Issue date: 2/5/09 Section: Opinion

Wednesday's article, "Reverse Culture Shock," was enlightening, but not in terms of the topic. In elaborating upon College Station's lack of "substantial cultural education," the author provides only one example germane to College Station ­- the attire and speech of Northgate attendees. What the author, like many in the media, fails to accept is that this style of dress with its corresponding "twanged English" is itself generated from a valid and distinct culture. Certainly, members of this group can lack cultural education, but the author commits the same offense by utilizing dress and dialect, outward cultural expressions, to bolster the last sanctioned cultural stereotype - that of the hillbilly, the yokel, the intolerant redneck. How dare they mingle in public in their rustic, rural, backwards attire? Surely these must be the uncultured masses. This brand of cultural education would be accepting of the Bengalese lungi or the Muslim burqa while ridiculing the local lack of "haute couture." While I'm certain there are times in which the community is less than culturally aware, those instances should be addressed instead of upholding what, in terms of the article's title, can be best surmised as a "reverse" cultural pigeonholing.

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