Manual for Students
.pdf2.Davis O. I. In the Kitchen: Transforming the Academy through Safe Spaces of Resistance / Olga I. Davis // Western Journal of Communication. – 1999. – No. 63 (3). – P. 364 – 381.
3.Eibl-Eibesfeldt I. Social Interactions in an Ethological, CrossCultural Perspective / Irenaus Eibl-Eibesfeldt // Cross-cultural Perspectives in Non-Verbal Communication. – Lewiston, 1988. – P. 107 – 130.
4.Freeley T. H. Humans as Lie Detectors: Some More Second Thoughts / Thomas H. Freeley, Marcus J. Young // Communication Quarterly. – 1998. – No. 46. – P. 109 – 126.
5.Fussell P. Class: A Guide through the American Status System / Paul Fussell. – New York : Columbia University Press, 1992. – P. 82.
6.Gudykunst W. B. Communicating With Strangers: An Approach to Intercultural Communication / William B. Gudykunst, Stella TingToomey. – New York : McGraw-Hill, 2003. – P. 95.
7.Hall E. T. Beyond Culture / Edvard T. Hall. – New York : Garden City, 1976. – P. 75.
8.Hasegawa T. Silence in Japan and the United States / Toki Hasegawa, William Gudykunst // Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology. – 1998. – No. 29. – P. 668 – 684.
9.Marsiglia F. F. Personal and Interpersonal Interventions / Fernando F. Marsiglia, Michael L. Hecht // Communicating Prejudice. – London : Thousand Oaks, 1998. – P. 287 – 301.
10.Martin J. N. Intercultural Communication in Contexts / Judith N. Martin, Tomas Nakayama. – New York : McGraw Hill Higher Education, 2000. – P. 236.
11.Matsumoto D. Cultural Influences on Facial Expressions of Emotions / David Matsumoto // Southern Communication Journal. – 1990. – No. 56. – P. 128 – 137.
12.Preston D. Sociolinguistics and Second Language Acquisition / Dennis Preston. – Oxford : Blackwell, 1989. – P. xi.
13.Proust M. Swann in Love: Remembrance of Things Past / Michele Proust. – New York : Harper Collins, 1981. – P. 462.
14.Vande Berg L. R. An Introduction to the Special Issue on “Spaces” / Leah R. Vande Berg // Western Journal of Communication. – 1999. – No. 63 (3). – P. 249.
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-6-
UNDERSTANDING INTERCULTURALTRANSITIONS
Overview
In this chapter we will look more specifically at how we move between cultural contexts. People travel across cultural boundaries for many reasons: for work, study, or adventure, or in response to political or other events. The pattern of migration has tremendous implications for intercultural communication. Migration is changing the makeup of population everywhere – and migration does not have to be defined in terms of crossing national borders. For example, Сhina has the largest rural-to-urban migration, and Asia in general has substantial intraregional migrations (e.g., Thais migrating to Taiwan for jobs). Singapore has a million foreign workers among its 2.1 million workers. Thailand also has substantial numbers of foreign workers.And the same thing is happening in Europe: Britain and France each have 7% foreign-born population immigrants now constitute nearly 10% of Germany’s population. And 17% of residents in Canada are foreign-born [12, p. 264].
The oil-exporting Middle East countries have huge numbers оf foreign workers (e.g., 70% of the labor force in Saudi Arabia in 2000), but they also have 45% of the world’s refugees [ibid.]. In contrast, some regions are losing more people than they are gaining – many African and Caribbean nations have more emigration than immigration. Reductions in a region’s population also have implications for intercultural communication. For example, the “brain drain” from Africa has resulted in many youngAfricans seeking education abroad and then settling there, depriving their home countries of needed educational and technological expertise [ibid.].
We begin this chapter by discussing characteristics of three groups of travelers (migrants). We will define culture shock and examine how migrants resist or adapt to new cultural contexts. Using a dialectical framework, we will also identify four ways in which migrants and hosts can relate. Then we will turn our attention to the individual experience of dealing with cultural transitions. We will identify four models of individual adaptation: 1) the anxiety and uncertainty management model;
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2) the U-curve model; 3) the transition model; 4) the communication system model. Finally, we will explore the relationship between identity, context, and adaptation, and examine the contexts of intercultural transitions.
Topics covered include: Types of Migrant Groups; Culture Shock; Migrant-Host Relationships; CulturalAdaptation; Identity andAdaptation; Intercultural Transitions.
Key words: Assimilation, Cultural Adaptation, Culture Shock, Explanatory Uncertainty, Integration, Intercultural Identity, Marginalization, Multicultural Identity, Predictive Uncertainty, Segregation, Separation, Transnationalism, U-Curve Theory, W-Curve Theory.
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6.1 Types of Migrant Groups
To understand cultural transitions, we must simultaneously consider both the individual migrant groups and the contexts in which they travel. Migration may be long-term or short-term and voluntary or involuntary. A migrant is an individual who leaves the primary cultural contexts in which he or she was raised and moves to a new cultural context for an extended period [1, p. 17]. For instance, exchange students, sojourns are relatively short-term and voluntary, and these transitions occur within a structured sociopolitical context. Cultural transitions may vary in length and in degree of voluntariness.
6.1.1 Voluntary Migrants
According to Thomas Nakayama and Judith Martin, there are two groups of voluntary travelers: sojourners and immigrants [12, p. 261]. Sojourners are those travelers who move into new cultural contexts for a limited time and a specific purpose. They are often people who have freedom and the means to travel. This includes international students who go abroad to study and technical assistance workers, corporate personnel who go abroad to work for a specific period. Some domestic sojourners move from one region to another within their own country for a limited time to attend school or work.
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Another type of voluntary traveler is the immigrant. Families that voluntarily leave one country to settle in another exemplify this type of migrant. There is often a fluid and interdependent relationship between the countries that send and those that receive immigrants. Countries like the United States and Germany welcome working immigrants, even issuing special visas and developing programs during times of economic prosperity. Currently, there are only five major countries that officially welcome international migrants as permanent residents: the United States, Canada, Australia, Israel and New Zealand. Altogether, these countries accept 1.2 million immigrants a year, a small percentage of the estimated annual global immigration – and these countries can quickly restrict immigration during economic downturns [3]. However, most migrants who move to another country are not accepted as official immigrants. And due to shifts in economic and political policy, family members of migrants may be trapped in the home country, unable to join the rest of the family in the new home country.
International migration is a global fact of life in the XXI century. According to the Population Reference Bureau, at least 160 million people were living outside their country of birth or citizenship in 2000, an increase of about 25% since 1990. Most of this international migration occurs not from developing countries to industrialized countries but from one developing country to another. The voluntariness of immigration is more variable than absolute. Some migrants feel that they have a choice in moving whereas others may not. The decision to migrate usually is made while other factors intervene. The three main reasons that people migrate are asylum seeking, family reunification, and economics [4, p. 3].
6.1.2 Involuntary Migrants
There are two types of migrants who move involuntarily: long-term refugees and short-term refugees [12, p. 262].According to one estimate, 14 million people have left their home countries since 1979 because of superpower struggles (e.g., in the USSR, Afghanistan, Angola, and Cambodia) and, more recently, because of internal ethnic strife (e.g., in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda) [4, p. 5]. Long-term refugees are those forced to relocate permanently because of war, famine, and
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oppression. Long-term refugees include those who left Rwanda during the war in 1993, and the war in the former Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s.
The following article describes the experience of one group of shortterm refugees – the thousands of Native American youths who were taken from their homes and sent to “boarding schools” from the 1880s through the 1960s. Richard Pratt, a zealous army officer, spearheaded this movement, believing that removing these children from their culture would force their assimilation into mainstream society:
Whether toddlers or teens, they were taken from home and shipped thousands of miles to dreary barracks. Their hair was cut, they were given new names, and each was assigned a number. The United States government began their brutal attempt at social engineering in 1879. Breaking rebellious Indians by indoctrinating their children inAnglo ways was considered a cost-effective alternative to war. But the personal cost to native Americans was incalculable.
They were literally kidnapped, loaded on wagons or trains, and all of them thought at any moment they were going to die. When the children arrived at the schools, it was the first time they’d been away from home.
Contagious diseases often swept through the schools, and exposure to the elements took the lives of many runaways. For decades, there was little criticism of this abusive program, from a nation steeped in dime novels about “the savage Indian”. Instead, magazines such as Harper’s Weekly praised the schools. Vocational training was central to the boarding-school mission. Indian teens worked at various tasks – girls setting tables and cooking meals, boys repairing shoes or pushing wheelbarrows.
Pratt’s misguided vision was never fully realized, as most children eventually returned to their families and old ways of life. By the 1960s, tribes wrestled control of the schools away from the federal government. Today, only four boarding schools remain, and attendance is voluntary [12, p. 14].
6.2 Culture Shock
Individuals face many challenges of transition in new cultural contexts. Culture shock is a relatively short-term feeling of disorientation,
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of discomfort due to the unfamiliarity of surroundings and the lack of familiar cues in the environment. Kalvero Oberg, the anthropologist who coined the term, suggests that it is like a disease, complete with symptoms (excessive hand washing, irritability, and so on). If it is treated properly (that is, if the migrant learns the language, makes friends, and so on), the migrant can “recover”, or adapt to the new cultural situation and feel at home [15, p. 180].
Although most individuals experience culture shock during the period of transition to a new culture, they are less likely to experience it if they maintain separateness because culture shock presumes cultural contact. Almost all migrants who cross cultural boundaries, whether voluntarily or not, experience culture shock. They then face a long-term process of more or less adapting to the new culture. However, for many individuals, the long-term adaptation is not easy. Some people actively resist assimilation in the short term. For example, many students from Muslim countries, especially females, often continue to wear traditional clothing while living in other countries, thus actively resisting participating in a host popular culture. Others resist assimilation in the long term, as is the case with some religious groups; like the buddhists or hinduists in foreign countries. Some would like to assimilate but are not welcome in the new culture, as is the case with many immigrants to the United States from Latin America. And some people adapt to some aspects of the new culture but not to others. In sum, the relationship between host society and migrants is complicated. Continuing with the theme of the personalcontextual dialectic, let us look at how hosts and migrants can relate.
The majority of individuals and families that emigrate from other countries have the ability to positively confront the obstacles of a new environment. Dr. Carmen Guanipa, a psychologist, suggests specific ways to combat stress produced by culture shock:
–develop a hobby;
–learn to include a regular form of physical activity in your routine. This will help combat the sadness and loneliness in a constructive manner;
–practice relaxation and meditation. These are proven to be very positive for people who are passing through periods of stress;
–maintain contact with your ethnic group. This will give you a feeling of belonging and will reduce your feelings of loneliness and alienation;
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–maintain contact with the new culture. Learn the language. Volunteer in community activities that allow you to practice the language you are learning. This will help you feel less stress about language and useful at the same time;
–allow yourself to feel sad about the things that you have left behind; your family, your friends, etc;
–recognize the sorrow of leaving your old country. Accept the new country. Focus your power on getting through the transition;
–pay attention to relationships with your family and at work. They will serve as support for you in difficult times;
–find ways to live with the things that do not satisfy you 100%;
–if you feel stressed, look for help. There is always someone or some service available to help you [5].
6.3Migrant-Host Relationships
There are four ways in which migrants may relate to their new cultures: they can assimilate, remain separate, integrate or become marginalized.
6.3.1 Assimilation
In an assimilation mode, the individual does not want to maintain an isolated cultural identity but wants to maintain relationships with other groups in the new culture. And the migrant is more or less welcomed by the new cultural hosts. When this course is freely chosen by everyone, it creates the archetypal “melting pot”. The central focus in assimilation is not on retaining one’s cultural heritage. Many immigrant groups, particularly those from Europe, follow this mode of adapting in North America. For them, assimilating may not require adjusting to new customs. The same religions dominate, eating practices (the use of forks, knives, and spoons) are the same, and many other cultural practices, originated in Europe are already familiar. However, when the dominant group forces assimilation, especially on immigrants whose customs are different from those of the host society, it creates a “pressure cooker” [13, p. 273]. This mode of relating
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often entails giving up or losing many aspects of the original culture, including language.
As Ukraine is not exposed to significant emigration, again we have to look at other countries’ experience in dealing assimilation process of numerous incoming ethnic groups. A recent study of African Americans and Hispanic Americans showed the effects of society’s pressure on groups to assimilate.According to the study, the more experiences people had with ethnic or racial discrimination (on the job, in public settings, in housing, and in dealings with police), the less importance they assigned to maintaining their own cultural heritage. This suggests that heavy doses of discrimination can discourage retention of immigrants’ original cultural practices.
6.3.2 Separation
There are two forms of separation. The first is when migrants choose to retain their original culture and avoid interaction with other groups. This is the mode followed by groups like the Amish, who came to the United States from Europe in the XVIII century. They maintain their own way of life and identity and avoid prolonged contact with other groups. Many strict religious groups actively resist the influence of the dominant society. The Amish, for example, do not participate in U.S. popular culture; they do not have television or radio, do not go to movies or read mainstream newspapers or books. An important point here is that these groups choose separation, and the dominant society respects their choice [11, p. 273].
However, if such separation is initiated and enforced by the dominant society, the condition constitutes a second type of separation, segregation. Many cities and states in the United States historically had quite restrictive codes that dictated where members of various racial and ethnic groups could and could not live. For example, Oregon passed legislation in 1849 excluding Blacks from the state; it was not repealed until 1926 [7, p. 74]. Some people, realizing that they have been excluded from the immigrant advancement version of the melting pot by legal or informal discriminatory practices, in turn promote a separate mode of relating to the host culture. They may demand group rights and recognition but not assimilation.
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6.3.3 Integration
Integration occurs when migrants have an interest both in maintaining their original culture and language and in having daily interactions with other groups. This differs from assimilation in that it involves a greater interest in maintaining one’s own cultural identity. Immigrants can resist assimilation in many ways – for example, by insisting on speaking their own language in their home.
Migrant communities can actively resist assimilation in many ways. They may refuse to consume popular culture products (TV, radio, movies) or the fashions of the host society, often for many generations. In any case, integration depends on the openness and willingness of those in the dominant society to accept the cultures of others.
6.3.4 Marginalization
Marginalization occurs when individuals or groups express little interest in maintaining cultural ties with either the dominant culture or the migrant culture. This situation of being out of touch with both cultures may be the result of actions by the dominant society – for example, when the U.S. government forced Native Americans to live apart from other members of their nations. However, the term marginalization has come to describe, more generally, individuals who live on the margin of a culture, not able to participate fully in its political and social life as a result of cultural differences.
6.3.5 Combined Modes of Relating
Immigrants and their families often combine these four different modes of relating to the host society – for example, integrating in some areas of life and assimilating in others. They may desire economic assimilation (via employment), linguistic integration (bilingualism), and social separation (marrying someone from the same group and socializing only with members of their own group). In some families, individual members choose different paths of relating to the larger culture. This can cause tensions when children want to assimilate and
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parents prefer a more integrative mode. This was true of the high school students in Falls Church, Virginia, referred to at the beginning of the chapter. When asked what they thought about the cultural rules that their parents tried to enforce, the Sikh students said they rebelled when their parents would not let them cut their hair. Some of the Muslim girls argued with their parents about what kinds of dresses they could wear. And some of the Asian students rejected their parents’ decree that they marry another Asian.
As these experiences indicate, one of the more difficult aspects of adaptation involves religion. How do immigrants pass on their religious beliefs to their children in a host country with very different religious traditions? Or should they? Aporva Dave, an honors student at Brown University, was curious about this question and conducted (along with another student) a study as an honors thesis. He interviewed members of South Asian Indian families that, like his own, had immigrated to the United States. He was curious about how strictly the parents followed the Hindu religion, how strongly they wanted their children to practice Hinduism in the future, and how the children felt about following the religious practices of their parents. In general, as expected, the children had a tendency to move away from the traditional practices of Hinduism, placing more emphasis on Hindu values than on Hindu practices (e.g., prayer). Although many of the parents themselves prayed daily, most were more concerned that their children adopt the morals and values of Hinduism. The parents seemed to understand that assimilation requires a move away from strict Hindu practices. Most viewed Hinduism as a progressing, “living” religion that would change but not be lost.And many spoke of Hinduism as becoming more attractive as a religion of the future generation [12, p. 277].
However, the study also revealed that children raised in the same house could have very different attitudes toward adaptation and religion. For example, two sisters who participated in the study were raised with “moderately” religious parents who worship weekly, read religious articles, and spend much time thinking about God. One sister followed the traditions of the parents: she prays every day, spends time reading religious scriptures, and is committed to marrying a Hindi. The other sister does not practice Hinduism and places emphasis on love in making a marriage
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