Culture

Culture

1. References: Porter, R. Mcdaniel, E. (2010). Intercultural communication

2. What is culture?

   • Culture is the rules for living and functioning in society. In other words, culture provides the rules for playing the game of life
     • It includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society

3. What culture does

   • It provides "rules" so we can function in a society.
     • It also provides us with our identity, or sense of self.
       • Our cultural identity is derived from our “sense of belonging to a particular cultural or ethnic group”

4. Culture´s Components

   • Culture is learned
   • Culture Is symbolic
     • Words, gestures, and images are merely symbols used to convey meaning.
   • Culture is transmitted intergenerationally
     • You learned your culture from family members, teachers, peers, books, personal observations, and a host of media sources.
   • Culture is dynamic
     • Within a culture, new ideas, inventions, and exposure to other cultures create change.
   • Culture is Ethnocentric
     • The strong sense of group identity, or attachment, produced by culture can also lead to ethnocentrism, the tendency to view one’s own culture as superior to other cultures.

5. When you integrate communication and culture interculturality starts.

   • A number of culture-related components are important to the study of intercultural communication.
     • Perception
     • Patterns of cognition
       • Culture can often produce different ways of knowing and doing
     • Verbal behaviors
     • Nonverbal behaviors
     • The influence of context
       • What is appropriate in one culture is not necessarily correct in another.