Community and its culture: How does community affect our upbringing?

When discussing community culture, it typically refers to culture located within select areas. Countries, continents, even entire regions have dedicated cultures that are used as umbrella terms to cover the nuance that lies beneath.

Te Kuiti is a small, rural town located in the King Country region of New Zealand, and it is the home of over 4,500 people of multiple cultural backgrounds, including Mori, New Zealand-European, Asian, American, African and Australian. Tremaine Hughes is a young adult and mixed race Māori and Pakeha who has lived the entirety of his life in Te Kuiti. He was interviewed to discuss his connection to Te Kuiti and what the culture there is like compared to other areas of New Zealand.

Tremaine is a polite, reserved person, often looking to avoid any abrasive answers if possible, though for this interview he was asked before-hand to be straight-forward with his views, as they are essential in supporting the philosophy behind this article. When asked how he views Te Kuiti in comparison to other towns, Tremaine answered that he found Te Kuiti to be “…very rural, but we still have quite a bit of people passing through.” The ‘people’ he mentions referring to travelers from other towns and tourists.

Tremaine was then asked if he feels that the more isolated culture of Te Kuiti has affected him growing up, his response was “Not too much, considering most of that town is [blood-related] family, so I just walk around without any worries or anything.” Tremaine then clarified that because he grew up with so much family near him, he never felt pressured into conforming into the culture of the town, be it sub-consciously or otherwise. When being raised into a culture, one often adapts themselves to fit seamlessly into it in order to fit in better, so this was an interesting response, though Tremaine went on to say that he would most-likely fall into that trap if he were raised in an area with less family.

Cultural indoctrination sounds malicious, but it is human nature. Being born and raised into a town often leads one to have ideologies/moral beliefs that are based on that of the culture in the town/community they were raised in. Te Kuiti is far from flashy, but its sense of community is admirable, with the people all knowing one another, and a real sense of ease spread, thanks to that connected atmosphere.