On this blog, we’ve had a lot of discussions about time. How is it measured? How has the technical measurement of time changed over the decades? We’ve discussed ancient, old, and new clocks. We’ve discussed time travel and time dilations. We’ve not discussed how we use time in a cultural sense.
Most of this post will be rooted in the work of the famous anthropologist Edward T. Hall. If you’d like to know more about the cultural salience and manipulation of time, you may want to check out his book “The Silent Language”. His groundbreaking work forever changed how we view the meaning behind the hands of the clock. Mr. Hall’s book was originally published in the late 50’s. Most of the information is still solidly accurate, but we’ll touch on some of the more recent cultural changes later in this post.
Edward T. Hall - Cool guy, scientist and author
The concept of how a society views time can be divided into three categories: formal, informal, and technical. The technical concept of time is limited to scientists and academics. These are the people who need to know if you’re talking about a solar year or a geological year before they can tell how much time comprises a year.
We’ll let them debate that because it makes our heads hurt. Formal time is the time we all know and take for granted. We look at a clock and if the hour hand is on the three and minute hand is on the six, then we consider the time to be 3:30 or “half past three”. That’s the formal concept of time. It’s easily quantified by checking a clock. Concepts like 12:00 being “noon” or “midnight” are also formal concepts of time. The “squishiness” of how we deal with time falls under the informal category. This is also where we most commonly use time. Phrase like “in a little while”, “after a while”, “in a bit”, or “shortly” vary from culture to culture and can vary within a culture. How much formal time is “shortly”? How many minutes, exactly, is “in a bit”?
On a micro-level, if a friend tells you that they will call you “shortly”, you need to know that friend to understand how soon you need to be ready for a phone call. On a macro-level, the informal concept and manipulation of time leads to two different types of societies: monochromic and polychromic.
Germany, the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Australia are prime examples of monochromic societies. Germany is considered staunchly monochromic. Latin American countries are famously polychromic. What does “monochromic” or “polychromic” mean? “Chronic” means “of or related to time” (in this sense). “Mono” means “one” while “poly” means “many”. A “monochromic” society operates on a unified sense of time while polychromic societies operate with many different senses of time.
This fundamental difference can cause huge problems for businesses that cross the “chronic cultural barrier”.
Are you a Monochromic kind of person?
Monochromic societies tend to be focused on time schedules and strictly keep to them. Meetings are planned in advance and agendas are set. If a meeting is set at 4:00, then the bulk of the participants will arrive between 3:45 and 3:55. A short “muttering apology” (as phrased by Mr. Hall) is expected from anyone arriving between 4:00 and 4:05. A longer apology is expected from people who arrive between 4:06 and 4:10. Ten to fifteen minutes after the scheduled start time is entering the “offending zone” of tardiness. Anything after fifteen minutes and the tardiness is considered an egregious offense. The scheduled completion time of the meeting is strictly adhered to and the meeting is only extended under extenuating circumstances.
Monochromic societies encourage people to focus on one task at a time. If the agenda for a meeting states that the future of a website will be discussed, then that topic must be discussed. If other things are discussed instead of the intended topic, then people get a bit discomfited. Meetings that end thirty or more minutes early can disturb some people while meetings that end five to ten minutes early are taken in stride.
Long term planning in monochromic societies are approximately five to ten years into the future. Recent discoveries about environmental hazards are slowly changing the concept of long term planning in some monochromic societies.
Or are you instead more of a Polychromic type?
In polychromic societies, being forty-five minutes late to a meeting is regarded as being five minutes late in a monochromic society. Meetings end when they’re ready to end. Shows and dances start when they’re ready to start. An agenda for a meeting may not be established at all. If there is an agenda, it’s loosely followed. Topics are discussed when they’re ready to be discussed or when they’re needed to be discussed. Polychromic societies are the masters of multi-tasking. Long term planning is very long term with timeframes varying from 20 years to thousands of years.
Multi-tasking is a recent development in some monochromic societies. It’s more of a business buzzword than true multi-tasking. In the USA we expect our employees to keep up on e-mail, phones calls, and write a TPS report (with cover sheet) all at the same time, but we force it into a monochromic schedule. It’s considered rude to text one person while having a face to face conversation with another, but it’s becoming culturally acceptable. It’s more like serial single-tasking than true multi-tasking. In polychromic societies, phone calls are accepted during meetings. E-mails are answered while listening to a supervisor. Texting is perfectly fine. Phoning someone at three in the morning doesn’t necessarily mean it’s an emergency.
Both monochromic and polychromic societies are perfectly functional and productive.
A culturally monochromic person views a culturally polychromic person as living in chaos and being rude while a culturally polychromic person views a culturally monochromic person as stand-offish, rigid, stressed out, and gunning for a heart-attack.
Are heart-attacks an aspect of how we view time?
We’re not going to risk it.
Our next blog post will be up when it’s ready. 