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The Basic Function of Culture
❖ At the core of culture is the idea that it is intended to make life easier for people by “teaching” them how to adapt to their surroundings.
❖ Some people shake hands when introduced to a stranger, but other people bow at such an encounter. Why?
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Culture
❖ Definitions of culture are numerous. ❖ We define culture as the deposit of knowledge,
Generation. ❖ Culture Is Based on Symbols. ❖ Culture Is Subject to Change. ❖ Culture Is an Integrated System. ❖ Culture Is Ethnocentric.
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Culture Is Not Innate; It Is Learned.
The formal teaching of a culture is far more structured and is often left to the various institutions of the culture, such as schools and churches.
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Confucius
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Warm-up Case
❖ Fish Is Fish
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Learning Objectives
❖ Define the term of culture ❖ Describe the characteristics of culture ❖ Understand the nature of culture ❖ Be aware of cultural differences
experience, beliefs, values, attitudes, meanings, social hierarchies, religion, notions of time, roles, spatial relationships, concepts of the universe, and material objects and possessions acquired by a group of people in the course of generations through individual and group striving.
❖ "He who speaks has no knowledge and he who has knowledge does not speak."
❖ As the English writer Thomas Fuller wrote 200 years ago, "Culture makes all things easy."
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Characteristics of Culture
❖ Culture Is Not Innate; It Is Learned. ❖ Culture Is Transmitted from Generation to
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Culture
❖ Some people in many parts of the world put dogs in their ovens, but people in the United States put them on their couches and beds. Why?
❖ Some people in Iran pray five times each day while sitting on the floor, but some people in Las Vegas sit up all night in front of video poker machines. Why?
❖ Culture is learned in a variety of ways and from a host of different sources.
Informal learning, which is often very subtle, normally takes place through interaction, observation and imitation.
Learning Culture through
Proverbs
❖ "One does not make the wind blow but is blown by it."
❖ "Order is half of life."
❖ "The mouth maintains silence in order to hear the heart talk."
Chapter Two
Culture and Intercultural Communication
Human beings draw close to one another by their common nature, but habits and customs keep them apart.
❖ Some people paint and decorate their entire bodies, but others spend hundreds of dollars painting and decorating only their faces. Why?
❖ Some people talk to God, but others have God talk to them, and still others say t