Unit 2 跨文化交际

Unit 2

Culture and Communication

What is culture?

“文化”是一个广泛的概念，它的内涵很丰富。

在英语中,“culture”一词是一个难以解释的词，它最早来源于古法语cultura, 拉丁语colere和德语“kultur”，原指土地的开垦及植物的栽培；后来随着人类生存空间和生存方式的改变逐渐扩延，转而意指人的身体、精神，特别是指艺术和道德能力和天赋的培养；进而泛指人类社会在征服自然和自我发展中创造的物质财富和精神财富，包括饮食、器具、舟车、房屋、社会组织、政治制度、风俗习惯、语言、学术思想等。

More than 500 definitions up to the present

(Refer to p. 40 for some of the well-known ones)

First definition: E. B. Tylor (1871) in Primitive Culture: “that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of a society.”

文化是一种复合的整体，它包括知识、信仰、艺术、道德、法律、习俗以及人们作为社会成员而获得的能力与习惯

Broadly speaking, it means the total way of life of a people, including the patterns of belief, customs, objects, institutions, techniques, and language.

In a narrow sense, it refers to local or specific practice, beliefs or customs, and language. Define culture from different perspectives

From Intellectual Perspective

From Anthropologic Perspective

From Social Perspective

From Psychological Perspective

From Intercultural Communication Perspective

From Intellectual Perspective

According to the Concise Oxford Dictionary, culture is "the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively".

It refers to intellectual perspective, such as music, art, exhibition, dance, etc. When you talk about Picasso, Beethoven, etc., you are talking about culture.

From Anthropologic Perspective

Culture is "the customs, civilizations, and achievements of a particular time or people." This is an anthropologist's definition.

From Social Perspective

Culture is what a society does and thinks.

Culture covers everything of a society.

From Psychological Perspective

Culture is the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one category of people from another.

From Intercultural Communication Perspective

Culture is a learned set of shared interpretations about beliefs, values, and norms, which affect the behavior of a relatively large group of people.

Culture Is Learned

We learn culture from __parents__, ____teachers____ friends ___,_other family

members_____,_ and even strangers who are part of the culture_.

Culture Is a Set of Shared Interpretations

All communications take place by means of symbols

Culture Involves Beliefs, Values, and Norms

a. Beliefs

Beliefs refer to the basic understanding of a group of people about what the world is like or what is true or false.

b. Values

Values involve what a culture regarded as good or bad, right or wrong, fair or unfair, just or unjust, beautiful or ugly, clean or dirty, valuable or worthless, appropriate or inappropriate, and kind or cruel.

c. Norms

Norms refer to rules for appropriate behavior, which provide the expectations people have of one another and of others

Norms in the army: Salutes

Norms in different fields：

Culture Affects Behaviors

Culture Involves Large Groups of People

Three Things Culture Does

p46-48 (self-study)

Culture ranks what is important

Culture furnishes attitudes

Culture dictates how to behave

Culture ranks what is important

Different cultures have their own value orientation and what is important in one culture may be virtually meaningless to another.

Culture ranks what is important. In other words, cultures teach values or priorities.

Values underlie attitudes. They also shape beliefs.

Within a culture, values may be of greater or lesser importance.

Culture furnishes attitudes

An attitude is learned, and it is a tendency to respond the same way to the same object or situation or idea.

Attitudes can change, although change can be difficult. Attitudes are based on beliefs as well as values.

Beliefs are convictions or certainties based on subjective and often personal ideas rather than on proof or facts. Belief systems or religions are powerful sources of values and attitudes in cultures.

Culture dictates how to behave

Behavior comes directly from the attitudes about how significant something is --- how it is valued.

Attitudes vary according to how important something is reckoned to be (value).

Values drive actions.

1.3 Classification of Culture

One of the most popular classification of culture:

high culture: philosophy, literature, fine arts, music, religion etc.

popular culture: customs and habits, rites and rituals, ways of living (housing, dressing, eating and drinking) and all interpersonal behavior.

deep culture: the conception of beauty, definition of sin, notions of modesty, ordering of time, etc.

Cultural iceberg: p. 44-50

Conscious or subconscious?

Deep culture—the out-of-awareness part of a culture

Nine-tenth of an iceberg / culture is out of sight.

Those that are above the “water” :

what to eat and how to eat it;

how to keep healthy;

how to raise children;

how to participate in ceremonies;

how to introduce and greet people;

Those that are below the “water” :

what is good or bad;

what is right or wrong;

what is beautiful or ugly;

what is clean or dirty;

how is an individual related to others;

Generally speaking, differences in those things that are usually outside of our conscious awareness, i.e. the so-called “ deep culture”, are more likely to cause problems in intercultural communication. The reason is that this part of culture is internalized in people’s mind and thus is hard to perceived.

Summary

Culture is not anything that people in a group are born with, but something they learn either by being taught or by growing up in it.

Different cultures have different ways of eating, drinking, dressing, finding shelter, marrying and dealing with death.

Our own culture seems natural to us while other cultures may think it funny, strange or even disgusting. However, this has nothing to do with right or wrong.

It follows that there is no “best” culture suitable for all people in the world. In comparing cultures, we can hardly say which culture is definitely better than the other, for each culture can be appropriate to certain group of people living in a particular geographic and social environment.

A culture should therefore be judged and interpreted in its own context. Without considering the environment in which people of a particular culture live, it would be impossible for us to really understand and appreciate what is significant and meaningful in that culture. Perhaps, if we could examine the manners of different nations with impartiality, we should find no people so rude, nor any so polite.

2. Instinctive Behavior and

Cultural Behavior

Reading : p. 41

Questions:

---Do you know Maslow’s theory?

---Do human beings realize all these needs at the same time?

---Do people all over the world share the same basic needs described by Maslow?

---Do people realize these needs in the same ways?

---Is culture conscious or subconscious?

2.1 Instinctive behavior

—innate and universal

2.2 Cultural behavior—learned and transmitted from generation to generation through the use of symbols

People in different cultures satisfy these needs in different ways.

Examples:

Different ways of eating p.43;

Difference in treating visitors. p. 38 (Warm Up)

Difference in ending the meals. p. 59 (Group Work)

Case Analysis

Case 5 p. 60

Difference in taking offers

Case 7 p.62

Difference in the view of gifts

Case 8 p.62-63

Difference in food for banquet, table manners

Analysis

In China, it is often not polite to accept a first offer and Heping was being modest, polite and well-behaved and had every intention of accepting the beer at the second or third offer. But he did not know the North American rules which firmly say that you do not pull alcoholic beverages on anyone. A person may not drink for religious reasons, he may be a reformed alcoholic, or he may be allergic.

Whatever the reason, you do not insist on offering alcohol. So the Americans didn’t make a second offer of beer to Heping, who probably thought North Americans not hospitable. However, there are always individual differences between people from even the same culture. Probably the young Chinese nurse had known something about the American culture and was just trying to behave like an American when she was in an American family.

Case 7 p.62

What do you think of Keiko insisting on giving valuable gifts to her college friends?

How would you feel if Keiko presented you with a gift for your help?

Analysis

Keiko insists on giving valuable gifts to her college friends, because in countries like Japan, exchanging gifts is a strongly rooted social tradition. Should you receive a gift, and don’t have one to offer in return, you will probably create a crisis. If not as serious as a crisis, one who doesn’t offer a gift in return may be considered rude or impolite.

Therefore, in Japan, gifts are a symbolic way to show appreciation, respect, gratitude and further relationship.

Keiko obviously has taken those used items from Mary, Ed and Marion as gifts, for she

p robably doesn’t know that Americans frequently donate their used household items to church or to the community.

Mary, Ed and Marion would never consider those used household items given to Keiko as gifts. No wonder they felt very uncomfortable when they received valuable gifts in return.

Case 8 p.62-63

Why did the girl consider the menu created by her mother a strange one?

What cultural differences can you find in this case?

Analysis

When the Chinese girl fell in love with an American boy at that time, it seems that she preferred to celebrate Christmas in the American way, for she wanted very much to appear the same as other American girls. She did not like to see her boyfriend disappo inted at the “shabby” Chinese Christmas. That’s why she cried when she found out her parents had invited the minister’s family over for the Christmas Eve dinner. She thought the menu for the Christmas meal created by her mother a strange one because there were no roast turkey and sweet potatoes but only Chinese food.

How could she notice then the foods chosen by her mother were all her favorites?

From this case, we can find a lot of differences between the Chinese and Western cultures in what is appropriate food for a banquet, what are good table manners, and how one should behave to be hospitable. However, one should never feel shame just because one’s culture is different from others’. As Amy’s mother told her, you must be proud to be different, and yo ur only shame is to have shame.

3.1 Definition of Communication

---A behavior-affecting process in which one person (a source) intentionally encodes and transmits a message through a channel to an intended audience (receivers) in order to induce a particular attitude or behavior.

---Transmission and reception of meaning through the manipulation of symbols, language and context.

---A process involving the exchange of messages and the creation of meaning.(p.58)

It involves a sender who encodes a message and a receiver who decodes the message.

3.3 Types of Communication(1)

Interpersonal Communication (Dyad)

Intrapersonal Communication (Within)

Mass Communication

Group Communication

Public Communication

Business Communication

Intra-cultural Communication

Intercultural/Cross-Cultural Communication

International Communication

Intracultural Communication

Shared communication between members of the same cultural group /communication between people from the same culture

Intercultural Communication

communication between people from different cultures

Intercultural Communication…

Requires an understanding of …

Own culture

Cultures of other groups

Parent/Dominant culture (e.g. based on race or ethnicity)

Co-cultures (e.g. based on gender, religion, age)

Intercultural Communication…

Requires an understanding of …..

Knowledge system

Beliefs

Values

Customs

Behaviors

Intercultural / Cross-cultural Communication

Although the term cross-cultural is often used as a synonym for intercultural, it traditionally implies a comparison of some phenomena across cultures.

For example, if we examine communication between two Chinese or between two Americans, we are looking at intra-cultural communication.

If we observe communication between a Chinese and an American, in contrast, we are looking at intercultural communication.

If we compare the speech act of apology in the Chinese culture and in the American culture, for example, we are making a cross-cultural comparison.

If we look at how an American or a Chinese is making an apology when communicating with each other, in contrast, we are looking at intercultural communication.

Cross-Cultural Communication

Involves highlighting similarities and differences across cultural groups to promote communication

International Communication

Interactions among people from different nations. Certainly, communication among people from different countries is likely to be intercultural communication, but that is not always true.

3.3 Types of Communication(2)

human communication (人类交际）

animal communication (动物交际）

human-animal communication （人类与动物的交际）

human-machine communication（人机交际）

machine-to-machine communication（机器交际）

3.4 Media of Communication

Face-to-Face

Telephone

Broadcast Media

Verbal

Non-verbal

Which other media of communication can you identify?

3.6 The Communication Process

Matching Task p.57

One more example:

1. A: Can you tell me the time?

B: Well, the milkman has come.

(No, I don’t know the exact time, but I can tell you that the milkman has come so that you may be able to tell what the approximate time it is now.)

Case 6 p.61 ( assignment)

Case Analysis

Case 6 p.61

Why did the Chinese mother-in-law decide to leave the very afternoon?

What was wrong with Litz asking her husband how long his mother was going to stay just two days after her mother-in-law’s arrival?

Analysis

When a speaker says something to a hearer, there are at least three kinds of meanings involved: utterance meaning, the speaker’s meaning and the hearer’s meaning.

In the dialogue, when Litz asked how long her mother-in-law was going to stay, she meant that if she knew how long she was going to stay in Finland, she would be able to make proper arrangements for her, such as taking her out to do some sightseeing. However, her

mother-in-law took Litz’s question to mean “ Litz does not want me to stay for long”. From the Chinese point of view, it seems inappropriate for Litz to ask such a question just two days after her mother-in-law’s arrival. If she has to ask the quest ion, it would be better to ask some time later and she should not let her mother-in-law hear it.

Another Case

Situation:

A Chinese student had just arrived at the States. One day, when he was reading in his room, he heard someone shouting outside: “ Watch out!” So he went to the window and stretched out his head and tried to find out what’s going on outside. Just then, his head was right poured by the water from above…

Question:

What are the three meanings of “ Watch out” in communication?

Key to the question:

1.Utterance meaning: Be careful!

2.Speaker’s meaning: Don’t pull out !

3.Hearer’s meaning:

Something is happening! Look out!

3.9 Characteristics of Communication p.68-73

Dynamic

Symbolic

Interactive

Interpretive

Contextual

Communication is a dynamic process

Communication is an ongoing, ever changing activity. It is not fixed.

“You can’t stand in the same stream twice.”

When people communicate, they are constantly affected by each other’s messages and as a consequence, people undergo continual change.

Each time one is influenced, one changes in some way and people never stay frozen when in communication.

Once a word or an action is employed, it cannot be retracted.

Communication is symbolic

Communication involves the use of symbols.

A symbol is a word, action, or object that strands for or presents a unit of meanings. Meaning, in turn, is a perception, thought, or feeling that a person experiences and might want to communicate to others.

P eople’s behaviors are frequently interpreted symbolically, as an external representation of feelings, emotions, and internal states.

Communication is interactive/transactional

Communication must take place between people.

When two or more people communicate, their unique backgrounds and experiences serve as a backdrop for the communication interaction.

Communicators are simultaneously sending and receiving messages at every instant that they are involved in conversations.

There are no such entities as pure senders or pure receivers.

Communication is systemic/contextual

Communication does not occur in isolation or in a vacuum, but rather is part of a larger system.

Setting and environment help determine the words and actions you generate and the meanings you give the symbols produced by other people.

Dress, language, topic selection, and the like are all adapted to context.

People do not act the same way in every environment.

Communication is contextual/systemic

All communication takes place within a setting or situation called a context.

By context, we mean the place where people meet, the social purpose for being together, and the nature of the relationship.

Thus, the context includes the physical, social, and interpersonal settings within which messages are exchanged.

The physical context includes the actual location of the interactants: indoors or outdoors, crowded or quiet, public or private, close together or far apart, warm or cold, bright or dark. The social context refers to the widely shared expectations people have about the kinds of interactions that normally should occur given different kinds of social events.

The interpersonal context refers to the expectations about the behaviors of others as a result of differences in the relationships between them. (examples---p69-70)

Communication is interpretive

Whenever people communicate, they must interpret the symbolic behaviors of others and assign significance to some of those behaviors in order to create a meaningful account of the other’s actions.

There is no direct mind-to-mind contact between people, you cannot access the thoughts and feelings of other human beings but can only infer what they are experiencing.

Communication is complex

Although all cultures use symbols to share their realities, the specific realities and the symbols employed are often quite different.

People are both alike and different.

Cultural, as well as individual, differences keep people apart.

Members of different cultures look differently at the world around them.

A successful intercultural communicator appreciates similarities and accepts differences.

4. Elements of Communication p.50-56

Context

Participants

Messages

Channels

Noise

Feedback

Context

physical setting

the formality of the conference room

the seating arrangements

lighting

the time of day

the distance between communicators

historical context

previous communication events

psychological context

the manner of perceiving themselves and others

cultural context

communication norms

Participants

play the roles of senders and receivers:

senders form messages– encoders;

receivers process the messages and react to them—decoders

variables affecting participants:

---relationships: familiar or unfamiliar

---gender: males or females

---culture: from the same culture or from different cultures

Messages

meanings

the meanings may not be transferred successfully

symbols

words chosen

facial expressions, gestures

tone of voice

encoding and decoding

message encoded may not be decoded as intended

culture and nonverbal factors

Channels

---sound, sight, smell, taste, touch

---the nature of the channel selected affects the way a message will be processed

---the impact of a message changes as the channel used to transmit it changes

---the more channels used, the more successful the communication will be

Noise

---any stimulus that interferes with the sharing of meaning

external noise

stimuli in the surrounding that distract attention

internal noise

interfering thoughts and feelings inside a communicator

semantic noise

inappropriate choice of words

---noise can function as a communication barrier

Feedback

verbal response

nonverbal response

serves useful functions for both senders and receivers: it provides senders with the opportunity to measure how they are coming across, and it provides receivers with the opportunity to exert some influence over the communication process.

Cultural Noise

–-- cultural variables that undermine the communication of intended meaning

Examples of Semantic Noise

一次性用品：A Time Sex Thing

一次性筷子：One Sex Chopsticks

平时禁止入内：No entry on peace time

小心溺水：Careful Drowning

童子鸡：Chicken without sexual life

麻婆豆腐：Bean curd made by a pockmarked woman

贵阳：Expensive Sun

干果区：Fuck the fruit area

Assignments

1. Find a misleading sign in Meizhou and point out what’s wrong and give a correct one.

2. Further Reading I : Understanding Culture p.64-67