Due to the flexible attitudes of Turkish individuals and their tendencies to engage in multiple activities at once, Turkish societies tend to be polychronic. Turkish societies generally are more lenient with deadlines and punctuality, putting less of an emphasis on a orderliness. For example, Turkish schools are much less strict when it comes to attending class or turning in assignments. While it is expected that students make an effort to come to class, coming in late or missing a few classes is much more understood in Turkish culture. This polychronic sense of time can also be seen in transportation in Turkey. Bus, train, and ferry schedules tend to give more of an estimate in regards to the time that they are expected to arrive at and depart from the station. In this way, none of the scheduled stops are provided specific times of arrival or departure but rather passengers are only told the times of the first and final stops. This tendency creates a much more laid back, go with the flow kind of culture where people are less structured and living more in the present moment.
I assume the attitude about time in the culture of Korea is Monochronic. It means where things are typically done one at a time, where time is segmented into precise, small units, and where time is scheduled, arranged and managed. Considering its influence under Chinese and Chinese culture, it is natural to think that Korea's attitude to time is monochironic.According to online resources, in Korea's culture, time is viewed as a tangible commodity than can be spent, saved or wasted, and a paramount value is placed on regimented schedules, tasks and “getting the job done”. This perception of time is probably rooted in the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th Century, and the archetypal examples are the United States, Germany and Japan etc.
According to the Korea Herald, "Korean time" is known to have a laid-back, relaxed attitude with a tendency for tardiness in appointment times. It is often considered normal for people to be a few minutes late without giving prior notice, even stretching to an hour or more. A common saying is for Koreans to tell each other, "you can come late too", and often times when friends arrange no one arrives at the same exact moment. Because of this tendency for tardiness, it is common for people to set a meeting time an hour than actually desired. For example, a dinner is scheduled at 6 PM when the true desired time is 7 PM. This laid back attitude does indeed reflect in the language since Koreans tend to ask "what time, roughly?" instead of asking for a specific time. Though it is unsure how Koreans adapted this sort of attitude, it is hypothesized that "Korean time" follows the system used by our ancestors, in which one day is divided into a certain number of units, with each unit spanning a certain number of hours. Korean time is divided into 12 units, with each unit then being divided into eight parts consisting of 15 minute increments.
Modern Korean society has a different perception of time from the traditional Korean society. The present-day Westernized Korean society shows a similar pattern of awareness of time as many institutions that are operating in Korea at present are adopted from the Western example with its strict time schedule. Schools, companies, factories, hotels, and stores have their own time schedule for everyone concerned to follow in order to operate smoothly. Thus, punctuality or diligence that is required to be punctual is regarded as the basic condition to be accepted as a respectful member in the particular community.
On the other hand, in the traditional Korean society with no such modern institutions, there was no concept like punctuality and diligence was considered a virtue mainly for women or servants who have to do manual work. The phenomenon of urgent demand for immediate gratification of one's wants or needs widespread in Korean society is to be interpreted as a combination of the newly introduced Western idea of punctuality and the impatience.
Like most of Asian countries, the Korean attitudes about time can be defined as cyclical time which consists of repeating ages. It is related to Korean culture and belief. For cyclical time, people always view time as circular and repetitive. Therefore, sometimes people believe the things they experienced before would happen again to himself/herself or to their relative since time is circular. Also, with the belief of cyclical time, people make decisions and complete tasks over a long period of contemplation and reflection. They are cautious and earnest that want to complete the tasks as good as possible even during a long period. As a result, people would focus on the long term in tasks and relationships in most cases. Another common point for cyclical time is that people will see connections and interrelatedness in people and events. They believe that life controls time. It is also interesting that they will pay a lot of attention on the past, their history.
Attitudes to time may differ between different cultures in often quite significant ways. While in Korean cultures, there is an emotional need for rules time is money, people have an inner urge to be busy and work hard, precision and punctuality are the norm. For example, being late for an appointment, or taking a long time to get down to business, is not accepted. In Korea, “on time” refers to expected delays of less than one minute, while in many other countries, up to fifteen minutes leeway is still considered “on-time”.In any case, attitudes towards time vary a great deal person to person, and cultural differences with regards to time serve mainly as a touch point of consideration when dealing with business clients and families.
I have befriends many Pakistani's over my time at University of Richmond. From my personal experience, it seems that their conception of time is very loose. There were many times when I had appointed a time to meet with them but they would arrive very late. I am not sure if this is a cultural thing or a personal thing but at least from my experience, I have come to see that my Pakistani friends don't put too much thought into timely arrivals. I don't know if this is reflected in the language; I wasn't able to figure out if it is.
I think Korea has a monochronic behavior and viewpoints about time. Punctuality is important in South Korea and being on time is enforced at an early age. When I attended elementary school in Korea, the school bell would ring five minutes before classes began, and everyone would hurry to class. Many teachers would punish students if they were late to class. Some schools closed and locked the front entrance gates as soon as the bell rang for first period. Punctuality is an important concept in Korean society, especially in terms of customer service. For example, food delivery service is free and extremely fast in Korea, and many restaurants are open 24/7 or until 2-3am. If delivery takes longer than expected, many restaurants offer a discount, free meal, or an additional service of some sort.
I would consider Korea to have a mostly monochronic culture, because punctuality is highly valued. Especially in formal business settings, it is considered highly rude to appear late. This is contrary to polychronic cultures, where punctuality is not as valued, and timekeeping is not as stringent. Considering Korean culture takes social distinctions very seriously, it is an even bigger social blunder to be late for a meeting with someone of a more distinguished social status (AKA a boss or elder).
With that being said, Koreans tend to exhibit polychronic behavior when surrounded by friends or family. They are less likely than Americans to sit and enjoy a meal after the check has been handed out, which is generally seen as polychronic behavior. This points to the fact that Koreans, like most cultures, do not easily fall into the monochronic/polychronic distinction, because the importance of punctuality is highly dependent on the context of the situation.
In researching "Israeli viewpoints about time" on Google, the top responses were all geared toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in one way or another. So, I went back to the drawing board and refined my criteria. According to the EuroAfricaCentral network, Israelis fall on the monochronic side of the spectrum. This means that they place an importance on punctuality, like to fixate themselves on one task at a time, and have a predilection to divide their socio-emotional time. In short, their understanding of time is linear, one event at a time. While I agree with the latter, Israeli culture in my understanding from living there are the antitheses of monochronistic. I am actually very surprised that the Israeli culture could be categorized as such along the lines with the U.S. and especially Germany. As a warning, my understanding of the "Israeli" is narrow as a polychronic label could not be affixed to many sections of its society. However, in general, Israelis are know to have their own time, "Israeli time," that does not have an understood time interval within its definition. For example, Country x's "own time" may be 20-25 minutes after a given time, however, this does not apply to Israeli time. Moreover, Israel, for its survival, could not just be fixated on one issue at a time. Israelis are known for their creativity and this entails a curious mindset not preoccupied with a single circumstance, but many. In fact, Israel integrates many disparate sectors of their workforce in order to become more efficient work culture and produce a better product. Lastly, while Israeli's place a high premium on their leisure time, they don't necessarily delegate and divide their time between work and pleasure. In fact, at one job in which I worked, work and pleasure was a fantastic blend, and this was for a ministry in a government. Nevertheless, this workforce produced a great product and was very efficient.
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Due to the flexible attitudes of Turkish individuals and their tendencies to engage in multiple activities at once, Turkish societies tend to be polychronic. Turkish societies generally are more lenient with deadlines and punctuality, putting less of an emphasis on a orderliness. For example, Turkish schools are much less strict when it comes to attending class or turning in assignments. While it is expected that students make an effort to come to class, coming in late or missing a few classes is much more understood in Turkish culture. This polychronic sense of time can also be seen in transportation in Turkey. Bus, train, and ferry schedules tend to give more of an estimate in regards to the time that they are expected to arrive at and depart from the station. In this way, none of the scheduled stops are provided specific times of arrival or departure but rather passengers are only told the times of the first and final stops. This tendency creates a much more laid back, go with the flow kind of culture where people are less structured and living more in the present moment.
I assume the attitude about time in the culture of Korea is Monochronic. It means where things are typically done one at a time, where time is segmented into precise, small units, and where time is scheduled, arranged and managed. Considering its influence under Chinese and Chinese culture, it is natural to think that Korea's attitude to time is monochironic.According to online resources, in Korea's culture, time is viewed as a tangible commodity than can be spent, saved or wasted, and a paramount value is placed on regimented schedules, tasks and “getting the job done”. This perception of time is probably rooted in the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and 19th Century, and the archetypal examples are the United States, Germany and Japan etc.
According to the Korea Herald, "Korean time" is known to have a laid-back, relaxed attitude with a tendency for tardiness in appointment times. It is often considered normal for people to be a few minutes late without giving prior notice, even stretching to an hour or more. A common saying is for Koreans to tell each other, "you can come late too", and often times when friends arrange no one arrives at the same exact moment. Because of this tendency for tardiness, it is common for people to set a meeting time an hour than actually desired. For example, a dinner is scheduled at 6 PM when the true desired time is 7 PM. This laid back attitude does indeed reflect in the language since Koreans tend to ask "what time, roughly?" instead of asking for a specific time. Though it is unsure how Koreans adapted this sort of attitude, it is hypothesized that "Korean time" follows the system used by our ancestors, in which one day is divided into a certain number of units, with each unit spanning a certain number of hours. Korean time is divided into 12 units, with each unit then being divided into eight parts consisting of 15 minute increments.
Modern Korean society has a different perception of time from the traditional Korean society. The present-day Westernized Korean society shows a similar pattern of awareness of time as many institutions that are operating in Korea at present are adopted from the Western example with its strict time schedule. Schools, companies, factories, hotels, and stores have their own time schedule for everyone concerned to follow in order to operate smoothly. Thus, punctuality or diligence that is required to be punctual is regarded as the basic condition to be accepted as a respectful member in the particular community.
On the other hand, in the traditional Korean society with no such modern institutions, there was no concept like punctuality and diligence was considered a virtue mainly for women or servants who have to do manual work. The phenomenon of urgent demand for immediate gratification of one's wants or needs widespread in Korean society is to be interpreted as a combination of the newly introduced Western idea of punctuality and the impatience.
Like most of Asian countries, the Korean attitudes about time can be defined as cyclical time which consists of repeating ages. It is related to Korean culture and belief. For cyclical time, people always view time as circular and repetitive. Therefore, sometimes people believe the things they experienced before would happen again to himself/herself or to their relative since time is circular. Also, with the belief of cyclical time, people make decisions and complete tasks over a long period of contemplation and reflection. They are cautious and earnest that want to complete the tasks as good as possible even during a long period. As a result, people would focus on the long term in tasks and relationships in most cases. Another common point for cyclical time is that people will see connections and interrelatedness in people and events. They believe that life controls time. It is also interesting that they will pay a lot of attention on the past, their history.
Attitudes to time may differ between different cultures in often quite significant ways. While in Korean cultures, there is an emotional need for rules time is money, people have an inner urge to be busy and work hard, precision and punctuality are the norm. For example, being late for an appointment, or taking a long time to get down to business, is not accepted. In Korea, “on time” refers to expected delays of less than one minute, while in many other countries, up to fifteen minutes leeway is still considered “on-time”.In any case, attitudes towards time vary a great deal person to person, and cultural differences with regards to time serve mainly as a touch point of consideration when dealing with business clients and families.
I have befriends many Pakistani's over my time at University of Richmond. From my personal experience, it seems that their conception of time is very loose. There were many times when I had appointed a time to meet with them but they would arrive very late. I am not sure if this is a cultural thing or a personal thing but at least from my experience, I have come to see that my Pakistani friends don't put too much thought into timely arrivals. I don't know if this is reflected in the language; I wasn't able to figure out if it is.
I think Korea has a monochronic behavior and viewpoints about time. Punctuality is important in South Korea and being on time is enforced at an early age. When I attended elementary school in Korea, the school bell would ring five minutes before classes began, and everyone would hurry to class. Many teachers would punish students if they were late to class. Some schools closed and locked the front entrance gates as soon as the bell rang for first period. Punctuality is an important concept in Korean society, especially in terms of customer service. For example, food delivery service is free and extremely fast in Korea, and many restaurants are open 24/7 or until 2-3am. If delivery takes longer than expected, many restaurants offer a discount, free meal, or an additional service of some sort.
I would consider Korea to have a mostly monochronic culture, because punctuality is highly valued. Especially in formal business settings, it is considered highly rude to appear late. This is contrary to polychronic cultures, where punctuality is not as valued, and timekeeping is not as stringent. Considering Korean culture takes social distinctions very seriously, it is an even bigger social blunder to be late for a meeting with someone of a more distinguished social status (AKA a boss or elder).
With that being said, Koreans tend to exhibit polychronic behavior when surrounded by friends or family. They are less likely than Americans to sit and enjoy a meal after the check has been handed out, which is generally seen as polychronic behavior. This points to the fact that Koreans, like most cultures, do not easily fall into the monochronic/polychronic distinction, because the importance of punctuality is highly dependent on the context of the situation.
In researching "Israeli viewpoints about time" on Google, the top responses were all geared toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in one way or another. So, I went back to the drawing board and refined my criteria. According to the EuroAfricaCentral network, Israelis fall on the monochronic side of the spectrum. This means that they place an importance on punctuality, like to fixate themselves on one task at a time, and have a predilection to divide their socio-emotional time. In short, their understanding of time is linear, one event at a time. While I agree with the latter, Israeli culture in my understanding from living there are the antitheses of monochronistic. I am actually very surprised that the Israeli culture could be categorized as such along the lines with the U.S. and especially Germany. As a warning, my understanding of the "Israeli" is narrow as a polychronic label could not be affixed to many sections of its society. However, in general, Israelis are know to have their own time, "Israeli time," that does not have an understood time interval within its definition. For example, Country x's "own time" may be 20-25 minutes after a given time, however, this does not apply to Israeli time. Moreover, Israel, for its survival, could not just be fixated on one issue at a time. Israelis are known for their creativity and this entails a curious mindset not preoccupied with a single circumstance, but many. In fact, Israel integrates many disparate sectors of their workforce in order to become more efficient work culture and produce a better product. Lastly, while Israeli's place a high premium on their leisure time, they don't necessarily delegate and divide their time between work and pleasure. In fact, at one job in which I worked, work and pleasure was a fantastic blend, and this was for a ministry in a government. Nevertheless, this workforce produced a great product and was very efficient.