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Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
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A Geography of Time summary
Robert N. Levine
On Tempo, Culture, And The Pace Of Life
24 mins
Brief summary
A Geography of Time by Robert N. Levine examines cultural perspectives on time perception and usage, revealing how different societies approach time management and punctuality, and influencing our understanding of behavior and efficiency across cultures.
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A Geography of Time
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Key idea 1 of 6
Every culture has its time
It may seem odd at first to think about culture in terms of time. But if you think about it, the pace of life is one of the most recognizable and defining characteristics of any cultural region. After all, it’s about more than just speed. It’s about rhythm, duration, and how in sync we are with the people around us. It’s the tempo of how we experience the world.
Tempo, which we usually think about in terms of music, is at the heart of it all. Just like a song played at different speeds will conjur completely different emotions, the same tasks and experiences feel vastly different depending on how quickly or slowly they unfold.
One person might rush through a novel in a day, while another will savor it for weeks. A tourist might zip through Europe, quickly bouncing from city to city, while a backpacker will mosey along for months trying to soak in every detail. Likewise, some cultures will prioritize work above all else. For others, it will rank below spending time with friends and family. Tempo is deeply personal – and differs from one person or culture to the next.
If you’ve done some traveling, you’ve probably run into a tempo clash. For instance, there are places where waiting seems to be a national pastime – waiting for buses, for meals, for meetings to start. An American used to a strict schedule might fume when a ticket counter in India closes right as they reach the window, while the locals will just shrug it off and settle in for a leisurely lunch.
In Brazil, a person in a hurry might get a kind but firm “Calma, calma” – a reminder that not everything is worth rushing. The author discovered this one firsthand. And after working in Brazil for a while, he became fascinated by these different cultural tempos. Eventually, he found a way of measuring and comparing the pace of life in different places around the world.
For starters, he found that the wealthier a place, the faster its tempo. While industrialized nations tend to be driven by a time-is-money mentality, there’s also the double-edge sword of technology. Whether it’s the vacuum cleaner or the personal computer, throughout history, technological innovations have been pitched to us as time-saving tools. But in actuality, they only increase the expectations for how much we can accomplish in an hour or in a day, making us feel more pressed for time than ever. Perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise that people in industrialized nations work more hours and have less free time than their counterparts in less developed societies.
It’s also not surprising that big cities tend to move faster than small towns, and that warmer places tend to have slower paces of life, while colder regions, like Switzerland and Germany, are some of the fastest-moving cultures in the world.
We’ll get into more about these results in the following sections. But first, let’s look at how our relationship to time changed forever with one relatively recent development.
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What is A Geography of Time about?
Geography of Time (1997) takes you on a fascinating journey across cultures, revealing how different societies perceive and experience time – whether it’s the fast-walking streets of New York or the laid-back rhythms of rural Brazil. It uncovers the hidden forces shaping our daily lives and may just change the way you think about time itself.
Who should read A Geography of Time?
- Cultural explorers
- Business professionals and travelers
- History and sociology buffs
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