UNDERSTANDING

COMMUNICATION IN
MULTICULTURAL SETTINGS
INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

 communicating or dealing
with people who speak
different languages or who
come from different
cultures
 INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

 A form of communication that

shares information across
different cultures and social
groups. (Edward Hall, The
Silent Language, 1959)
 Forms of
Intercultural Communication:

1.Interracial Communication –
communicating with people
from different races
 • Three Great Human Races .
The geographic barrier split our species
into three major races

• Negroid (or Africans),

• Caucasoid (or Europeans) and
• Mongoloid (or Asians).
 Forms of Intercultural
Communication:
2.International Communication
communicating between
representatives from different
nations
3. Intracultural Communication
interacting with members of
the same racial or ethnic
group or co-culture
• EFFECTIVE INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

 It is important to be culturally aware

and culturally sensitive when
navigating intercultural
communication.
•
 Intercultural communication is more
challenging than intracultural
communication because there is greater
mastery of one’s own language and
culture
• EFFECTIVE INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION
•
 For intercultural communication
to be effective, adaptations to a
culture different from one’s own
are necessary.
•
 One also needs to “abide by the
cultural norms and standards
English imposes on the users of
language.”
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES:
 HIGH CONTEXT VS LOW CONTEXT
• One in which things are fully
(though concisely) spelled
out. Things are made
explicit, and there is
considerable dependence on
what is actually said or
written.
Ex.: Anglos, Germanics and
Scandinavians.
• HIGH CONTEXT VS LOW CONTEXT
• One in which the
communicators assume a great
deal of commonality of
knowledge and views, so that
less is spelled out explicitly
and much more is implicit or
communicated in indirect ways.

Ex:Japanese, Arabs and French

 • MONOCHRONIC VS POLYCHRONIC
Monochronic cultures like to do
just one thing at a time. They
value a certain orderliness
and sense of their being an
appropriate time and place for
everything. They do not value
interruptions.

Germans tend to be monochronic.

 • MONOCHRONIC VS POLYCHRONIC
Polychronic cultures
like to do multiple things at
the same time. A manager's
office in a polychronic
culture typically has an open
door, a ringing phone and a
meeting all going on at the
same time.
• French and the Americans.
 INDIVIDUALISM VS COLLECTIVISM
In individualist cultures,
individual uniqueness, self-
determination is valued. A person
is all the more admirable if they
are a "self-made man" or "makes up
their own mind" or show initiative
or work well independently

Anglo cultures tend to be

individualist.
 INDIVIDUALISM VS COLLECTIVISM

Collectivist cultures expect

people to identify with and
work well in groups which
protect them in exchange for
loyalty and compliance.

Many of the Asian cultures

are collectivist
• VARIETIES AND REGISTERS OF
SPOKEN AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE
People shift their language depending on:

Social factors:
• (1) who they are talking to
• (2) the number of people they
are addressing
• (3) the general social context
•
Physical factors:
• (1) distance between speakers
• (2) presence of a crowd
• Chronological factors "their ages"
(or factors connected with their age). It is
saying that age is the most important thing
when describing the behavior of children aged
5-10, i.e. they tend to develop certain
concepts at certain times of their lives.
 Cultural Conventions.

Different cultures use

different conventions for writing the
date, the time, numbers, currency,
delimiting words and phrases, and
quoting material. A locale defines the
behavior of a program at runtime
according to a language
or cultural region's conventions
 • TYPES
• OF LANGUAGE REGISTERS
• or STYLES
1.Static Register – rare and
never changes

Formal Register – used in

delivering public speeches and
announcements
Consultative Register - uses
professional discussion between
someone superior and a
subordinate
Casual Register – uses informal
language like slang,
vulgarities, and colloquialisms