Intercultural communication

Michał Wesołowski
Wrocław, 02/02/2010
 INDEX

 Introduction; What exactly is the intercultural

communication? How we can define it?
 Non-verbal communication
 Stereotypes
 Own identity
 The concept of time
 Taste
”

Culture:

➡ is linked to communication and a wide range of human

experience including feelings, identity and sense-making
➡ provides people with different ways of thinking, seeing,
hearing and interpreting the world;
➡ involves a number of man-made, collective artefacts
and is shared by the members of a social group;
➡ is something that shapes one‘s behaviour or structures
one′s perception of the world
t Scout Law”

Culture and communication

Culture is often “Culture is
defined in communication
interrelation to and
Communication communication
is culture”

It means that Culture is passed on via communication and

communication reflects one′s culture!
 Intercultural communication

“We may say that intercultural communication is

the communication among those people who
have so different cultural references that they
perceive themselves as pertaining to differnent
cultures.”1
1Rodrigo Alsina, Miquel: “Comunicación
intercultural”, Anthropos Editorial, Barcelona 1999, p.
12
Non-verbal communication

The shortest way

between
two people is a smile
 Non-verbal communication

non-verbal language may have the

following basic functions:
1) to communicate attitudes and emotions
2) to support the sense of words
3) substitution of verbal language
 It means that

1) to communicate attitudes and emotions

2) to support the sense of words
This may take place in different ways:
 completing the sense of the words
 controlling synchronisation
(among the different speakers of a group)
 producing feed back
 maintaining the attention
3) to substitute verbal language
 body language, gestures
 gaze behaviour
 ...
Non-verbal language, depending on
authors, makes from 50% to 70% of direct
communication among human beings.
 Stereotypes

Stereotypes often reflect the differences in

socioeconomic status, religion or dialect;
➡ It is important to suspend judgement, avoid
misconceptions, narrow perspectives and
immature reactions;
➡ Stereotypes often contain a grain of truth, but
cannot characterize an entire culture;
➡ Getting the whole picture of culture needs
active participation;
 Identity

 Identity Is the relationship between “the I” and

“the other”

 there is no identity without the “other”

 so: when talking about the own identity, we

also have to consider the foreign identity
 Two kinds of identity

Two kinds of identity

1. Personal identity:
based on the culture in which we were
socialized
2. Cultural identity
founded on the sense of belonging to a
community with certain characteristics
 TIME BEHAVIOUR:
THE CONCEPT OF “TIME”
Monochronic Cultures Polychronic Cultures

•Also called: Rigid-time •Also called: Fluid-time

culture culture
• Do only one thing at the • Do several things at the
same time same time
•Appointments (time) are time engagements are
inescapable more flexible
• Punctuality is a norm of • work is considered less
conduct important than being polite,
• Time is money nice, helpful, etc. with other
people
• Time is an opportunity
 It means that

Two people, participating is the same task, one

monochronic and the other
polychronic:
 will consider the whole process from very
different points of view
 will have different objectives
 will have different priorities
 The concept of taste

What we have to take into account…

 There are no “better” and “worse” tastes
 There are different culinary customs
 Each culture establishes its culinary order and
marks food as “eatable” or “uneatable”
 Each culture marks certain food as
unacceptable
 The concept of taste

 Food is an element of cultural

 identification. (We are what we eat.)
 9
 British call French “frogs”
 Germans call Italian “Spaghettifresser”
Spend few minutes at the end of this session
answering these three reflective questions:
!What did you learn today?
!Why is that learning important to you?
!How can you make use of that learning
tomorrow?
Thanks for your attention!