communication & culture跨文化交际

Culture &
Communication
I Elements of Culture
1. Products: literature, folklore, art, music & artifacts
2. Ideas: beliefs, values & institutions
3. Behaviors: customs, habits, dress, food & leisure Culture decides:
--how people get married (their customs)
--what people teach their
children about right and wrong (their values)
--what people think is beautiful (their beliefs)
--how people look at each other when they are talking (their nonverbal communication)
--what people study in school (their institutions)
…
II Characteristics of Culture
1. Culture is learned, not
hereditary.
The needs that we are born with are basic needs such as food, clothing and shelter. Humans need food. But what to eat, when, where and how to eat is learned. That’s why. We use chopsticks while Westerns prefer knife and fork, and why we like rice while Americans prefer bread. Sneezing is physiological, but after the other person
sneezes, a Guangdong person says jixing, while an English native says “God bless you”. When we cough in public places, we Chinese tend to ignore it, but an American usually says “Excuse me”immediately after one does so.
We learn our culture in many ways and from a variety of sources, either consciously or unconsciously. One way is
by means of proverbs that, communicated in colorful and vivid language, offer an important set of instructions for members to follow. For example, the English proverb “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” encourages people to “speak up and make sure their views are heard.
2. Culture is transmitted from generation to generation.
Without the advantage of knowledge from those who lived before us, we would not have culture. A culture is but one link in the whole chain of generations, some of which have become history and some of which are yet to come.
3. Culture is dynamic.
Cultures, once formed, are stable, but are at the same time changing with the development of human
society. The Chinese culture has experienced great changes in its long history, especially since the May 4th Movement in 1919. For example, handshaking that was not practiced before is popular now, yet in some remote rural areas, elderly farmers still don’t shake hands. Today changes in China are even more frequent than ever before. And contact, by its very
nature, brings change. Cultures also change through several mechanisms: innovation, diffusion, and acculturation being the most common.
Innovation is usually defined as the discovery of new practices tools, or concepts that many members of the culture accept and that may produce slight changes in social habits and behaviors. (TV,
the computer, the internet, environmental awareness, women’s rights movement, the compass, the printing technique, gunpowder, the cutting of men’s pigtails after the Qing Dynasty was overthrown.)
Diffusion is the borrowing by one culture from another. Historically, diffusion has been part of cultural contact for as long as cultures have existed.
Examples are tobacco from S. America to many other countries, Buddhism from India to China, McDonald’s hamburgers now being sold all over the world, jeans popular in the world, western suits in many other countries, Qigong getting known in the west…
Acculturation usually is in response to extended and intensive first-hand contact between two or
more previously autonomous cultures or co-cultures. This type of change is common to international immigrants, who for a variety of reasons find themselves in another culture.
One point has to be made: although many aspects of culture are subject to change, the deep structure of a culture resists major alternations. That is,
changes in dress, food, transportation, housing and the like are likely to occur very quickly. However, values associated with such things as ethics and morals, work and leisure, definitions of freedom, the importance of the past, religious practices, the pace of life, and attitudes toward gender and age are so deeply embedded in a culture that they persist generation after
generation.
4. Most of culture is hidden, like the part of the iceberg under water.
It’s difficult to study culture because most what we call culture is below the surface and cannot be seen. That’s to say most of culture exists in the subconscious mind of people, who therefore aren’t aware of the fact that their actions are governed by their own
culture, or cultural rules. 5. Values are the core of culture, and cultures are mainly differentiated from others by way of different values people hold. Many of these differences can be seen from what people do. For example, western people celebrate Christmas; people in East Asia celebrated Spring Festival. Some people speak Spanish, but others speak English.
Some people talk to God, but others have God talk to them. And still others say there is no God. Some people paint and decorate their entire bodies, but others spend millions of dollars painting and decorating only their faces. People like to hear compliments and praises, but people from different cultures respond differently to the same compliments
and praises.
III Characteristics of Values
1. As part of culture, values are learned from people around: family, school, mass media, and so on. Once learned, they tend to be stable. And they govern people’s beliefs, attitudes, ideas and actions.
2. Values are hidden. We do not see them as they exist in our subconscious. We are
not always aware of them, but we make judgments according to them.
3. Each of us has a unique set of individual values, but there also are values that tend to permeate a culture. They are called cultural values. What we are concerned here are cultural values shared by most members of a community. The point we have to keep in mind is that the value of
the culture may not be the value of all individuals within the culture. In other words, there are exceptions to the culture values when we come to individuals within a culture.
4. Values can be compared on continuum rather than one of only two possible choices. People everywhere posses the same value to different degrees. Every culture teaches their young
to be civil, yet the importance of that common value, and how it gets acted out, is matter of degree.
5. Values are interrelated. They don’t work alone. For example, the value toward family usually leads to those toward age, status, etc.
6. Values of a culture change just as cultures do. They change, of course, much more slowly than do the way people dress, the
artifacts people make, and other parts of a culture that are easily seen. The “women’s movement”, for example, has greatly altered the value system in the US. There are also changes seen in our country.
IV Case study
Case study 1
During the American Civil War, a very hungry young man fell down in front of a farm gate. The farmer gave
him food but in return he asked the young man move a pile of wood in his yard—in fact it was not at all necessary to move the wood. When the young man left, the farmer moved the wood back to its original place. Seeing all this, the farmer’s son was confused. Questions:
Why did the farmer do that? And what values are reflected in this story?
Explanations:
The farmer explained to his son that one could never at any time in any way make other people feel inferior, even unintentionally and out of goodwill. What accounts for the farmer’s behavior is that he believed in individualism, independence, self-reliance, self-esteem, and egalitarianism, the major values in the USA.
_______________________ _______________________ _______________________ Individualism is used by anthropologists to designate one of the basic orientations of some cultures. The American culture is often referred to as an individualistic culture where individuals subordinate the goals of collectives to their personal goals. A key belief of people in individualistic
cultures is that the smallest unit of survival is the individual. Individualism applies to, besides American culture, other cultures, particularly those of E urope, North A merica, Australia, and New Zealand. Individualism was first used by the
Individualism was first used by the French historian and politician Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859).
According to Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary individualism is “a theory maintaining the political and economic independence of the individual and stressing individual initiative, action and interests; also: conduct or practice guided by such a theory.”The pursuit of individual rights and interests is considered utterly legitimate. Self-actualization and the
maximal realization of individual potential are supreme aims in life. Two quotations may bear out this individualism. One is “There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women.”(Quoted by Zhao Biao, 2001). The other is “You are selfish and I am selfish, but you don’t stand in my way and I don’t stand in your way. We are both selfish and we are both
happy”(one American professor). (Quoted by Zhao Biao, 2001).
Of all the American values, individualism is probably the most basic.So so me people refer to the American culture as “I”culture, as individuals are emphasized. Many American prefer to use the word “freedom”to mean what scholars call individualism. By freedom, they mean the desire and
ability of all individuals to control their own destiny without interference from the government, a ruling noble class, the church or any other organized authority. So Americans are expected to take initiative in advancing their personal interests and well-being and to be direct and assertive in interacting with others (Hu & Grove, 1991). There is, however, a price to be paid
for the individual freedom: self-reliance. Americans believe that individualism must learn to rely on themselves or risk losing freedom. This means achieving both financial and emotional independence from their parents as early as possible, usually by age 18 or 21. It means that Americans believe that they should take care of themselves, solve their own
problems and “stand on their own feet”.
The other major type of culture is often called a collectivism culture where individuals subordinate their personal goals to the goals of some collectives. A key brief of people in collectivist cultures is that the smallest unit of survival is the collective. In many situations people in collectivist cultures have
internalized the norms of their collectives so completely that there are no such things as a distinction between group goals and personal goals. Cultures that fall into the category of collectivism include to a greater or lesser extent those in Asia, Africa, South America, and the Pacific islands.
Chinese culture is believed to be collectivism-oriented
where the basic unit of the society in the family (collective), not the individual. So it is sometimes referred as a collective “we” culture. Parents are highly protective of their children. Even grown children depend on their parents’financial support until they find employment; they live in their parents’household until they are married, if not
longer. Filial piety is one of the principal virtues counseled by Confucius: this virtue is not an abstraction but one that continues to be played out on a daily basis as children—including adult children—demonstrate again and again that they are obedient to their parents and solicitous of their welfare. Therefore, support from family members and other
relatives is very important for individuals, whether parents or children.
In order to get necessary support, it’s very important to get along with other people. Therefore, harmony is highly valued, and open conflicts are to be avoided.???Competition is never encouraged.???
But as society is developing and things are changing, there have already been
changes in the values and beliefs. However, changes in this area are not likely to occur very quickly.
_______________________ _______________________ _______________________ Case study 2
(1) Read the quotation from Abraham Lincoln and discuss in small groups what value he expressed. We…wish to allow the humblest man an equal
chance to get rich with everyone else. When one starts poor, as most do in the race of life, free society is such that he knows he can better his condition; he knows that there is no fixed condition of labor for his whole life.
(2)If a poor man were to get rich as Lincoln said, what would he do to succeed? Discuss the answer in pairs.
(3)Placing a high value on
material possessions is called “materialism”. Although many people find this word offensive, acquiring and maintaining a large number of material possessions is of very great importance to most Americans. Discuss in pairs why it is so and how people get their wealth. Explanations:
(1) The value President Lincoln expressed in that
quotation is “equality of opportunity”, by which Americans mean that each individual should have an equal chance for success, not that everyone is—or should be—equal.They see much of life as a race for success. For them, equality means that everyone should have an equal chance to enter the race and win. In other words, equality of opportunity may be thought
of as an ethical rule. It helps ensure that the race for success is a fair one and that a person does not win just because he/she was not born into a wealthy family.
(2) If much of life is seen as
a race, then a person must run the race in order to succeed; a person must compete with others. That is a price to be remunerated for the equality of opportunity. If every person
has an equal chance to succeed, then it is every person’s duty to try. Americans match their energy and intelligence against that of their neighbors in a completive contest for success. People who like to compete and are most successful than others are honorably called “winners”. The pressures of competition in the life of an American begin in
childhood and continue until retirement from work. Learning to compete successfully is part of growing up in the US. People believe that competition and the desire to win are healthy and desirable. So there are such sayings as “Every man for himself and God for us all.”“Every man is the architect of his own fortune.”And “upward mobility”is
admired.
(3) Probably the main reason is that material wealth is the most widely accepted measure of social status there. As Americans rejected the European system f hereditary aristocracy and titles of nobility, they had to find a substitute for judging social status. The quality and quantity of an individual’s material possessions became
the accepted measure of success and social status. But Americans pay a price for their material wealth: hard work. The North American continent was rich in natural resources when the first settlers arrived, but all these resources were underdeveloped. Only by hard work could these natural resource can be converted into material possessions and a
comfortable standard of living. Hard work has been both necessary and rewarding for most Americans throughout their history. In some ways, material possessions are seen not only as tangible evidence of peopl e’s work, but also of their abilities. Case study 3
We know that there are quite a few questions that you are not supposed to ask in the
US and some other western countries. It is considered impolite to inquire a person’s age, marriage status, income, religious belief, choice in voting, property, and others. If one of your American friends shows you something that he has just bought, you will, of course, say “What a nice skirt. It looks fabulous”or something like that but not inquire about the price. Of
all the aspects, one’s income is the top secret. People at the same office have the faintest idea of how much each person earns, except the boss.
Questions:
How would you account for this phenomenon? What concept is behind this? Discuss in small groups. Explanations:
This is the concept of privacy which refers to the
state of condition of being free from being observed or disturbed by other people, or being free from public attention. It has a lot to do with the value of individualism. In order to understand the American, or Western, idea of personal privacy, you should start by thinking of a nation’s concept of “territoriality”. A nation has borders or boundaries, and everything
within those boundaries belongs to that nation and no other. And so is it in the cases concerning personal affairs. Take a private house. If one enters a private house without asking for permission, he is likely to be accused of trespassing or even burglary. And there is, again, individual territory, even in a house: a person’s bedroom, for example, is his or her territory. Those who
do not live in that bedroom must not enter without asking and must not open the closet or drawer in that room. On top of the desk, there may be letters, business papers or other articles. You must not pick up one of these and read it. If a person if reading something, you must not lean over his shoulder to “share” it with him. It is his private property. The same
concept is true in an office. If it is somebody else who wants to enter the office, he/she usually asks, “May I come in?”and waits for an affirmative answer before entering the room.
Case study 4
In the early 1980s, a group of social scientists from around the world conducted a survey of Chinese values. In order to avoid biasing the research by using Western。