Reflection On Intercultural Communication

Washington, Okoro and Thomas (2012) have written an analysis of the benefits and challenges of improving intercultural communication in international business. Their article functions as an overview of some key issues, and is fairly well-researched, but ultimately treads no new ground. The article first outlines the case for improved intercultural communication, noting that business is becoming increasingly globalized. As nations come together, there is the risk that ventures and deals could fail as the result of errors in intercultural communication. The authors note, however, that "as businesses begin to appreciate and respect cultural differences, they develop a better understanding of why people act in certain ways, and give them a better understanding on how they should be act while conducting business."

Attached please find a Closing Memorandum with respect to the disposition of the above-captioned matter involving Tooms I, LLC v. DC Water.

Intercultural communication is defined as when people communicate with one another who have different cultures. They may differ because of their languages, beliefs, values, and behavioral characteristics (Bennett, 1998). The intercultural communication plays a key role in globalization. It will help organizations to have a long-term success if they can manage the cultural differences and intercultural cooperation effectively to conflicts. Increasing shared knowledge and dealing with miscommunication are the two main factors for having a successful intercultural communication. However, the difference in discourse systems is the most miscommunication issue that leads individuals to misunderstand and misinterpret to the contents or messages

With the growing of globalization, opportunities of intercultural communication become more common to individuals’ everyday life. Thus, it is of vital importance that people understand linguistic relativity and language ideologies in order to avoid misunderstandings and achieve effective intercultural communication.

After the study of Intercultural Communication, I get a good experience and knowledge of how to share information with people from different cultures and social groups. Also, what are the major problems that appear at workplace or any organization, how different contexts are to different religions or cultures and how people react to it. It also helped in getting a fair sense of knowing how people from different backgrounds and countries and cultures react and communicate efficiently. Being very helpful in becoming an effective intercultural communicator by experiencing intercultural communication in action at different sites and from self-experience with people in Australia, leading to improve my understanding as I do not belong to the country where English is the ‘lingua franca’{Tsui,2014}. I will be relating my first experience I have had respective of intercultural communication at the site being the Vodafone store at rundle mall. And the second being at the rundle street and the third at my own university and the where I have faced how intercultural communication eased the situations and also relating my three experiences with the course readings.

I feel the ability to communicate with people across different cultural backgrounds is a strength that I have developed over time. Intercultural communication is the term given to communication that takes place between people whose cultural beliefs values and behaviours differ from one another (Buchanan 2015, p. 44). Cultural knowledge that is developed through socialisation and transferred from one generation to the next, shapes the way people communicate both verbally and nonverbally. It influences an individual’s perception of the world which in turn impacts intrapersonal communication; self-talk, and interpersonal communication; expressing meaning in a variety of settings (Buchanan 2015, p. 34; Kreunus et al. 2011, p. 48). When a person constructs meaning from a message, they attempt to understand what is spoken, how it is spoken and the context of the communication (Kreunus et al. 2011, p. 48). Semantic barriers can occur during when people interpret a messages by associating the meaning to their own cultural understanding and knowledge in order for it to make sense to them (ibid; Tylor, Kossen & Charmaine 2005, p. 271). The following principles can be applied to improve intercultural communication and increase cultural sensitivity; remove cultural barriers; decrease ethnocentrism, challenge biases and stereotypes, avoiding over-attribution bias, be aware of cultural differences to adjust communication (Buchanan 2015, p. 43; Tylor, Kossen & Charmaine 2005, p. 269).

The site was chosen in assignment two and is the 2015 Aria Awards, which is an annual event, held annually in Sydney exclusively for the music industry. The Aria Awards were chosen has been chosen as I work in the music industry and have a passion for new and existing talent. The Aria Awards involves forms of intercultural communication in various areas and situations that can be detailed in three theories. Identifying or focusing on three situations on a particular aspect of the site and providing a detailed account. This essay will detail how intercultural communication works at the site with examples. Firstly Theory A edited by Murray, N & Scarino, A and named Dynamic Ecologies: A Relational Perspective on Languages Education in the

In today’s world, globalization is rapidly dominating and mobilizing multicultural interactions among leaders (Bücker & Poutsma, 2010). The Eurocentric Germanizing authoritative leadership approach is no longer dominating in a colorful society of people (NewsBlaze, 2007). As globalization comes into realization, more and more people of various gender, race, religion, nationality, ethnicity, and even disability will continue to change the course of leadership (Nahavandi, 2014; NewsBlaze, 2007). Successful leaders are challenged to adapt new methods to seek out effective communication and address every human being with compassion and empathy (Harvard Business Review, 2011).

The world today is characterized by an ever growing number of contacts resulting in communication between people with different linguistic and cultural backgrounds. In the process of globalization, the relationship between people differ racially, ethnically, nationally, and regionally. These groups become such a normative thing and seen as a good sign of a process of integration and social diversity. It is important for one to experience intercultural communication. It can help society grow in knowing different elements of different cultures. It can help create a positive awareness of our own and others cultures, by being able to observe similarities and differences in cultural behaviors, attitudes, and experiences. I have recently been able to experience intercultural communication with Central Washington University’s AUAP students. Once a week I would go into an AUAP classroom and help them with the classroom activities. This experience allowed me to get over my uncertainty avoidance and self- disclose information with the AUAP students in order to connect with them more. Before going into the classroom, I was very anxious and uncertain of what might happen during my time with the students. After I met them I felt more reassured that they were very nice and it was going to be a good experience for me to volunteer in their classroom. This then led to self- disclosed information being exchanged between the AUAP students and myself. After some information was disclosed

Intercultural communication is understanding the effective way in communicating between people with different cultural background. Factors such as business etiquettes and cultural differences are critical to be able to achieve a positive outcome in a negotiation. Knowing how to negotiate with the Japanese is essential especially when the person comes from a different background. In this essay, Emily, an australian entrepreneur who wish to expand her business venture in Japan will be advised on gaining a good impression with meeting Mr. Hamasaki, a manager of a popular store.

This understanding of the cognitive and behavioral strategies that are most likely to result in effective intercultural communication thus helps to understand and/or accept the similarities and differences in the background, experience, culture and perspectives of individuals from a culture different that mine. This is the fourth most important dimension as it is seemingly impossible to obtain without the other three dimensions, but still important nonetheless. It is important because as the world is becoming more global with the help of technology, travel and education the success of these encounters will

From the theory adaptation is perceived as the process of dynamic unfolding of the natural tendency of human strive for an internal equilibrium in face of often adversarial conditions of the environment (Jackson, 2008). The theory of adaptation tries to create and enhance an understanding of the process of intercultural adaptation. However it has special focus on the effects of micro and macro levels factors on cultural adaption process. This refers to cultural and institutional patterns of host culture and individual background and psychological characteristic respectively. It has also focused on understanding of cross cultural adoption in the context of new learning and psychological growth so as to form more complete understanding of the cross cultural adaption process, organizational and consolidation of factors that influence cross cultural adoption process has also been focused and finally inclusion of assimilation of ideological points of view.

Intercultural Communication: A discoursed approach by Scollon, R, Scollon, S; & Jones, R.H. (2011) identifies various

“Understanding cultures and intercultural communication in terms of countries and nationalities is no longer relevant or effective.” Evaluate this statement, referring to relevant theories and using examples where appropriate.

During the implementation of the research plan, I did have a few issues and changes I had to adjust with a few methods that I had previously stated. The one idea I completely removed from my plan was the idea of traveling to Houston with Bhavik to visit with him and his family members due to the busy holiday schedule, nothing could be worked out. On the plus side, using social media he was able to send me videos and snapchats of Hindu decorations, food and videos of him spending time with his family and although the clips were short it gave a good sense of how the culture was still instilled in their family even though they now reside in the United States. As I was getting started off on the project and my research the conversation seemed to be easier said than done. Although, I was very fortunate enough to know someone of another culture beforehand for the project ultimately it created a challenging task during the discussions making it slightly harder to stay on topic. After the first few meetings, we planned to get together and focus on correcting the issue of staying on topic and it seemed to decrease after time and the flow of cultural communication was more achievable and easier to stay on the subject.