Cross-Cultural Relations - Essay Example

Cross Cultural Relations Most people work and live in familiar environment, in the surroundings we were brought up or places similar to this. Accordingly, people that we meet, work with and entertain, are similar to us, due to the fact that they have the same ethnic context, similar viewpoints and religion, the same framework of values, and the same language, that we speak. The experts describe it with the notion of “inhabiting a culturally homogeneous space”. (Hoerder) Despite life in familiar surroundings is usual for the majority of people, there are some exceptions to the rule. Since the beginning of the humankind history, there were many groups of people or individuals that moved to foreign countries for multiple purposes – for work, getting education, teaching someone, to entertain or just to change the place of residence. Diaries of the most famous travelers, such as Christopher Columbus and Marco Polo are full of descriptions devoted to what the scientists now call “culture contact”. (Hoerder) With rapid scientific and technological progress, advanced means of communication and transport, more and more people travel abroad, and the range of purposes they tend to achieve, enlarged as well. Many people now travel to share organizational and business experience, study abroad to come back home, many people travel just to see and study cultural background of other countries, some of them come to other countries with peace missions. Unfortunately, political and economical conditions in many countries of the world make many people move abroad as immigrants or refugees. But, regardless of the travel purposes, the notions of cultural contact and cultural shock are relevant for all categories of travelers. (Hoerder) Before examining this phenomenon it’s necessary to give a strict definition of it. At first, it’s necessary to mention that there are some titles to define this phenomenon: “cross cultural relations”, “between society culture-contact”, “cross-cultural interaction” etc. Here is the definition of this phenomenon provided by Bochner: “between society culture-contact refers to individuals who travel beyond their countries of origin for a particular purpose and for a specified period of time, and the relationships they establish with members of the host society”. (1986, p.23) There are also some necessary terms used to describe these relations, for instance “sojourner”. This term is used to refer to “culture travellers, indicating that they are temporary visitors intending to return home after achieving their aims”. (1986, p.33) On the contrary, people of the visited society are called “host-society members”. It’s evident that changing society background in any case demands some contact on personal level, when the representatives of various societies interact. From the part of sojourner it demands much effort to integrate into unusual social and cultural patterns. This may cause stress, especially in the case of immediate and unexpected transition, and this condition is defined by the specialists as “culture shock”.(Bochner) There are some concepts and approaches used to investigate the nature of this phenomenon. They are as follows: regional comparison, holocultural analysis, controlled comparison, and coding. Regional comparison was worked out by Driver and Kroeber. This approach lies in determination of cultural classification and then making assumptions about the processes of interconnection in the limits of one region of culture. Holocultural analysis is also called worldwide cross-cultural analysis. He was worked out by Tylor, Sumner, Keller and Murdock. Levinson describes it as a study “designed to test or develop a proposition through the statistical analysis of data on a sample of ten or more nonliterate societies from three or more geographical regions of the world” ( p.33). Within this concept cultural features are observed apart from cultural background in general, and then are compared with features of distinct cultures to find common features and differences in culture in its global sense. (Hoerder) Controlled comparison is applied to comparative studies of small size. One of the scientists, who worked out this approach, Eggan, assumed that “the combination of the anthropological concepts of ethnology with structure and function, allowing the researcher to pose more specific questions on a broader range of subjects” (qtd in Hoerder, p.36). Coding approach includes collecting information from two various sources – ethnographic sources and reports of HRAF files, or taking for consideration coded information from ethnographic sources, previously coded, or from other studies. (Hoerder) To make detailed picture of the observed phenomenon it’s necessary to give some details related to basic notions, related to the conception of cross cultural contact. The first of them is “within-society contact”. This term is used to describe relations that exist between ethnic groups in the society of multiple cultures. Prosperous and developed countries with multiple cultures represented may include various ethnic groups that are integrated into social pattern with the help of special institutions and arrangements that promote shared viewpoints and shape common feeling of being a united nation. USA is the example of such country. Since the early times of its history, a diversity of nations and cultures were introduced to the society. Under such social conditions people face with others, who may have quite different color skin, traditions, viewpoints and religion. In modern advanced societies with developed methods of providing successful inter-cultural contact, this process makes the lives of native population richer. (Furnham, 1986) The other term demanding detailed observation is “cultural shock”. Within the last 50 years, the number of travels abroad significantly increased. There are multiple reasons for it, including development of fast means of transport, like jumbo jet. In addition to speed, these new means of traveling made traveling abroad cheaper, easier, and, in turn, more available for many people. Global changes in economy also made this process faster. The process of globalization is much spoken about today, and this process refers to entertainment and education equally as to commerce and industry. According to the statistics, “in 1999 overseas assignments by United States companies exceeded 350,000 business persons, a figure that does not take into account all the other nations sending their executives abroad. It has been estimated that at any given time there are about a million and a half students and scholars attending educational institutions abroad. The figures for tourists are even greater: The World Tourism Organisation has projected that by the year 2010 the number of international tourist-related journeys will rise to a total of 940 million trips per year.” (Hoerder, p.98) The notion of cultural shock was first used by Kalervo Oberg, anthropologist, who applied it to describe people’s reaction to strange surroundings. The other scientists, that continued to study this condition, offer not to understand it literally: “that it reflects some of the feelings and experiences of travelers who suddenly find themselves in new, strange, or unfamiliar places. The unknown can be an uncomfortable and at times terrifying experience. However, the use of the word "shock" places too much emphasis on the threatening circumstances of contact with novel situations, without acknowledging that such experiences may also have beneficial consequences for the participants.” (Hoerder, p.88) There are some hypotheses regarded as the causes of culture shock condition. The first of them is the similarity-attraction hypothesis (Bochner). One of key findings in studies of social psychology was the fact that people are attracted by the people similar to them, and those who have little resemblance to us, call less degree of inclination. The notion of similarity is complicated, as there are many factors, determining resemblance. According to the results of the researches, human perception of each other has the major importance here. In other words, “individuals are more likely to seek out, enjoy, understand, want to work and play with, trust, vote for, and marry others with whom they share characteristics they regard as important” (Bochner). These characteristics include religion, viewpoints, physical appearance, language, age, nationality and many other aspects that make people differ from each other. It should be noted that people address perceived similarity, rather than actual. This perceived similarity derives from definite features, like skin color, clothes, accent or any other visible elements. There is a special term meaning attraction of people that have similar mind, “in-group bias”. The theory which this term is related to, is based upon the evidence that feeling of similarity, caused by another individual is reassuring. There are multiple choices that the surrounding world suggests to people. There are no strict schemes of behavior in this or that situation, and this is unpleasant for the individual. As the result, this individual starts to find proof to his actions in people around. This process of seeking for behavioral pattern in other people is called “consensual validation”. This process leads to mutual feeling of satisfaction with the behavior of the self, that the person experiences. The dissimilar individual, on the contrary, destroys personal feeling of security. (Ward, C., Bochner, S., & Furnham) The next assumption is hypothesis of the culture-distance. The researches showed that with increasing cultural distance between two individuals, the probability of establishing harmonious relationship between them decreases. This effect was true for various categories of sojourners, for instance, students who came from abroad, guest-workers, tourists. It was noted that they revealed a less degree of successful activity compared to their habitual surroundings. Besides, culture distance affected communication, and this is also an important issue. (Ward, C., Bochner, S., & Furnham) The third hypothesis concerning factors producing cultural shock is entitled as “differences in core values”. It is known that interrelations between the representatives of the societies, representing opposition on core values are often hostile. Example here may be the opposition of the western and eastern world regarding the question of women’s role in the society. This problem leads to multiple conflicts between the representatives of Middle East and the West. (Ward, C., Bochner, S., & Furnham) As for successful strategies of overcoming condition of cultural shock and establishing successful inter-cultural contact, the psychologists’ advise the following: it’s necessary to remember some important issues while living in strange environment. It’s necessary that the person keep its identity integrated. This person should think over positive moments of being in strange surroundings. This person should also be aware that the time for adaptation is needed, and patience will make this term shorter. Some time for relaxation is also necessary. It’s necessary to be open to constructivism and dialogue. Flexibility will be helpful in any situation that may occur. Sometimes some kind of hobby or habitual activity as swimming or skating may be helpful to improve emotional condition of sojoumer. It will be useful and helpful if the person tries to learn more about new culture – and it is better done with the help of native speakers. Learning the language and participating in some community activities make the process of adaptation easier and painless. (Hoerder) All the methods, mentioned above will be useful for any person, visiting foreign country, regardless of the purpose. It’s evident that successful integration into strange society depends mainly on the type of human personality. Sociable and flexible persons are more likely to integrate into new society without much effort. They may instinctively use the methods described above. But introvert identities will also have success if they study these methods and use them. As the researches and theoretical conceptions demonstrate, the notion of cultural shock doesn’t necessarily mean something negative, this condition always has positive features in it, and successful adaptation in new society depends mainly upon the person and his desire to become a part of new social pattern. References Hoerder, D. (2002). Cultures in Contact: World Migrations in the Second Millennium. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Furnham, A., and Bochner, S. (1986). (Reprinted 1989, 1990, 1994). Culture shock: Psychological reactions to unfamiliar environments. London: Methuen. Levinson, D. (1977). A Guide to Social Theory: Worldwide Cross-Cultural Tests. volume I - Introduction, New Haven, Connecticut, Human Relations Area Files. Ward, C., Bochner, S., & Furnham, A. (2001). The psychology of culture shock. Second edition. Hove, UK: Routledge. Read More