Individualism vs. Collectivism. Where is your culture?

I was thinking about where is my own culture according different descriptions and concepts of individualism or collectivism. Individualism or individual-oriented based on outcomes such as self-determination, self-reliance, and independent living. Each person has different responsibilities and goals and visions etc. Each person has a mision of growing, develop, and take care of her/himself. She or he can be free and responsible in different ways like thinking, knowledge, make decisions etc. “The individualistic view is that there are sharp boundaries between people, with each person being a complete unit. In other words, people are considered to be independent. They are generally also thought to have rights and responsibilities that are more or less the same. A person’s identity (i.e., the sense of self) in an individualistic society tends to be based mainly on one’s personal experiences—accomplishments, challenges, career, relationships with other people, etc.“

In constrast, collectivism is based on diffrent groups of the society. Collectivistic view is that people are not separate units, but rather are part and parcel of a larger group (i.e., extended family, village, or tribe). In other words, people are interdependent. A person’s identity in a collectivistic society tends to be based on one’s roles and experiences within the group context. There are positive and negative aspects between both. For example, the colectivism has developed extremist groups, in some groups is forbiden to express personal opinions, some leaders of the group make decisions for others without take into account their own feelings, age, desires, dreams and so on. But there are other positive aspects like they keep the rules, can be grateful, think about more better in function of family or members, they are good workers together, more respectful, commitmed and they can achieve faster the same goals .

I think in my role as an ESL teacher is important to know about these kind of cultural differences because I will need to plan different activities to help my students to work together, and being also independent at the same time keeping in mind the respect and the admiration to each other. For that reason I think it is better to be neutral and unbiased to avoid misunderstandings.