Cross -Cultural Communication
Cross-cultural communication is the communication between people who have different culture. In the other word, it is the communication between people who have different ideas, customs, and social behavior of particular people or society. In generally, it indicates verbal communication in different country or religion. Sometimes it is difficult for people between different cultures to communicate and understanding other cultures clearly, because every culture have different points of view about other cultures. Japanese culture and American culture is often mentioned as opposite culture. Compare these two country that have different culture, they have many different way of communication: tacit understanding, personal space, and verbal communication.
In the first place, Tacit understanding is the understanding that arises from the unconscious self, a part of the mind outside the range of normal awareness (Dubin 1). It means that understood or implied without being stated. Cross-cultural communication can be divided into two types, high-context communication and low-context. High-context communication features “Pre-programmed information that is in the receiver and in the setting, with only minimal information in the transmitted message”(Samovan 23). On the other hand, Low-context communication transactions “Most of the information must be in the transmitted message in order to make up for what is missing in the context”(25). The typical high-context communication culture is Japanese culture, and the typical low-context communication culture is America.
In generally, Japanese people are good at tacit understanding. For example, when their friend looks less energetic, they consider that she has worries and they would ask her to tell them her worries. Japanese culture is called tacit understanding culture. On the other hand, people in the low-context culture, like Americans are not good at tacit understanding. They mostly cannot aware her worries until she tell them that she has worries. In high-context culture, messages are the norm in most collectivistic societies, and a great amount of information is held in common among members, and so less needs to be said explicitly. Consequence of this, if people do not know about the fact that they have different context in different cultures, it bring about unexpected misunderstand.
In the second plase, Verbal communication is when people communicate their message verbally to whoever is receiving the message(63). Non-verbal communication is ways of communication without verbal communication: tone down or up the voice, facial expression,body language, and eye contact. Eye contact can make a clear distinction between America and Japan. In America, direct eye contact communicates interest and respect. On the other hand, Japanese may look away from anothere’s eyes almost completely to be polite(68). For example, in Japan, when students are scolded by their teacher, they tend to not stare his eyes, because it is sometimes received as provocative attitude and it makes him unger.When peopele communicate verbally or non verbally with other members of their own culture, they do so with seeming ease. Their experiential backgrounds are similar enough that they share basically the same meaning for most of the words and actions used in everyday communication. Verbal and non verbal meanings are learned and reside with in people( 60).
At last, Personal space is the region surrounding each person, or that area which a person considers their domain or territory. Often if entered by another being without this being desired, it makes them feel uncomfortable. If someone pierces this boundary, they will feel uncomfortable and move away to increase the distance between them (EduPASS 1). The average personal distance varies from culture to culture.
Japanese tend to have narrow personal space, for they take an elevator though it congested. They can bear that their shoulders touch others ones. On the other hand, few Americans take a crowded elevator. They prefer wait other elevator to take a crowded one, because they tend to require more personal space than Japanese.
In conclusion, many differences are brought about between different cultures. Sometimes difference bring about misunderstanding, and it makes intercultural communication difficult. Each culture have each experiences. Experiences have been different beliefs, attitudes, values, concepts, and expectation. People in every culture need to know that they have different culture and different ways of communication. People have to know and recognize each culture.
