Download Chapter One

Communication Skills
ELE205
Chapter Two
Communication Diversity
Eng.Mohmmed Alsumady
Outline
1. Diversity definition.
2. Acknowledge intercultural interdependence.
3. Principles of intercultural Communication
4. Intercultural Communication styles
5. Barriers to intercultural Communication
6. Tools of diversity
Diversity definition
• Diversity is defined as the condition of being different.
• In other words, it means dissimilarity and variance
between things. The differences could be in size, weight,
age, and so on.
• In communication, diversity could be in: cultural values,
religion, habits, gender, origin, accents, stereotypes and
so on.
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
a) Movement toward a global economy
•
When OPEC raised the
Price of oil in the 1970, people
In the whole world had to stand in
waiting Lines at gas stations
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
a) Movement toward a global economy
•
Many of our jobs are directly
or indirectly is dependent on
foreign trade.
•
We are not just interacting with people
different from us, we rely on them in health, education and food
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
b) Increase in ethnic/ language minorities
The 2000 U.S genus's Data
characterized 12.5% of U.S
Population is Latino, 12.3% are
African, 10% others (Indian, Asian,…)
in addition to Bi-racial.
In short: 1 from 3 American can be
classified as ethnic minority
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
b) Increase in ethnic/ language minorities
Actually they are not numbers They are
people we know, care about, and depend
upon.
They enrich our lives, because of their
differences and they help us to Imagine
new ways of thinking and behaving
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
c) Variation in communication styles
Differences in communication styles
can make the sender of the message
appear to be pushy, rude, aggressive,
passive, etc. Factors involved in this
are volume and rapidity of speech,
tone of voice, and emphasis on key
words
Acknowledge Intercultural Interdependence
Sources of diversity:
c) Variation in communication styles
For example much has been
written about differences in
gender.
Best seller book in 1993 is
“Men are from Mars and women
are from Venus”
Cross-Cultural Communication
• Is a field of study that looks at how people from different
cultural backgrounds communicate, in similar and different ways
among themselves, and how they try to communicate across
cultures.
• Understanding these different perspectives about how
communication works is a necessary first step in communicating
cross-culturally.
Picture Intercultural Communication
• Not all cultures view communications at the same way. For example
the American way is different than Asian one .
• Enryo-Sasshi Communication: is certain to the image of Japan as a
passive society, where people wok to avoid conflict.
1- Sender’s potential experiences.
2- Sender’s chosen ideas (enryo filtering)
Sender, Enryo
Receiver, Sasshi
5
3- Sender’s encoding (filtering)
1…2…3…4
6…7…8…9
4- Narrow, limited sending (filtering)
5- Channel
Feedback
6- Wide, open receiving
(traditions, cultures)
7- Receiver's decoding
Sasshi: conjecture,
8 Receiver's expanded ideas (sasshi) Enryo:reservation,
restraint, coyness,
judgment, guess,
9- Receiver’s experience
regard,
understanding,
This model works efficient because
hesitation,
consideration,
Japanese are homogeneous people
diffidence
sympathy
Principles of Intercultural Communication
1. The greater the cultural/linguistic difference,
the greater the likelihood of communication
breakdown.
•
For example communicating with customer from
France is more difficult than communication with
Syrian customer (for Jordanian).
•
Differences in world-views, values, and
communication styles leads to misunderstandings.
Principles of Intercultural Communication
2. Communication breakdowns are most often
attributed to cultural differences
• Also such breakdowns could be the result of
misunderstanding based on personal differences or
any of the breakdowns described in chapter 1 (gaps,
gossips,…)
Principles of Intercultural Communication
3. Cross-cultural communication makes us more
conscious of our own communication.




Choose our words carefully
Clarify our questions
Refrain from discussing some topics.
Fear from misinterpretation of nonverbal.
This increased awareness can make us uncomfortable
when communicating with people from other culture.
Principles of Intercultural Communication
4. Cultures vary with their “do’s and taboos”
(What is good to do or bad to do)
• The effective cross-cultural
communicators learn what they
are and respect them.
Example: giving small gift to
Japanese visitor.
Any other examples??
Principles of Intercultural Communication
5. Learning about cultural norms and variation in
communication styles of a particular cultural group
helps ensure understanding.
• Cultural norms are behavior patterns that are typical
of specific groups. Such behaviors are learned from
parents, teachers, and many others whose values,
attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors take place in the
context of their own organizational culture.
• It is helpful to understand the world-view and the
value systems different groups of people hold.
Principles of Intercultural Communication
6. Barriers are more easily overcome if people
see each other as friendly, cooperative and
trustworthy.
Outline
1. Diversity definition.
2. Acknowledge intercultural interdependence.
3. Principles of intercultural Communication
4. Intercultural Communication styles
5. Barriers to intercultural Communication
6. Tools of diversity
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken communication:
begin with the value cultures place in language itself.
• Americans generally value the power of the spoken
word. So they often feel uncomfortable in silence. In
contrast other cultures believe language can never
reveal the truth. they feel comfortable with silence.
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
Nonverbal communication is the sum total of our
body's communication. It is how our body
communicates or sends a message.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• values placed in language:
American generally value the power of the spoken
word, other cultures are skeptical of language.
• Purpose of language
- American are concerned with language that
accomplish tasks to get the point quickly.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Purpose of language:
-
Pay attention to the language variation help us to
learn how people regards relations.
-
For example in English we use the word “you” for
friend, boss, or president of USA while in Spanish
they use “Su” for Boss and use “tu” for informal
relations.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
Structure of language: Subject- Verb –Object
format used for communicating in English. In
Spanish order of words doesn’t matter.
-
Classes of words (parts of speech), meanings of
words is called semantics (‫)علم دالالت االلفاظ‬.
-
how words are organized in relation to each other is
called syntax (‫)بناء الجمله‬.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Structure of language:
-
Morphology is how words are formed
-
The study of sounds of words is phonology .
-
There are overall 800 sounds in human languages, in
English there are about 45 sounds and in Hawaiian
there are 18 sounds.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Structure of language:
-
In English : she hit the ball
-
In Spanish: she the ball hit, the order of words dose
not matter
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Most languages are tonal:
-
In English : we don’t know how to pronounce word
start with “ng” or “ts” but can read them at the end
of word “for example: cats, meaning”.
-
In Spanish; words don’t begin with “sp” but begin
with “es”. Spanish speaker will read “speech as
espeech”
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Differences in word meanings:
 Denotative differences: in English chair means the
object you sit in or the head of committee but in
Arabic different words would be used for each
version of chair that you mean.
 Connotative differences: emotional meaning that
come with words, in English we describe a woman
supervisor as “aggressive” but a man supervisor as
“assertive”. Also we usually have negative feeling
about “propaganda” but Spanish has no such feeling.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Word meanings:
•
Figurative language:
for example:
-
White hands?! Clean hands or cocasion person?
-
Fish sleeping?! Does it mean lazy or boring?
(wishy-washy person).
-
You are just like palm tree?! Tall person?
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• Knowing how language is used is called
(pragmatics):
•
Where and with whom we are communicating
-
Person talks while you are talking, example Hawaiian
-
Respond to a question by telling a story that irrelevant to
the topic, example Native American.
-
The appropriateness of topics changes from culture to
culture, asking about your age or money you make.
Intercultural Communication Styles
1. Variation in spoken language:
• As a result;
-
-
We tend to make modification to our communication
depending on where and with whom we are
communicating. In class or in coffee shop.
We change depending on informal or formal
relationships.
How we think people will respond to our use of
slang or regional variation in dialect.
Talking louder and slower when talking with
children or non-English speakers.
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variations in nonverbal communication: is the
hidden dimension of our communication
• Use of time:(chronemics) how we regard time
• Use of personal space: proxemics
• Use of eye contact: oculesics
• Use of gestures (kinesics), touch (haptics) and
voice (vocalics)
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
• Use of time: chronemics
-
time is important for Americans “ losing time,
killing time, saving time, time is money,..etc”
-
In contrast to time orientation is relationship
orientation where the quality of the interaction
indicates how much time will be spent.
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
• Use of personal space:(proxemics):
-
Refers to differences in the distance we stands when
talking with one another .
-
People in middle east have shorter distance and
people from England have large distance compared
to USA.
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
• Use of eye contact: oculesics
-
Americans: like soft eye contact where people look
at them, from time to time, look away. Intense stars
makes most Americans feel very nervous.
-
Other cultures is very little eye contact
-
For middle Easters the eye is the window of the
soul, they can read eyes (read our true messages).
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
• Use of gestures (kinesics), touch (haptics) and
voice (vocalics)
-
Hand gestures are by
no mean universal
-
hug and a kiss is a typical
greeting even among strangers
in Latin America.
Intercultural Communication Styles
2. Variation in nonverbal communication:
• Use of gestures (kinesics), touch (haptics) and
voice (vocalics)
-
Some cultures talk too loud in conversation
(Americans), and others tend to vocal volume
deemed.
Outline
1. Diversity definition.
2. Acknowledge intercultural interdependence.
3. Principles of intercultural Communication
4. Intercultural Communication styles
5. Barriers to intercultural Communication
6. Tools of diversity
Barriers to Intercultural Communication
We will identify four barriers to
effectiveness in intercultural
communication:
1. Walking on eggs
2. Hot buttons
3. Container myth
4. Language, vernacular (‫ )عاميه‬and
accent bias
Barriers to intercultural Communication
1. Walking on eggs:
Certain topics create tension for ethnic minorities
When someone says they feel like they are walking on eggs, what is
that telling you? It's telling you :
- that they can no longer be themselves in your presence.
- that they fear your reaction whenever they speak.
- that they are stuck, that they cannot move in either direction, for
fear of upsetting you.
- It is also telling you that they need to stop this feeling that is
tearing them apart.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
1. Walking on eggs:
If you are walking on eggs, you are being
very careful not to offend someone or do
anything wrong.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
1. Walking on eggs:
2. Certain topics create tension for ethnic minorities
-
This tension can make those communicating with
ethnic minorities hesitant to approach these topics.
-
Its difficult to know exactly what these topics are?
-
one example is ethnic jokes.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
1. Walking on eggs:
Several things can help with this barrier:
-
Remember that these topics are profoundly (deeply) personal.
-
Have implication (‫ )ضمنا‬for how people feel and think about
themselves.
-
Learn to handle defensiveness and to support ethnic minority
people.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
1. Walking on eggs:
Several things can help with this barrier :
-
It may work to invite these ethnic minority people to
discussion and to share their perception(‫ )فهم‬of the topic at hand
.
-
Remember that listening is vital(‫ ) حيوي‬link in any constructive
communication interaction.
-
Finally, and the best is to avoid these topics, until stronger
relationship (trust) is established.
Barriers to Intercultural Communication
2. Hot buttons:
-Hot buttons are words that invoke an emotional response in
other person.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
2. Hot buttons:
-Sometimes words simply are misunderstood
-Swearing can become hot button for ethnic minority people
who have a more formal view of the world.
-Derogatory words used for
people from specific ethnic
minority groups (Red necks).
Barriers to intercultural Communication
2. Hot buttons:
To avoid:
-Identify the hot buttons for you and for other people you
communicate with, then try to avoid them.
-If they are used then work hard to control your emotional
response.
-When tension is minimized talk about why and how these
buttons produce that reaction, the other will cease from using
these hot buttons next time.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
3. Container myth
Is assumption that words
mean the same thing
across all cultures
Barriers to intercultural Communication
3. Container myth:
-
Sometimes words is misunderstood, for example, as
when our students told that “foul” language is not
allowed, a concerned student from Turkey came to
office to ask why they could not talk about chickens
and birds “fowl” in class.
Barriers to intercultural Communication
3. Container myth:
-
Also as we talk before about denotative (‫ داللي‬and
connotative (‫) تلميحي‬meaning of words.
-
A relationship built on trust will create a climate
where people share their understanding.
It would be helpful to be curious about language use
across culture.
Stay away from jargon.(specialized language of an
occupation).
-
Barriers to intercultural Communication
4. Language, vernacular and accent bias:
-
Every group have particular affinity for their
language.
-
There are certain biases that come with a particular
accent.
You must identify your biases about languages,
vernaculars (the specific language used in particular
communities) or accents and actively work to
overcome them.
-
Barriers to intercultural Communication
4. Language, vernacular and accent bias:
-
There is power in learning new languages.
-
There are advantages of being able to use multiple
languages.
English is the international language of business.
relationships are strengthened with others when you
can demonstrate some competence in there
language.
Outline
1. diversity definition.
2. Acknowledge intercultural interdependence.
3. principles of intercultural Communication
4. intercultural Communication styles
5. Barriers to intercultural Communication
6. Tools of diversity
Tools of diversity:
The specific tools for effective communication across
cultures are easy to list and describe but difficult to
employ, we will discuses four tools:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Overcome personal biases
Relate culture to communication
Empathizing with non-English speakers
Developing intercultural competence.
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
•
Racism, stereotypes and discrimination negatively
impact our communication with others.
•
These are the source of hurt feelings and result in
miscommunication, damaged relationships and loss in
productivity.
•
The history of ethnic relations in America makes it
difficult to overcome Americans current struggles with
racism. (the mentality that justified slavery……).
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
•
Relations become strained when many EuroAmericans assert that these historical practices are
over (and thus ethnic minority people should “just
get over it”) or when feeling of guilt keep them
away from creating meaningful relationships with
ethnic minorities.
Overcome personal Biases
To overcome:
• Develop an understanding about what is
biases?
• Recognize that racism and discrimination are
still a powerfully part of the American landscape.
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
To overcome:
• Not only be sensitive to your own racisms but
also develop strategies to resist the racism
that may occur in your workspace.
• Be attuned to how we communicate our
prejudices.
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
Forms of racism:
•
Overt racism (‫ )علني‬such as “all… are lazy” or “they
should go back where they came from”.
•
Symbolic racism, is attacking some symbol of
importance to a particular group of people.
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
Forms of racism:
•
Symbolic racism, such as saying “ affirmative (
‫)ايجابي‬action required companies to hire people who
were not qualified is a distortion of the actual
policy”. The response is emotional and not based on
fact.
Tools of diversity:
Overcome personal Biases
Forms of racism:
•
Arms – length racism: is suggesting that you don’t mind
to work or know minority people, but you oppose any
closer relationship.
•
Tokenism: is communicated by people who say ”I can’t
be racist one of my best friends is….”believing that
knowing one person from (different race….) is enough
to prove that he is not racist.
Tools of diversity:
Forms of racism:
•
Institutional Racism: Ideologies and structures that are
used to systematically legitimize unequal division of
power and resources between groups on the basis of
race.
Some Important Definitions
Stereotype: negative beliefs about a particular group, it does not
consider people as individuals, but rather categorizes them as
members of a group who all think and behave in the same
way. We may pick up these stereotypes from what other
people say, from T.V or from what we read.
Prejudice: a set of rigid and unfavorable attitudes toward a
particular
group.
An
unsupported
accompanied by disapproval.
judgment
usually
Tools of diversity:
Some Important Definitions
Scapegoating: The policy of blaming an individual or group
when the fault actually lies elsewhere. Those who we
scapegoat
become
objects
of
our
aggression.
Scapegoating can lead to verbal and physical violence,
including death.
Tools of diversity:
Some Important Definitions
Discrimination: the differential treatment based on unfair
categorization. It is denial of justice prompted by
prejudice. When we act on our prejudices we engage in
discrimination. It involves keeping people out of
activities or places because of the group to which they
belong.
Racism: the belief that one race is superior to another.
Tools of diversity:
Relate culture to communication
•
Recognize the connection between culture and
communication
•
Its hard to learn language without its culture.
•
Nonverbal communication is impacted by culture
specific meanings.
•
We learn more values and world- view if we
communicate with others.
Tools of diversity:
Relate Culture to Communication
• Seek to understand these cultural differences
• Recognize the interdependence nature of
groups.
• Seek culture specific knowledge which
includes history, current social issue,….
• Learn a second language your self
Tools of diversity:
Empathize non-English Speakers
• Develop empathy for second language learners,
and learn second language yourself.
• Appreciate others attempts to learn your language
• Support those attempts by minimizing stress and
making your messages understandable
Tools of diversity:
Develop Intercultural Competence
The kind of competence meant here is an ability to
accomplish goals while also reducing misunderstanding
and building strong interpersonal relationships, these
competencies will enhance your overall quality of your
life.
Tools of diversity:
Develop Intercultural Competence
•
•
•
•
•
•
Acknowledge and work on overcoming prejudices and
biases
Work toward equal-status relationships
Challenge personal assumption
Learn how your culture is different from others
Communicate with those from other cultures
Learn how others want to be treated and try to
accommodate them
• People fail to get along because they
fear each other, they fear each other
because they don’t know each other,
they don’t know each other because
they have not properly communicated.
End of chapter 2
Any Question?