culture and identity

Question 1

what is culture

Answer 1

• the ongoing negotiation of learned and patterned beliefs, attitudes, values and behaviour
• negotiation: it is fluid, rules stay and change based on the types of people
• learned and patterned e.g. Korean kids bowing out of respect

Question 2

levels that cultures exist at

Answer 2

• from macro to micro

cultural institutions, standpoints, speech communities

Question 3

cultural institutions

Answer 3

culture defined by nationality, religion or ethnic heritage

• expansive -> difficult to escape
• but you can choose to immerse in a different culture and change your nationality
• macro

Question 4

standpoints

Answer 4

culture defined by shared life experiences

• a shared position from which people see the world based on their society
• can be created based on people’s age / economic class by access to education / jobs
• micro macro

Question 5

speech communities

Answer 5

developed among people with regular contact with each other and have shared norms and values

• similar ways of interpreting and using symbols
• arises when people live, study or work together -> shared experiences, norms and communication practices
• can be considered subcultures
• develop when people communicate with each other directly

Question 6

how cultures form and change

Answer 6

selectivity
- cultures are distinct because cultural groups have selected different behaviours, beliefs and practices as meaningful

shared with new members
- “socialisation”: the process by which newcomers come to understand a culture’s assumptions and guidelines

changes over time

• ways of thinking, feeling, behaving that define a culture evolve overtime
• “invention”: development of new cultural practices (e.g. revolution, experience like covid)
• “diffusion”: when a society adopts the cultural practices of another group

Question 7

classifying culture: power distance index

Answer 7

high
- acceptance of a hierarchical order in which everybody has a place and which needs no further justification

low
- people strive to equalise the distribution of power and demand justification for inequalities of power

Question 8

classifying culture: individualism vs collectivism

Answer 8

individualism
- a preference for a loosely-knit social framework

collectivism
- tightly-knit framework in society

Question 9

classifying culture: masculinity versus femininity

Answer 9

masculinity
- preference in society for achievement, heroism, assertiveness and material rewards for success

femininity
- stands for a preference for cooperation, modesty, caring for the weak and quality of life

Question 10

classifying culture: uncertainty avoidance index

Answer 10

high
- maintains rigid codes of belief and behaviour and are intolerant of unorthodox behaviour and ideas

low
- societies maintain a more relaxed attitude in which practice counts more than principles

Question 11

classifying culture: long term orientation versus short term normative orientation

Answer 11

high
- pragmatic approach, they encourage thrift and efforts in modern education as a way to prepare for the future

low
- societies prefer to maintain time-honoured traditions and norms while viewing societal change with suspicion

Question 12

culture shapes communication

Answer 12

speech code

• culturally grounded system of symbols, rules for interpretation and assumptions that people create to accomplish communication
• created through social interaction and within particular situations, their meanings are both complicated and flexible
• “Communication as a local practice instilled with and guided by the cultural particularities of a given speech community.”

Question 13

communication reflects culture

Answer 13

messages people create reveal their culture → acts of communications reflect a cultural group’s way of thinking, assumptions about human relationships and strategies for living

boundary marker
- messages that indicate when an action is inappropriate or off-limits within the cultural group

myths
- sacred stories about heroes or villains that embed cultural themes

rituals
- carefully scripted performances that mark culturally significant events

Question 14

intercultural communication

Answer 14

occurs when interaction is guided by the participants’ memberships in different social groups, rather than their unique qualities as individuals → changing the way you communicate based on your knowledge or stereotypes about a partner’s cultural group

Question 15

communication accommodation theory

Answer 15

describes how cultural group memberships influence interpersonal interactions

• characteristics of the participants’ speech can become more similar to each other ⇒
  reflect a desire to increase connection, signal willingness to bridge cultural gap
• characteristics of the participants’ speech can become more distinct to each other ⇒
  reflects a desire to decrease connection

Question 16

barriers to effective intercultural communication

Answer 16

ethnocentrism
- tendency to seeing one’s own cultural beliefs and practices as more correct, appropriate, or moral than those of other cultures

uncertainty and anxiety
- uncertainty refers to a lack of knowledge about the person’s traits, expectations and customs; anxiety is a negative emotional state that arises when you feel uneasy, worried or apprehensive

anxiety/uncertainty management theory

marginalisation

• tendency to treat less dominant groups as inferior or unimportant
• influential cultural groups have the power to determine the communication norms and values for the whole society
• marginalisation makes cultural differences more pronounced (they are magnified by power differences) hence it is a barrier to effective intercultural communication
• when marginalised members of a society communicate with members of the dominant group they are forced to adapt to the very values and norms that marginalise them

Question 17

how to create a single story

Answer 17

show this person as one thing and one thing only, over and over again

impossible to talk about a single story without the word “power”

power: to tell the story of another person and to make it the definitive story of that person

the single story creates stereotypes: incomplete

Question 18

communication between men and women

Answer 18

sex: whether a person is biologically male or female
gender: one’s internalised psychological orientation toward masculine or feminine traits, or
how one is socialised to be a man or woman (Internalised through social institutions; “learned”)

men and women have different life experiences that can foster distinct cultural values and practices
- from infancy and childhood – mothers and fathers talk more or less and talk differently to their sons and daughters, choosing to use harsher or gentler language; young children prefer to socialise with peers of the same gender

• dating – men and women are expected to play distinct roles in the mating game (e.g. men are expected to initiate first dates, plan activities, drive, pay for expenses, and initiate sexual intimacy); men and women have different ways about how they talk about their dating relationships to others
• work relationships – men and women confront unique communication challenges (encounter different expectations) and perceive meanings differently at work (e.g. women expected to be submissive polite and other-focused; men expected to be assertive, use their dominance to influence decisions and provide leadership, and to talk about their own strength)

Question 19

race

Answer 19

is it biologically determined or just a social construct?

biological basis

• some biological differences among human in genes, melanin accumulation, skull shape, etc
• differences exist on a continuum
• regardless of race, 99% of DNA is same

Social construct

• many argue that race is a social construct, not a biological one
• product of historical and contemporary social, economic, educational, and political circumstances
• becomes a marker around the time of European colonial expansion in the 1500s, Western Europeans travelled met those different from them
• perceived differences used as justification for colonialization, enslavement, genocide, exploitation
• “Categories” may not be biological

Question 20

cultural relativism

Answer 20

refers to not judging a culture to our own standards of what is right or wrong, strange or normal. Instead, we should try to understand cultural practices of other groups in its own cultural context