FOSTERING INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Here’s a video that I found on Intercultural Communication. It mainly mentions the parts that were covered by Grace and Qu Kui’s peer teaching session on the 6 fundamentals patterns of cultural difference and the 4 cultural dimensions. The video’s quite long, but the music’s rather enjoyable. :P This video gives us different perspectives by the East and the West. It also mentions about the individualism/collectivist mindset that each culture from the West and East has, respectively, through quotes.

In the past, I used to think that intercultural communication is only limited to how people of different nationalities or races interact with each other. Well, there's the phrase "Workplace culture", but I hardly associate it as "culture culture".  This peer teaching session has really broadened my perspective on the word "Culture"!

Context

The situation occurred on a school day, during our break. Two of my close friends, Iris and Miranda were conversing with 2 of their classmates. At that time, several of my classmates started converting their religion to a certain religion due to the well-persuasions of the proselytisers. I shall refer to that religion as R for simplicity's sake. It was almost turning into a trend where a lot of people I knew started converting to R.  

Iris, who was of another religion, was their next target in their bid to spread more of their religion's message and in gaining more followers.  Miranda was a new convert at that point in time.

Description

As persuasion involves elucidating the benefits of the object/subject that one is trying to induce another to like or accept, Miranda and the other 2 classmates, who were followers of R as well, were enthusiastically telling Iris all about how good their religion was.

They were very caught up in their praises of their religion and the divine beings involved that they did not seem to notice the discomfort that Iris was displaying. Iris was fidgeting throughout their dialogue, while trying to be as polite as possible when answering their queries. I forgot what the exact questions were, but it was in line of trying to get Iris to accept their beliefs.

They were rapidly asking Iris questions in order to get her to think about how accepting R would be beneficial to her. Meanwhile, Iris tried to rebut their questions in a roundabout manner which involved finding 'loopholes' in their questioning and trying to reject their attempts to convert her without offending any of them.

It went on for quite some time, and nearing the end of the dialogue Iris' mouth was fixed in a rigid line. Iris then went home after quite some time as Miranda and the other classmates had other commitments to attend to.

Their Possible Interpretation

As Iris was smiling, albeit having a weak smile during the conversation, Miranda and other classmates may have thought that Iris is receptive to their reasoning. Furthermore, Iris was responding to their questions, so they might have gotten the impression that Iris could be persuaded to convert to R if they answered her questions thoroughly.

My  Intepretation

Iris wanted to politely reject their attempts of converting her, since she wanted to maintain the friendship with Miranda and the other 2 classmates. Yet, she was responding to their questions by finding loopholes in their questioning and questioning them back in return to show her disagreement with their points.

Miranda was trying hard to be respectful to them and the religion discussed, but she couldn't rein in her disapproval enough to halt the situation.

Evaluation

Other than simply going on and on about how good their religion is, perhaps Miranda and the two other classmates could have taken note of Iris' negative body language. Upon knowing the negative body language exhibited, they could have then backed down and eased the tension between them.

What I would have done in that situation

I would have listened to them, and pointed out the areas that I agree with. I would find that even though I may not agree with everything that they say, but as long as I respond to a mildly interested yet in a noncommittal manner, usually their enthusiasm wouldn't reach an overly high stage where it drags on and on. It seems to me that people tend to get more excited when you disagree with them, or agree with them completely via monosyllables. So I suppose we reply in moderation? :P



Resume & Application Letter

Greetings! The pictures below consist of my resume and application letter. Please feel free to give your most critical comments! :P For my application letter, some parts are underlined in red as it seems weird to me, but I'm not quite sure how to edit it to a better form. I will be extremely grateful if you can help me rectify the errors (if there are any)!

Thank you!

-REMOVED!-



Resolving Interpersonal Conflict

The person whom I have the most fights with is my mother. I believe it is because my mother is a housewife, and we see each other too much. Hence the phrase ‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder’ would apply to us quite aptly.

The frequency of fighting has lessened since, and most of the reasons of past fights have been forgotten, but a topic that we used to fight about most is about the television. Yes. It is as ridiculous as it sounds. We fought because of the selection of television programmes.

Since I am usually in the living room, I would promptly switch on the television and grab the remote control to change the channel to the one that I desire to watch first.

Trigger for the conflict: My mother wanted to watch another channel at the same time, but I refused to relent because I was the one that got to the remote control first. Being rather hot-headed, I responded impudently that offended her even further.

In the end, my mother got to watch the programme that she wanted to and I ‘earned’ a cold war from fighting with her about the issue.

Feelings generated: Anger and Resentment from both sides. To me, watching a television programme is considered as entertainment for me after hitting the books. For my mother, it is a similar situation.

What I have learnt:

1.     Choose my battles wisely by thinking about the consequences. Fighting over every single issue would result in deteriorating the relationship of the individuals involved. If it’s not such a serious issue, I should not push forward with my point aggressively.

2.     Compromising is key. Nowadays, if my mother wants to watch a certain programme that clashes with mine, I'll wait for the re-run or watch it online.

3.     Resolving the conflict not only mends the rift between two individuals, it also makes the people around us happier. For example, when two people in the family are having a conflict, it would create a tense atmosphere in the air, affecting the moods of others in the family. This is because everyone is trying to tip-toe around those involved and avoid from being drawn into the conflict.

4.     Empathy is important in understanding how to avoid conflicts. In this case, we failed to understand each other’s stand and hence ended up quarrelling and having a cold war.

5.     Resist from knee-jerk reactions, such as responding rudely to someone you are having a conflict with. As tempting it may sound, it would only end up driving a deeper wedge between the parties involved.

One thing I’m not so sure about:

Usually, when I have a conflict with anyone, I am always the one that takes the initiative to mend rifts, even if I am not the one that is at blame entirely. For example, as most of my conflicts with people result in ‘cold wars’, I will be the one that speaks to the other party first.

               

Sometimes, it seems like I am the one that’s treasuring the relationship more. What would you do if you were in my place?

References: Google Images, Someecards.com

Importance of effective communication

Ever since we were born, the ability to communicate with people effectively has been a crucial skill to cultivate. No man is a lone island, and in order to get things done, we should know how to communicate successfully with people. To me, a person who is an effective communicator will be able to express themselves in a manner that mostly:

1. Can cross inter-cultural boundaries, seeing that we live in a globalised world where we encounter people from different countries

2. Involves explaining/writing things concisely

3. Leaves people a good impression of them (through their speech, dressing and mannerisms)

4. Can diffuse a tense situation while getting out unscathed. Well, mostly unscathed.

Unfortunately, I have a habit of putting my foot in my mouth or being verbose, often resulting in my friends misconstruing what I really want to express. As such, I often find myself having to reiterate what I said so that my friends understand what I am saying, as they do not immediately understand what I was trying to convey. Furthermore, I feel that my conversational skills (which includes listening) leave much to be desired. Sometimes, I really wonder if I'm having an actual conversation or a monologue during a 'conversation' with friends.


During my pre-university days, we often have to embark on projects. From these projects, I have learnt that different communication channels should be employed for different occasions.

Usually, if we did not meet up for discussions, we would send emails with instructions to each other on what to do. However, as these emails were lengthy and our peers do not check their emails very often, the message was not delivered properly.

Hence, this brings us to the importance of bringing 7Cs into the equation. I have to be clearer in expressing my ideas, be more succinct and be more polite. Furthermore, I have to be more aware of the psychological barriers to effective communication such as:
1. Whether the person is interested in what I'm saying or not/situation of the target audience
2. Fear or some other factors, resulting in the wrong choice of channel for communication.

Currently, I am aspiring to be either a teacher or to be involved in a job that involves working with people often. Mainly because I'd rather not stare at a computer screen all the time and I think interacting with people from different walks of life will make my life much more interesting. Even though it's probably more stressful. On another tangent, I am planning to work during the term break.  

If I were to do well in such jobs, or even to apply for a job, I would require good communication skills. Such skills involve explaining things in a clear approach without beating around the bush. Last but not least, getting pass the first barrier-the interview! I do not have much experience with interviews, so I'm hoping that I would be able to learn more about it-in the practical sense.

Of course, I'm not saying that effective communication skills are crucial only for the sake of performing well at school or work. Such skills would also do me much help pertaining to my relationship with my peers!

References: 9gag.com

Greetings

Salutations!