跨文化交际案例分析

A Case Study on Intercultural Communication

1. Case Satement

Professor Johnson, a professor of Chicago Booth business school, was invited to give a guest lecture at a Chinese university in the early 1990s. He could tell the students that they were very attentive. They applauded warmly when the lecture came to an end. However, when professor Johnson asked whether they had any questions to ask him, all of students kept silence and even some students lowed down their heads. Professor Johnson was disappointed when no one asked any questions, even after they were encouraged to do so. In fact, most students avoided eye contact with him as he tried to communicate with them.

2. The analysis of the Case

I think this an example of failed intercultural communication. In my opinion, there may be three reasons for the failure of this intercultural communication.

Firstly, Chinese opinion on the power distance is very different from that of Amercicans. Power distance as a characteristic of a culture defines the extent to which the less powerful person in society accepts inequality in power and considers it as normal. The United States is a low power distance country. Americans believe that they are close to power, should have ready access to that power and emphasize that everyone is equal. So do teachers and students. So the student can interrupt the teacher’s teaching as his pleasure, and even can put forward his suspicions for the teacher’s speaking content in the face of his classmates. While China is a high power distance country. Chinese believe that power and authority are facts of life, and social hierarchy is prevalent and institutionalizes inequality. In our tradition, the teacher is a certain social status of the professional and nowadays still has performance under the environment of money first . The teacher represents authority and represents the experience. Proverb, "A day for the teacher lifelong for father", embodies the Chinese respect to teachers. Chinese students regard teachers as persons from a high power class, so they don’t doubt the authority of teachers. This is why Chinese students

don’t like to ask teachers any questions at the class. If they have some questions, they prefer to ask after the class. They can left the face by doing like this.

Secondly, the educational modle of America and of China are quite diefferent. In the United States, the traditional education method is trial and error, that is to say, students repeat to practice by themselves and to make mistakes, so finally they understand what is the truthy. This situation often require students to learn to be more autonomic, while the teacher’s task is to answear questions and not to inculcate knowledge. So American teachers like to ask questions, and to be asked at the same time. While in our country, the most common educational way is to watch and learn, that is to say, when the teacher tells you what it is, students just need to remember it. It is the all things that students can do in our classroom. This is one reason for the passive learning of Chinese students. So Chinese students are less autonomic than American students. They don’t like to ask any questions.

Thirdly, the meaning of eye contact is different in China and in the United States. In the individualism culture, when people speak to face each other eyes, this is a confident performance, because in their culture, modesty is not virtue. And Face up to others eyes also can show the respect to others. And in the east, avoiding eye contact means respect. This point is particularly obvious in the Japanese culture. When they talk with their elders or superiors they often low their heads. In my opinion, this point is not applicable in today's China, because more and more people realize that it is very polite to keep eye contact with the others when they are talking.

3. Conclusion

In intercultural communication, We have to remind ourselves to pay attention to the spontaneous emotional expressions of others and the situations where the interaction takes place. We have to remember that empathy can be increased if you resist the tendency to interpret the other’s verbal and nonverbal actions from your own culture’s orientation.To be successful as an intercultural communicator, people should become sensitive to the values and customs of the culture with which people are interacting. The more culture we know about the target language, the more likely we can succeed in contact . Only combining linguistic skill and cultural skill, can it