ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to argue why a culture represents a value system and how values are structured in our minds, relations, and society. First, the fundamental metaphysical form of culture is a set of values for the ontological equality of all cultures in intercultural interaction, which will be argued through reviewing Nietzsche’s (1872/1968) argument of the Dionysian and Apollonian worlds and his concept of a table of values. It is known that Nietzsche offers a philosophical foundation for deconstructing our metaphysical myths and ideological aspects of cultural frameworks. As Gemes (2001) explains, Nietzsche has been cited as a model of deconstruction, and his genealogical endeavours have been used as a paradigm of disclosing the origin in both sympathisers and critics of postmodernism (e.g., Habermas, Barthes, Lyotard, Foucault, & Derrida). In brief, Nietzsche argues that our perceptions are a table of values that is created through our Apollonian world, which obstructs the Dionysian demands, the flow of energy. This metaphysical interpretation indicates that a culture is composed of a set of values or a value system. For him, values are interconnected and form multiple cultural realities, yet the Apollonian separates us from our dynamic and creative engagement in value-interaction. In this sense, Nietzsche’s concept of a table of values can be extended to intercultural value networks by connecting the ontological complexity with multiple realities. Our ontological complexity is known as self-construal in cross-cultural psychology and intersubjectivity in philosophy. The concept of self-construal has been clinically tested through priming frameworks (e.g., independent self vs. interdependent self), whereas intersubjectivity has been argued for multiple realities (e.g., Popper’s three worlds of knowledge and Habermas’s theory of communicative action on the Lifeworld). Both will be also reviewed in this chapter.
