social values, but sometimes they do not. Some social values are so deep and hidden that can not be accurately embodied by the exterior looking of people. Therefore, we should analyze this issue more comprehensively.
Undoubtedly, in some aspects, most people choose their appearance and behave according to personal attitudes and interests, which sometimes reveal social ideas and values. We live in a society, therefore we are inevitably influenced by it. It is a potential and natural process. For instance, people in China will choose red clothes when celebrating festivals while people in Western countries will prefer white clothes. Similarly, when greeting with each other, Americans are more likely to hug with each other which shows their spirit of freedom and open mind. However, in the same case, English people are intended to behave in a gentle, respectful and courteous manner towards one another which shows their strong recognition of human dignity. It is true that some shallow aspects of the society can be told by the way people look, dress, and act. Hence, there's no denying that personal appearance and behavior not only reveals personal attitudes but also presents the society's ideas and values.
However, sometimes the outside appearance can not exactly indicate personal attitudes and values, let alone the social ones. As some people do not care about the external appearance or behavior, simply judge by the outside look may bring misunderstanding. If seeing an old man dressed raggedly, we probably consider him as a poor. You will never imagine he could be Einstein, the greatest physicist in the past century. Being emerged in science world, he always forgot to cut hair and shave off mustache, which made him look frowsy. In such cases, it is our eyes that betray us. To the social extent, modernization requires people to dress similarly due to the function of work, which is irrelevant with people's own interest. Also, along with world's globalization, people's aesthetics is sharing more and more similarities. Fashion has become a general pursuit. If clothes of certain style achieve high praise in a famous fashion show, they will gain popularity among the majorities sooner or later. Thus, nowadays, external appearance and behavior can not express the exact social ideas and values as before.
Actually, authentic social values lie in culture and history. Culture is defined as a set of distinctive material, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual features of a social group. The way people look, dress, and act is just a small part of culture. In other words, culture is concerned with almost every aspect of social life. Thus, through the study of culture, one can have a more comprehensive view of social ideas and values. Yet, to gain a deeper understanding, the study of history is indispensable. History reveals social humanity due to its continuity. Only by the study of the past can we find the origin of social values.
To sum up, the appearance and behaviors do reveal the ideas and values of a society to some extent. Nevertheless, the trend of globalization has diminished the effect of this approach. From a broader scope, the study of culture and history is essential to gain a deep and comprehensive understanding. Culture and history not only present the external appearance but also reveal the hidden ideas and impulses of a society.
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发表于 2010-3-28 18:24:58
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