Question

In your own words please answer these questions.

What is cultural humility? Why is it important? How can you practice cultural humility in your individualized organizations?

Answer 1

Cultural humility is having a respectful and humble attitude towards people belonging to other cultures or ethnicity that pushes professionals to challenge and evaluate their cultural biases. It is a realization that they cannot know everything about others and their cultures, and approach the learning of other cultures as a lifelong process and goal. It is the ability to maintain the other-person-oriented interpersonal stance.

Cultural humility is important as it increases the ability to see from another person’s perspective, understand his/her background, and to work together. This helps in creating a tightly-knit relationship and understanding one another. This helps to go a long way together with the other person and to know why an individual behaves differently from others.

Cultural humility can be practiced in individualized organizations in many ways. This can be practiced interpersonally as well as intrapersonally. Intrapersonal is engaging intentionally in self-critique as well as reflexivity to accept and recognize biases and assumptions. Interpersonal is active mindful listening to the answers of one’s genuine open-ended questions by the people they want to understand. There should be willingness and openness to listen, to collaborate, to negotiate, to understand, and to learn. Cultural humility can also be practiced by understanding clients’ cultural experiences and journeys and acknowledge one’s own cultural blindness in the process.