Essay on Intercultural Competence

Cultural competence is the ability to acknowledge, understand, respect and communicate with cultures and ethnicities different from one’s own. It encourages the acceptance of individual’s differences in appearance, behavior, and culture which offers positive changes in the way people interact with others. Furthermore, it offers an awareness and sensitivity to diverse cultures that often goes unrecognized (Hanser & Gomila, 2016). By fully understanding how to effectively interact with people from diverse cultures, the individual maximizes their ability to interact, not only in professional settings with staff and clients but in our growing society as a whole. Also, being culturally competent is beneficial because while it improves interactions between people of

For the intercultural interview, I decided to interview my friend Medelyn, a 19 year old female of Honduran and Mexican descent. During the interview, I focused on her Honduran culture, as she was born in Honduras, I asked her a multitude of various questions ranging from formalities in her culture to gender roles to classism in her culture.. The interview lasted about twenty minutes, I asked her about fifteen questions, and after she answered each question there would be a small discussion about her answer. When interviewing Medelyn, it was important to rid myself of any ethnocentrism, assumed cultural similarity or differences, stereotyping, and anything that could create a bias and compromise the interview.

It have been proven effective in providing services to individuals from a wide spread of diverse backgrounds. Cultural competence is understanding a set of congruent behaviors, knowledge, attitudes and policies that enable effective work in cross-cultural situations (Bazron, Cross, Dennis, & Isaacs, 1989). This means that an individual trains to understand different cultural groups. Cultural competency training is beneficial to all human service organizations because it aims to increase the knowledge and skills to improve one’s ability to efficiently serve different cultural groups therefore eliminating biases and

Cultural competence has to do with one’s culture. Culture affects among other factors, how children are raised, how families communicate, what is considered normal or abnormal, ways of coping with issues, the way we dress, when and where we seek medical treatment, and so forth. I should know because I come from a very cultural home where it is considered bad to talk to a male doctor about anything gynecological.

People live very different lives. Culture is a major importance in everyone lives. Everyone has customs that they follow, and somethings are more bizarre than others. But it may be bizarre in one persons ' eyes, and be completely normal to another. Having the ability to understand one 's culture and heritage can really help you have a better understanding of where they come from. In the medical it is very important to understand where an individual is coming regarding culture. From understanding their language, to understanding what they are against in the world of medicine is a difference between life and death for some of these individuals.

"Cultural competence is defined as a set of congruent behaviors, attitudes, and policies that come together in a system, agency, or among professionals and enables that system, agency, or those professionals to work effectively in cross cultural situations (Cross et al., 1989; Issacs & Benjamin, 1991). Operationally defined, cultural competence is the integration and transformation of knowledge about individuals and groups of people into specific standard, policies, practices, and attitudes, used in appropriate cultural settings to increase the

Some of the author’s major points are the lack of understanding of what cultural competence really means which is bringing confusion about ways it can be utilized in the social work field. The confusion of the utilization of cultural competence is leading to the lack of consensus concerning the effective training that providers should obtain and the population being served with the cultural competence skills lack clear description. According to the author, the most popular cultural competence intervention in the healthcare system is the cultural competency training which is for health care providers and the two approaches that have been utilized in creating the intervention are; the programs aimed at improving knowledge which is group specific,

Arthur H. Woodard, Jr., MSW Soulhelp@me.com Jim Wuelfing, NRPP Jim.Wuelfing@gmail.com  Name?  From where?  Doing what?  Why here?

Cultural competent? What is the big deal? “The term cultural competence is used to describe a set of skills, values and principles that acknowledge, respect and work towards optimal interactions between the individual and the various cultural and ethnic groups that an individual might come in contact with” (HumanServicesEDU, para. 1). Being able to understand and effectively understand other cultures than your own, can make a huge difference in the patient’s treatment and how well the case manager can do his or her job.

Cultural competence is important because it hinders culture exclusion. Excluding cultures can lead to culture attack, resentment, discrimination and civil disorder (Malmoe 2011).

Understand cultural competence and why is it important especially for that have a diverse workforce.

Today, we live in a culturally diverse society due to globalization. As our world grows, expands and become increasingly more interconnected, the need for effective interpersonal communication among differing cultures has become apparent. When people from different cultures interact with one another there is intercultural communication because different cultures create different interpretation and expectations about what is seen as competent behaviors that will enable the construction of shared meanings.

Today’s management in the workforce is composed of all types of people verses thirty years ago when white males held a majority of upper-management positions in companies. These positions are now held by a mixture of ethnic back grounds and women who hold just as many if not more management positions then men. Just by looking at the changes in management demographics shows how important it is for people to understand cultural competency in the workplace. Dr. Roosevelt Thomas Jr. (1999) stated, “Diversity is the collective mixture of whomever we have in our workforce characterized by their differences and similarities” (p.11). Managers and supervisors must understand the characteristics of a diversity mature individual; they also need to be

Orientation to Knowledge- The terms people use to explain themselves and the world around them

The developmental model that I will be using is Bennett’s developmental model of intercultural sensitivity (DMIS). Bennett’s model “…provides a framework for understanding individual development and awareness along a continuum from high ethnocentric to highly ethnorelative, and this framework can help us better understand some of the dynamics that might occur” (Bennett, 135). According to the model, there are two groups ethnocentric, which has three sub stages, and ethnorelative, which also has three sub stages. In the first category, ethnocentric, the three sub stages are denial, defense and minimization, while, the second category, ethnorelative, the three sub stages are acceptance, adaption and integration. “Denial is the inability to see cultural differences and is evident when individuals isolate or separate themselves in homogenous groups” (Bennett, 135). Defense is similar to denial; however, they are able to recognize cultural differences but have a negative outlook about other’s cultures (Bennett, 137). The last one in the ethnocentric category is minimization which when people can recognize and accept superficial cultural differences; however, they still view everyone as the same (Bennett, 138). The first one in the ethnorelative category is acceptance, which is when the individual is able to identify and appreciate one’s cultural differences such as values and behaviors (Bennett, 140). The next stage is adaption which is when individuals start to see “cultural