In this globalized world, there is a lot of interaction among people with different cultural backgrounds. Therefore, intercultural communication is unavoidable. Communication between people from diverse backgrounds is necessary for everyday activities, business, and other community issues. In this era, the world has become smaller as different people worldwide can congregate because of some shared interest. Intercultural communication is an essential skill in life as it allows people to communicate effectively and share different information with people from different cultures. Building up relevant intercultural communication skills includes understanding standards, people's thoughts, customs, embracing cultural differences, and adapting to the differences.
Intercultural communication competence is the ability to engage different people from different cultural groups, often helps to act with them and understand them. Reflecting on my intercultural communication competence, I exercised when I engaged two of my foreign interviewees and learned a lot about their culture. One is a Brazilian named Manuel, whose family moved to the U.S recently. The other is a Japanese, named Yui; she moved to the U.S, and she is working as a high school teacher. Being an American, it was easy for them to learn from me as I learned from them. Firstly, after engaging Manuel about their culture, I realized that their culture is mainly influenced by the European Portuguese culture as history indicates their colonial period.
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Brazilians are well recognized for their love of music and dance. They even have systematic festivals held during the year and the most popular being the Brazil Festival, frequently happening in Rio de Janeiro (Soh, 2016). Customs and traditions that Brazilians treasure often includes June’s party, carnival, offerings lemanja, loyalty to the famous, etc. (Soh, 2016). Also, they value honesty, trust, patience, and respect towards each other and family in general. Furthermore, there are some cultural etiquettes that Brazilians have stuck into, such as the okay sign is determined vulgar and rude (Soh, 2016). Also “Thumbs up” gesture indicates endorsement while streaking hands together shows “it does not matter”. More so, Brazil is considered to be having the most significant number of Catholics in the world (Soh, 2016). Catholicism is the main religion in Brazil, and Portuguese is the main language spoken in the country.
On the other hand, through engaging my Japanese friend, I learned many things about Japan and its culture. Most Japanese culture is resultant of China, which includes their language, art, Confucianism, and religion (Herold & Lee, 2017). They have many traditions, including Bonenkai parties held in December, Fukusasa lucky bamboo branches, Yamayaki mountain burning, KFC on Christmas Eve, and many more (Herold & Lee, 2017). Popular culture in Japan includes cuisine, music, Janese cinema, Video games, manga, and anime, all these retaining the traditions and older artistic styles which can be traced to ancient times. Also, the Japanese are not open when it comes to knowing their hobbies, especially when there is a perception that they will be frowned upon (Herold & Lee, 2017). Some Japanese etiquettes include bowing as a form of a greeting, or alternatively, nodding the head is enough (Herold & Lee, 2017). Shaking hands is a rare form of greeting in Japan. When it comes to religion, Buddhism and Shinto are the main religions in Japan.
Cultural diversity awareness is essential, especially now that the country consists of different cultural, ethical, and racial groups. We can be able to learn from each other, but people need to have a level of understanding about one another (Ilie, 2019). Cultural diversity awareness helps one understand various perspectives of people around us and within the globe. Cultural awareness helps dismiss negative personal biases and stereotypes towards different groups of people (Ilie, 2019). Cultural diversity awareness is essential as it also allows people to learn how to respect, recognize, and embrace different “ways of being” that other people have. This encourages people to interact and establish bridges of respect, understanding, and trust among cultures. This also improves people's way of thinking, language skills, variety of experiences, and new knowledge in society.
When interacting in a culturally diverse population with poor cultural awareness, the chances of making bad or poor decisions are high. The unseen elements of culture that are beliefs and values, are usually the hardest for most individuals to understand or deal with. However, cultural awareness enables reducing the chances of making poor decisions and increases the chances of making considerate and insightful decisions. Building communities that are powerful in attaining meaningful change needs people to work together (Ilie, 2019). Therefore, if various cultural groups link together, more achievements and reaching the same goals will be experienced. Different cultural groups have different strengths and perceptions of things that can be shared through a wide range of customs, wisdom, and ideas to solve problems and making life better in society.
Dimensions of Culture
Individualism-Collectivism
Cultural dimensions describe variances in cultures, and as described by Engleberg & Wynn, 2015, there are five dimensions of culture. The dimensions of culture include Individual-Collectivism, Power Distance, Gender expectations, High-low context, and Time orientation. These dimensions vary from culture to culture. From the interviews with The Japanese and Brazilian friends, there are different perspectives derived by the dimensions. Individualism-Collectivism is the point that culture depends on and has a commitment to the group or the self (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). The Brazilians do care a lot about family that is both extended and immediate family (Soh, 2016). Loyalty is highly expected among the family members, and it is also rewarded by total family unity. Brazil is altogether a collectivist society whereby identifiable, strong is crucial and encouraged.
On the other hand, the Japanese are more of a collectivist society as they put together a group above individual opinions' thoughts. They also possess a strong sense of shame though the Japanese are not tolerating the extended family system, forming the foundation of collectivistic society. However, compared with our country, our society is more individualistic (Herold & Lee, 2017). The level of interdependence that Americans maintain defines how they are; that is, people in society look upon themselves and their family when it comes to family.
Power Distance
Power distance is described as the psychological and physical distances between the people in power and those who do not have any relationships (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). In Brazil, they have high distance power, indicating that society respects and embraces inequalities and differences in their society (Soh, 2016). This includes recognizing the difference in wealth, age, and class. For instance, in business, hierarchy is vital, and with age, the elderly are much respected, and the young are expected to take good care of the elderly in the families. Whereas in Japan, they are not as high in power distance as they are conscious of hierarchical position and act accordingly in their society (Herold & Lee, 2017). However, in the U.S, their a low power distance as the society is more of interdependence, and thus, everyone is unique; that is, they are all unequal.
Gender Expectations
Gender expectations emphasize both expectations of appropriate role behaviors and expectations on similarities and differences in how men and women are to behave (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). The dimension of culture on gender expectations of Brazil is described as masculine as the country places its essential on masculinity and feminine characteristics. The country expresses its male dimension by focusing on being the best and feminine by driving towards the quality of life, which corresponds with the countries collectivist nature. On the other hand, masculinity reigns in Japanese society. However, due to its mild collectivist behavior, there are no competitive and assertive behaviors highly associated with masculine nature (Herold & Lee, 2017). Also, in the United States, masculinity is high, indicating that American society is driven by achievements, success, and competition (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). This can be as well evident by the combination of individualistic behavior present in the country.
Time Orientation
Time orientation is described as a cultural dimension that centers on time variables like the present, future, past, long and short term, one thing at a time and many things at a time, as well as the pace at which the activities are done (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). In this cultural dimension, Japan has a long-term orientation society as they have a notion of getting things done by doing one's best. Fatalism is normal that strange in Japanese culture; therefore, they take a more practical approach with that perspective. In Brazil, they have a mild long-term orientation. When it comes to considering the challenges of the future and present, they often consider two options that are practically approaching the issues or keep to respected traditions (Soh, 2017). Contrary, in the U.S, we have a short-term orientation tradition as we often have to analyze new information to determine if it is true. However, this does not imply that Americans are not practical. They are driven mainly by the mentality of "can do".
High-Low Context
High-low context describes a cultural dimension that either little express themselves through words or highly express themselves through their language (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). In Brazil, the country has a high-context culture that corresponds with the collectivist tradition. This is whereby silence, gestures, and facial expressions, and the relationship between the communicators have meaning (Engleberg & Wynn, 2015). In Japan, they also have high-context culture. In contrast, the Americans have a low-context culture in that they are often out-spoken and speak their mind more often.
Conclusion
Culture is understanding more than people's language and behaviors but interacting with people of different cultures with dignity and respect. Thus, intercultural communication is more of a process whereby it begins with self-awareness. It also entails accepting the variations in culture and as well adopting them. As the world's population is increasing, people frequently interact more; hence, intercultural communication facilitates communication and interaction with people of various cultures.
References
Engleberg, I. & Wynn, D. (2015). Think Communication: The Dimensions of Culture. Introduction to Speech Communication . Ed. 3, 47-52. https://www.pearson.com/us/higher-education/
Herold, D. & Lee, K. (2017). Cultural Relevance in Corporate Sustainability Management; Japan and Korea. Asian Journal of Sustainability and Social Responsibility . Vol.1, 1-18. Doi: 10:1186/s41180-016-0003-2.
Ilie, A. (2019). The Intercultural Competence. Developing Effective Intercultural Communication Skills. International Conference Knowledge . 25(2): 265-269.
Soh, C. (2016). Brazil: A Cross-Cultural Perspective for Global Managers. Journal of Cultural perspective . Vol. 2, 8-17. DOI: 10:13140/RG.2.215022.10564
