Lecture 2(for Students)

Lecture 2

Communication and Culture The Voice and the Echo Culture and communication, although two different concepts, are directly linked. They can not be separated. As Smith noted, “Whenever people interact they communicate. To live in a society, and maintain their culture they have to communicate.”

Communication

I. Defining Communication

?Complexity of Communication

?Intentional and Unintentional Behavior

?Components of Communication

1) Communication Is a Dynamic Process

2) Communication Is Systemic

3) Attribution of Meaning

4) Communication Is Symbolic

II. Characteristics of Communication

?No Direct Mind-to-Mind Contact

?We Can Only Infer

?We Seek to Define the World

?Communication Is Self-Reflective

?The Brain Is an Open System

?Communication Has a Consequence

?We Are Alike and We Are Different

Understanding Culture

I.Basic Function of Culture

1. Culture makes all things easy. (Fuller – English writer)

Two reasons:

1) Culture makes the world a less mysterious and frightening place.

2) Culture makes life less confusing because most of culture is automatic and subconscious.

2. Cultures are people’s primary means of satisfying three types of needs.

1) basic needs

2) derived needs

3) integrative needs

II. Definition of Culture

For our purposes, we are concerned with those definitions that include how culture and communication are linked together.

We define culture as the deposit of knowledge, experience, beliefs, values, attitudes, meanings, class, religion, timing, roles, spatial relationships, concepts of

the universe, and material objects acquired by a group of people in the course of generations through individual and group striving.

III.Characteristics of Culture

1. Culture Is Learned

In fact “the group’s knowledge stored up for future use” is at the core of the concept of culture.

We learn our culture in many ways and from a variety of sources.

1) We learn our culture through proverbs.

2) We learn our culture from folk tales, legends, and myths.

3) We learn our culture through art.

4)We learn our culture through mass media.

2. Culture Is Transmitted from Generation to Generation.

Communication makes culture a continuous process.

3. Culture is Based on Symbols.

Human culture without language is unthinkable. The emergence of language was the very step that made culture system.

Culture can use spoken word and written word as a symbol.

4. Culture is Subject to Change.

There are three most common culture changes.

1) innovation

2) diffusion

3) acculturation

5. Culture is Integrated.

Culture is systemic just like communication.

As Hall said, “You touch a culture in one place and everything else is affected.”

6. Culture is Ethnocentric.

Ethnocentrism: one’s own group is the center of everything.

Anthropologists generally agree that ethnocentrism is found in every culture.

7. Culture is Adaptive.

Culture is change, and culture is adaptive.

IV. Conclusion of Culture

From this section we conclude the pull of culture is very strong and culture is a powerful influence on our life.

Hall concluded that “There is not one aspect of human life that is not touched and altered by culture.” Culture is everything and everywhere

Intercultural Communication

I. Definition

Intercultural communication is communication between people whose cultural perceptions and symbol systems are distinct enough to alter the communication

event.

II. Forms of Intercultural Communication

?Interracial Communication occurs when source and receiver are from different

races.

?Interethnic communication refers to situations in which the parties are of the

same race but of different ethnic origins.

?Intracultural communication is communication between members of the same

culture, including racial, ethnic, and other co-cultures.

III. Elements of Intercultural Communication

1) One elements of intercultural communication is perception, “the process by which an individual selects, evaluates, and organizes stimuli from the external world.” Cultural perceptions are based on beliefs, values, and attitude systems.

2) Another intercultural element is verbal processes: how we talk to each other and think.

3) Nonverbal processes, the third element, involve the use of actions to communicate. The meanings of these actions shift from culture to culture.

4) The context of the communication event is influenced by culture.

Assignment

I. Answer the following questions

1. Could you provide examples to illustrate the characteristics of culture?

2. Explain the statement and give examples to explain it: “In stud ying other cultures, we do so from the perspective of our own culture"?

3. How do you understand the statement “We are the only species that can simultaneously be at both ends of the camera”?

4. Why “the brain is an open system”?

5. Explain the statement “people are alike, and people are different” relates to intercultural communication.

6. What is intercultural communication? What are the forms of intercultural communication? Give some examples of intercultural communication.

II. Explain the following terms:

Culture Co-culture Ethnocentrism Acculturation

Enculturation Innovation Diffusion Assimilation

Communication Intercultural communication

Interracial Communication Interethnic communication

Intracultural communication