COMM2110 CH2 Notes PDF

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Chapter 2 lecture and textbook notes for Fall 2018 COMM-2110 with Nicolle Johnson....

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1 COMM-2110 Interpersonal Communication Chapter 2 Notes

Table of Contents CHAPTER 2 CULTURAL AND GENDER 2.1 Understanding Cultural and Communication Defining Culture Distinguishing Between In-Groups and Out-Groups Acquiring a Culture

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The Components of Culture Cultures and Co-Cultures

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Belonging to Multiple Co-Cultures Social Media as A Co-Cultural

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Communicating with Cultural Awareness 2.2 How Cultural Affects Communication

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Individualism and Collectivism Low- and High-Context Cultures

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Low- and High-Power-Distance Cultures Monochronic and Polychronic Cultures

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Masculine and Feminine Cultures Uncertainty Avoidance

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Cultural Communication Codes 2.3 Understanding Gender and Communication

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Gender Roles and Communication Biological Sex and Communication

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Sexual Orientation and Communication Some Explanations for Gendered Communication

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2.4 How Gender Affects Communication Gender and Verbal Communication

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Expressive and Instrumental Talk Language and Power

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Gendered Linguistic Styles Gender and Nonverbal Communication

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Touch and Body Movement Emotional Communication

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Affectionate Behavior

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CHAPTER 2 CULTURAL AND GENDER Notes ●

Culture is a powerful influence on communication behavior. It can affect not only how we express ourselves but also how re interpret and react to the interpersonal behaviors of others. Another powerful influence on interpersonal communication is gender. Some people believe that communicating across genders can be nearly as confusing as communicating across cultures. Other lenses, such as ethnicity, age, and socioeconomic status, also can influence communication.

2.1 Understanding Cultural and Communication Vocabulary ●

Co-Cultures: Groups of people who share values, customs, and norms related to mutual interests or characteristics besides their national citizenship.

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Cultural: The system of learned and shared symbols, language, values, and norms that distinguish one group of people from another.

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Cultural Shock: Experiencing abnormally high stress in a new culture. Often happens to immigrants. Can contribute to illnesses such as high blood pressure, depression, and heart disease.

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Enculturation: The process of learning culture.

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Ethnicity: Perception of one’s ancestry or heritage.

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Ethnocentrism: The systematic preference for characteristics of one’s own culture.

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In-Group: A group with whom we identify.

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Nationality: Status as a citizen of a particular country.

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Out-Group: A group we see as different from ourselves.

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Similarity Assumption: When we presume that most people think the same way we do, without asking ourselves whether that’s true.

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Society: A group of people who share a given cultural.

Defining Culture ●

Culture can mean all sorts of things, such as “French culture,” or “Jewish culture,” or “deaf culture”. Culture isn’t a property of countries or theniticities or economic classes; rather, it’s a property of people. Each of us identifies with one or more groups that have a common culture comprising a shared language, values, beliefs, traditions, and customs.

3 Distinguishing Between In-Groups and Out-Groups ●

Research shows that immigrants often experience abnormally high stress during their first year in their new homeland. Research shows that the stress of culture shock can contribute to illnesses such as high blood pressure, depression ,and heart disease.

Acquiring a Culture ●

Culture is not inherited, but rather learned. Culture is not necessarily related to or based on our ethnicity, nor our nationality. Culture is determined by who raised us, by where we were raised, and by the symbols, language, values, and norms of that place.

The Components of Culture ●

No matter what their differences, cultural have some common components, including symbols, language, values, and norms. ○

Symbols: Something that represents an idea. For example, the bald eagle is a symbol of the United States.

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Language: Allows for written and spoken communication, and also ensures that cultures and cultural ideas are passed from one generation to the next. There are about 7,100 languages used in the world. The most commonly spoken languages in the world are Chinese, Spanish, and English.

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Values: A culture’s values are its standards for judging how good, desirable, or beautiful something is. They’re cultural ideas about what ought to be. An example is that the U.S. cultural values ideals such as equal opportunity, material comfort, efficiency, free enterprise, and individual choice.

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Norms : An example of a norm in North America is that people shake hands and say “Nice to meet you.”

Cultures and Co-Cultures ●

A co-culture isn’t based on the country where we were born or the national society in which we were raised. Instead, it is composed of smaller groups of people with whom we identify.

Belonging to Multiple Co-Cultures ●

Most people identify with several co-cultures at once, such as age group, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, musical tastes, athletic interests, and your college major. Every one of those groups has its own values, beliefs, traditions, customs, and ways of using language that distinguish it from other groups. Some co-cultures have smaller co-cultures within them.

Social Media as A Co-Cultural ●

Facts about social media:

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Approximately 400 million snaps are sent every day on Snapchat

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One out of every six people on the planet has a Facebook account.

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Roughly 500 million tweets are sent every day.

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Six billion hours of video are watched on YouTube every month.

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23% of adolescents name Instagram as their favorite social network.

In some ways, social media platforms make up their own co-cultures: ○

They have their own symbols

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They have their own terminology

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They have their own norms and values

Communicating with Cultural Awareness ●

People with different cultural backgrounds don’t just communicate differently; in many cases, they also think differently. Those differences can present real challenges when people from different cultures interact.

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Questioning your cultural assumptions can be a challenge, because you’re probably often unaware that you hold them in the first place. However, it is worth the effort to try, since checking your assumptions when interacting with people of other cultures can make you a more effective communicator.

2.2 How Cultural Affects Communication Vocabulary ●

Collectivistic Cultural: People are taught that their primary responsibility is to their families, communities, and employers. They focus on taking care of the needs of the group.

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Communication Codes: The verbal and nonverbal behaviors whose meanings are often understood only by people from the same culture.

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Gesture: Movements, usually of the hand or arm that express ideas.

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High-Context Culture: People speak less directly. Maintaining harmony and avoiding offending people are more important than expressing one’s true feelings.

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High-Power-Distance Cultures: Power is distributed less evenly. Certain groups, such as the royal family or the ruling political party, have great power. People in such cultures are taught that certain people or groups deserve to have more power and that respecting power is more important than respecting equality.

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Idiom: A phrase whose meaning is purely figurative.

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Individualistic Cultural: People believe their primary responsibility is to themselves.

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Jargon: Language whose technical meaning is understood by people within that co-culture.

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Low-Power-Distance Cultures: People believe in the value of equality. Found in democratic societies.

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Low-Context Culture: People are expected to be direct. These cultures value expressing oneself, sharing personal opinions, and trying to persuade others to see things one’s way.

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Monochronic: A concept that treats time as a finite commodity that can be earned, saved, spent, and wasted.

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Polychronic: A concept that treats time as an infinite resource rather than a finite commodity.

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Uncertainty Accepting: A culture in which people are more open to new situations and more accepting of people and ideas that are different from their own.

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Uncertainty Avoidance: The extent to which people try to avoid situations that are unstructured, unclear, or unpredictable.

Individualism and Collectivism ●

In an individualistic culture, children are raised hearing messages such as “Be yourself” and “You’re special.” Those messages emphasize the importance of knowing oneself, being self-sufficient, and being true to what one wants in life. Individualistic societies include the United States, Great Britain, and Australia.

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In a collectivistic culture, people place a high value on duty and loyalty, and see themselves not as unique but as a part of the groups to which they belong. Collectivistic cultures include Korea, Japan, and many countries in Africa and Latin America.

Low- and High-Context Cultures ●

Low-context cultures value expressing oneself, sharing personal opinions, and trying to persuade others to see things one’s way. Examples of low-context cultures include the United States, Canada, Israel, and most northern European countries.

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Examples of high-context cultures include Korea, New Zealand, and Native Americans.

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The potential for misunderstanding is great when people from low- and high-context cultures communicate with one another.

Low- and High-Power-Distance Cultures ●

People in low-power-distance cultures usually expect friendships and romantic relationships to be based on love rather than social status. In contrast, people in high-power-distance cultures are expected to choose friends or mates from within their social class.

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In low-power-distance cultures, individuals are often taught that it is their right and responsibility to question authority.

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Workers in low-power-distance cultures value autonomy, the right to make choices about the way they do their jobs, and the ability to have input into decisions that affect them. Employees in high-power-distance cultures are used to having little or no say about how to do their jobs.

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Examples of low-power-distance cultures include the United States, Canada, Israel, New Zealand, Denmark, and Austria.

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Examples of high-power-distance cultures include Mexico, Brazil, India, Singapore, and the Philippines.

Monochronic and Polychronic Cultures ●

Examples of monochronic societies are Swiss, Germans, and most Americans. They save time, spend time, fill time, invest time, and waste time as though time were tangible.

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Polychronic societies include Latin America, the Aarb part of the Middle East, and much of sub-Saharan Africa. Polychronic societies attach greater value to the quality of their lives and their relationships with others.

Masculine and Feminine Cultures ●

In a highly masculine culture, people tend to cherish traditionally masculine values, such as ambition, achievement, and the acquisition of goods. They also value sex-specific roles for women and men. Examples of masculine cultures are Austria, Japan, and Mexico.

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In a highly feminine culture, people tend to value nurturance, quality of life, and service to others. They also tend to believe that men’s and women’s roles should not be strongly differentiated. Examples of feminine cultures are Sweden, Chile, and the Netherlands.

Uncertainty Avoidance ●

Cultures vary in what Hofstede called uncertainty avoidance. Individuals from cultures that are highly uncertainty avoidant are drawn to people and situations that are relatively unlikely to take risks, for fear of failure. They are also uncomfortable with differences of opinion, and they tend to favor rules and laws that maximize security and reduce ambiguity. Argentina, Portugal, and Uruguay are among the most uncertainty avoidant societies.

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People in uncertainty-accepting cultures are more open to novel situations and are accepting of people and ideas that are different from their own. They take a “live and let live” approach, preferring as few rules as possible that would restrict their behaviors. Societies with cultures that are highly accepting of uncertainty include Hong Kong, Jamaica, and New Zealand.

Cultural Communication Codes ●

There kinds of communication codes—idioms, jargon, and gestures—differ greatly from society to society and can make intercultural communication especially challenging.

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Idioms: Most U.S. adults know that “break a leg” means good luck. A sign in a Hong Kong tailor shop says, “Ladies may have a fit upstairs.” Every society has its own idioms for whose meanings are not necessarily obvious to people from other cultures.

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Jargon: For example, physicians use precise medical terminology to communicate with themselves about medical conditions and treatments. Jargon can serve an important function by allowing people to communicate specifically, efficiently, and accurately.

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Gestures: Societies differ a great deal in their use of gestures. The same gesture can have different meanings from society to society. Holding up the index and pinky finger while holding down the middle and ring finger is a common gesture for fans of the University of Texas Longhorns. In Italy, however, that gesture is used to suggest that a man’s wife has been unfaithful.

2.3 Understanding Gender and Communication Vocabulary ●

Asexuality: The term used to describe people who have very little interest in sex.

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Androgyny: The term used to describe a combination of masculine and feminine characteristics.

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Biological Sex: Refers to being female or male rather than feminine or masculine.

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Bisexuality: Having romantic and/or esxual attraction to both women and men.

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Femininity: The set of role expectations a society typically assigns to women.

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Gender: A broad term encompassing the influences of gender roles, biological sex, and sexual orientation.

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Gender Clash: The experience of each sex not understanding the other.

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Gender Roles: Norms for how women and men are supposed to act.

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Heterosexuality: Being physically and romantically attracted to people of the other sex or gender.

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Homosexuality: Romantic and sexual attraction to members of one’s own sex or gender.

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Intersex: An individual whose internal sex organs do not match their external appearance.

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Masculinity: The set of gender role expectations a society typically assigns to men, although anyone can have masculine characteristics and communication behavior patterns.

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Sexual Orientation: The sex or sexes to which an individual is sexually attracted.

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Transgender: The conflict people experience between the sex they were born into and the sex they feel they should be.

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Transsexual: Transgender people who have undergone hormone therapy or sexreassignment surgery to bring their physical body in line with their self-image.

8 Notes ●

The experiences of online games reflect a very real truth: In both overt and subtle ways, gender influences who we are and how we act. It is a defining feature of our identity, shaping the way we think, look, and communicate.

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Although gender is powerful, it is far from simple or straightforward. The concept of gender includes many influences, such as psychological gender roles, biological sex, and sexual orientation. Some interpersonal behaviors are strongly influenced by psychological gender roles, and others are more strongly influenced by biological sex or sexual orientation.

Gender Roles and Communication ●

Specific masculine qualities usually emphasize strength, competition, independence, sexual aggressiveness, risk taking, logical thinking, and the acquisition of resources.

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The feminine gender role typically emphasizes empathy and emotional expressiveness; a focus on relationships and on maintaining them; an interest in bearing and raising children; and attentiveness to appearance.

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The concept of gender cultures further maintains that when women and men communicate with each other, they each bring their own rules and values to the table.

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Gender roles change over time, and vary from culture to culture. They also differ by culture.

Biological Sex and Communication ●

Some people don’t fit into either group of “male” and “female.” ○

Some people experience are transgender or transexual individuals.

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Women with Turner syndrome have an X chromosome only (XO), and men with Klinefelter syndrome have an extra X chromosome (XXY). About 1 in 17,000 people is born with some type of chromosomal disorder.

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Some people are intersex. For example, a child might be born with a penis but have ovaries instead of testicles.

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Biological sex is affected by psychology, genetics, and anatomy.

Sexual Orientation and Communication ●

People’s sexual orientation is determined by genetic and social factors.

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In a study, researchers found that, after ruling out differences in age, education level, and income, that participants in same-sex relationships actually reported higher relationship quality, intimacy, and compatibility.

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Heterosexuality: Several studies have confirmed that the majority of adults in most societies have experienced mostly heterosexual attraction and have engaged in primarily heterosexual behavior.

9 One possible reason for this tendency is that it has the potential to support reproduction. Another reason is that in most cultures, heterosexuality is the most socially approved form of sexuality. ●

Homosexuality: The U.S. Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal nationwide in 2015. Nonetheless, the argument against formalizing ho...