ARTICLE: Birthday Acculturation
DATE PUBLISHED: Sun. 28th May, 2017
AUTHOR: Com. Ademola Mayowa Joseph


Related & detailed explanation was made on:
- Birthday acculturation.
- Ways through which birthday acculturate


Everywhere around the world birthdays (it is the day on which a person was born, typically treated as an occasion for celebration and giving of gifts) helps to bring people together either by individual birthdays, religious celebration (Christmas), festivals, anniversary. it brings people together from different society, culture, ethnic groups, tribes, through presentation of gifts, family and friends, traditions and food.

Birthday is an important process of acculturation (acculturation refers to the processes that occur when different individuals of groups of people meet and exchange aspects of their culture) and it is a one way people can become acculturated. Due to advancement in birthday there has been a significant increase in the interactions among different cultures.


As a result, understanding acculturation, and learning how to accomplish it effectively, has become vital to the future of the world. Birthdays have helped people of diverse culture from varieties of ethnic groups to be able to have access to each other either through attitude, principle, social mores, values and in the process of continuous contact at birthdays people have exchanged foods, music, dances, clothing, tools and technologies which thereabout could cause social change among people of diverse ethnic groups.


For instance Christmas which is a Christian holiday celebrated on December 25th for the birth of Christ where many families and friends have a large dinner and exchange gifts, it can then be formulated that many families and friends of different ethnic groups has exchanged culture through dancing, foods, greetings, attitude and so on by so doing an ethnic group may admire an host culture thereby assimilating and adopting such culture which will cause social change.


In this process of acculturation through birthdays some people will adopt the host culture and abandoning their culture of origin, some will fail to adopt the host culture but preserving their culture of origin while some people will adopt to the host culture while preserving their culture of origin.


Acculturation as a strategy endorsed in a multi - cultural society, in which multiple cultures is accepted and appreciated, people who adopt host cultures at birthdays using it to preserve their culture are most liable to advance immensely because the adopted culture is used in comparing theirs and adjustment is made which is termed to be social change. Birthdays have played a very vital role in acculturation because it involves exchanging of diverse social activities (foods, music, dances, clothing, tools and technologies).


It also helps in improving interaction between diverse ethnic groups thereby reducing conflict and wars in a given society.