Wallace felt that each of us had such a mazeway in our head.
Wallace's idea was that the mazeway includes the goals we're trying to
achieve, as well as the plans and processes and techniques for
achieving those goals.
If you think back about our earlier definition of culture,
you'll remember that includes goals and values.
In so far as we acquire those goals and
values through social learning from others.
It also includes ways of behaving and speaking.
These are the analogues to the plans, processes, and
techniques in Wallace's mazeways.
Wallace was interested in extreme cases of mazeway disintegration, as for
example after natural disasters, but also dramatic cross-cultural encounters.
Many Native Americans, for example,
experienced mazeway disintegration when Europeans colonized the new world.
They experienced new and strange ways of life.
New preconceived routines.
Different ways of reasoning about the world.
Situations like the one experienced by the recently hired Global Farm
sales personnel are small scale examples of this kind of disintegration.
I myself never experienced this kind of deep culture shock that causes significant
depression.
However, I do recall my sense of shock as I became more deeply involved in Brazilian
culture.
I remember that many of my middle class Brazilian friends, when they were driving
on city streets, would see a pedestrian crossing in front of them.
And for me, shockingly, say in an aggressive tone of voice,
that guy wants to die, as they accelerated towards the pedestrian.
I experienced the game myself many times as a pedestrian.
And it invariably angered and upset me, as well as being frightening.
In particularly memorable incident, I was in Rio crossing the Avenida Beira Mar,
which has several lanes going in one direction.
There was only one car on the road at the time, fairly far away and
in the lane closest to me.
I knew that I would be well across the road before the car arrived.