And Intercultural Communication

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 690.

Lesson 4. Cultural Patterns

Ex. 6

Ex. 5

Ex. 4

Ex.3

Ex. 2

Ex. 1

Each culture has subtle, less visible differences that are taken for granted within a culture. In defining culture, we called the effects of these subtle differences shared interpretations. Shared interpretations lead to actions that are regarded as appropriate and effective behaviors within a culture. They are therefore very important and they result from the culture's collective assumptions about what the world is, shared judgments about what it should be, widely held expectations about how people should behave, and predictable behavior patterns that are commonly shared. We are going to call these unseen but shared expectations cultural patterns.

It is extremely important to understand differences in cultural patterns if you wish to develop competence in intercultural communication. Cultural patterns are the basis for interpreting the symbols used in communication. If the cultural patterns between people are sufficiently different, the symbols used in communicating will be interpreted differently and may be misunderstood - unless people are aware that no common set of behaviors is universally interpreted in the same way nor regarded with the same degree of favorability[Intercultural Competence, ch. 4-5].

.