Cultural Competency vs. Cultural Humility: Understanding Key Concepts in Diversity and Inclusion
In the evolving landscape of diversity and inclusion, two pivotal concepts often arise: cultural competency and cultural humility. Both are crucial in fostering effective and respectful interactions among diverse populations, but they differ in their approach and emphasis. Understanding these differences is key for professionals, educators, healthcare providers, and anyone interested in effectively navigating multicultural environments.
What is Cultural Competency?
Cultural competency refers to the ability of individuals and organizations to effectively deliver services that meet the social, cultural, and linguistic needs of their clients. It involves a set of behaviors, attitudes, and policies that come together to enable professionals to work effectively in cross-cultural situations. Cultural competency emphasizes gaining specific knowledge, skills, and experiences that facilitate understanding across cultural divides.
Key aspects include:
Knowledge: Learning about different cultural practices and worldviews.
Skills: Developing cross-cultural skills, often through formal education and training programs.
Awareness: Recognizing one's own cultural worldview and the impact it has on one's perceptions and interactions.
What is Cultural Humility?
Cultural humility is a lifelong process of self-reflection and self-critique whereby individuals not only learn about another’s culture but also examine their own beliefs and cultural identities. This concept emerged from the healthcare field and focuses on maintaining a flexible and humble attitude that acknowledges the limitations of one’s cultural knowledge. Unlike cultural competency, which often treats cultural understanding as a finite goal, cultural humility understands that cultures are complex and ever-evolving, and that understanding requires continuous personal and interpersonal development.
Key aspects include:
Lifelong Learning: Committing to ongoing self-evaluation and self-critique regarding cultural understanding.
Power Imbalances: Addressing imbalances in personal and professional interactions.
Partnership: Building and maintaining respectful and dynamic partnerships with diverse individuals and communities.
Comparing the Two
Foundation: Cultural competency is often seen as a foundational requirement—a checklist of skills and knowledge to acquire. Cultural humility, on the other hand, is about developing a personal and professional ethos that appreciates the complexities of cultural identity, including one's own.
Approach: Cultural competency often approaches culture from a static perspective, implying that one can become competent after reaching a certain level of understanding. Cultural humility rejects the notion that one can ever be fully competent in another’s culture, advocating instead for an ongoing process of learning and engagement.
Focus: The focus of cultural competency is on mastering a specific set of skills that can be applied in various cultural contexts, whereas cultural humility focuses more on the relationship and dynamics between individuals of different backgrounds, emphasizing respect and lack of superiority in these relationships.
Conclusion
While both cultural competency and cultural humility are essential in today's globalized world, they serve different purposes. Cultural competency is about acquiring specific cultural knowledge and skills that can be applied in diverse contexts, making it particularly useful in settings that require immediate and effective cross-cultural communication. Cultural humility, by contrast, focuses on the development of a personal disposition and long-term commitment to understanding oneself and others in depth.
In practice, the most effective approach may involve integrating both concepts—leveraging the actionable skills of cultural competency while embracing the reflective, lifelong learning approach of cultural humility. This combination can lead to deeper understanding and more meaningful interactions across cultural lines.
