c. 2 vocab

Personal-contextual dialectic

Although individuals communicate on a personal level, the context of the communication is also important. In different contexts individuals take on different social roles.

The Critical approach

1. Assumptions: a. Critical researchers share many of the interpretivists assumptions-they believe in subjective reality. b They emphasize the importance of studying the context in which communication occurs but usually focus on macrocontexts, for example, political and social structures. c. Unlike social science and interpretive researchers, they are interested in the historical context of communication. d. They are interested in understanding power relations in communication, and identifying cultural differences is important only in relation to power differentials. 2. Goals: Understand and change the lives of everyday communicators. Researchers assume that by examining and writing about how power functions in cultural situations people can learn to resist forces of power and oppression. 3. Procedures: a. Critical scholars usually use textual analyses. b. They analyze cultural "products" such as TV, movies, and essays. 4. Culture is seen as a site of struggle where multiple interpretations come together under a dominant force. 5. Methods: a. A critical scholar would try to situate the 9/11 attacks within a larger cultural struggle that has a much longer history than many U.S. Americans might realize. b. Critical scholars might also analyze media coverage of the attacks, or the hesitation of Hollywood to release certain movies during their aftermath. c. Another example of a critical analysis is Peck's (1993/94) study of Oprah Winfrey segments on racism, which identified three discourses about racism: liberal, therapeutic, and religious. d. Nakayama (1994) used the critical approach to analyze the movie Showdown in Little Tokyo, which depicts two Los Angeles police officers (one blond European American and one European Asian American) investigating a murder. He found that the European American character is favored over the Asian American character. e. Moon (1997) did a critical analysis of gender and social class communication by analyzing interviews with White women from working-class backgrounds. Among other findings, the study identifies strategies used by women to resist social reproduction. 6. Strengths and Limitations: a. One strength of this approach is its emphasis on power relations in intercultural interactions and the importance of social and historical contexts. b. One limitation is that it does not focus on face-to-face intercultural interaction but rather tends to focus on popular media forms of communication. c. Further, it does not allow for much empirical data. d. Another limitation is that this approach is rarely used to study international contexts. Most studies emphasize culture and communication in domestic settings.

Dialectic approach

1. It emphasizes the processual aspect of intercultural communication, assuming that cultures change and so do individuals. 2. It emphasizes the relational aspect of intercultural communication, highlighting relationships among various aspects of intercultural communication and the importance of viewing these holistically rather than in isolation. 3. It permits holding contradictory ideas simultaneously. This type of thinking is difficult because it goes against the dichotomous thinking formal education in the United States emphasizes. 4. An understanding of intercultural communication can be enriched by combining the three research perspectives. As the 9/11 example shows, each perspective provides an understanding of the problems and challenges that would be missed if only one perspective was used. a. The social science perspective helped researchers identify how specific cultural differences might predict communication conflicts. b. The interpretive perspective enabled researchers to confirm social science findings. c. The critical approach raised questions about the exportation of popular culture and the neutrality of our assumptions about intercultural experiences. 5. The knowledge gained by any of the three approaches is enhanced by the knowledge provided by the others. 6. Taking the dialectical approach requires that we not only recognize the contributions of each perspective but that we accept simultaneously the assumptions of all three perspectives.

cultural-individual dialectic

Communication is cultural, suggesting that we share some communication patterns with members of the groups we belong to. Other communication patterns are idiosyncratic or unique to the individual.

perception

the process by which individuals select, organize, and interpret external and internal stimuli to create their own view of the world

Privilege-disadvantage dialectic

Cultural members may be simultaneously privileged and disadvantaged, or they may be privileged in some contexts and disadvantaged in others.

differences-similarities dialectic

Human beings are simultaneously both different from and similar to each other. a. Overemphasizing differences can lead to prejudice and stereotyping. b. Overemphasizing similarities may prevent us from noticing the important cultural variations that exist.

static-dynamic dialectic

Intercultural communication is both static and dynamic because some cultural patterns remain relatively constant over time while others shift.

history/past-present/future dialectic

To better understand intercultural communication, it is important to think not only about the present but also about how history affects our present interactions.

ethnography

a discipline that examines the patterned interactions and significant symbols of specific cultural groups to identify the cultural norms that guide their behaviors, usually based on field studies

participant observation

a research method where investigators interact extensively with the cultural group being studied

Worldview of researcher

also known as research paradigm. The information we know affects how we interpret new information.

Social Science approach (functionalist)

based on research in psychology and sociology. Assumptions: a. The existence of a describable external reality. b. Human behavior is predictable. Methods: a. From the 9/11 example, researchers using this approach might want to measure attitudes toward Middle Easterners, then try to predict and prevent hate crimes against them. b. Several contemporary research programs take a social science approach. i. Gudykunst's uncertainty reduction studies have found that people in individualist or collectivist cultures vary in their strategies for reducing uncertainty during initial encounters. ii. Communication accommodation theory originated from studies focused on identifying when and how people change their communication patterns to accommodate others during an interaction. iii. Some social science studies explain how communication styles vary from culture to culture. iv. Other studies have investigated how travelers adapted overseas. 6. Strengths and Limitations: Many of these studies have made useful contributions; however, this approach has limitations. a. Many scholars now realize that human communication is often more creative than predictable. b. Reality is not just external but may be constructed by human beings. c. We cannot identify all of the variables that affect our communication. d. We cannot predict exactly why one intercultural interaction seems successful and others do not. e. Some of the methods used have not been culturally sensitive, and researchers have sometimes been too distant from their subjects.

The Interpretive approach (ethnography)

descriptive studies of communication patterns within specific groups. 1. Assumptions: a. Reality is constructed by humans. b. Human experience, including communication, is subjective. c. Human behavior is creative, not determined, and not easily predicted. Goals: Understand and describe human behavior (not predict). Procedures: a. Qualitative methods derived from anthropology and linguistics. b. Data is gathered using field studies, observations, and participant observations. c. Researchers are expected to be intimately involved in the research, often becoming good friends with members of the communities they study. d. The rhetorical approach is another example of interpretive research. In this approach researchers examine and analyze texts or public speeches and try to interpret the meanings they had in the contexts in which they occurred. 4. Interpretivists see culture as created and maintained through communication. 5. Two terms often used to distinguish the social science and interpretive approaches are etic and emic. a. Social science research usually seeks universal generalizations or etics. b. Interpretive research usually focuses on understanding communication patterns within specific cultures or behaviors that are emic to specific cultural communities. 6. Methods: a. Some communication researchers have used analyzed online conversations about 9/11 to explore its meaning as a "war" or a "crime" for particular speech communities. b. Other interpretive scholars might interview people who the American flag immediately after the 9/11 attacks in order to determine what they were intending to communicate by doing so. c. Interpretivists would take care to reveal the complexity of the responses and constructed meanings both within and between cultures. d. Other examples are studies that have investigated the language and nonverbal communication patterns of many different cultural groups. e. Asante's (1987) notion of Afrocentricity is another interpretive approach. This approach emphasizes that understanding and describing communicative rules must be grounded in the beliefs and values of the people in the culture, suggesting that European research perspectives are not applicable to African American communication. Asante's framework of shared African assumptions has been used to understand contemporary African American communication. 7. Strengths and Limitations: a. One strength is that the approach provides a more in-depth understanding of communication patterns in communities because of the emphasis on investigating communication in context. b. One limitation is that there are few interpretivist studies of intercultural communication; for example, scholars have typically not been concerned with what happens when two groups come into contact with each other, although there are some comparative cultural studies. c. The research is primarily conducted by outsiders to the research communities.

power

the capacity or ability to direct or influence the behavior of others or the course of events.

macrocontexts

the political, historical situations, social, backgrounds, and environments that influence communication

individualistic

the tendency to emphasize individual identities, beliefs, needs, goals, and views rather than those of the group

collectivistic

the tendency to focus on the goals, needs, and views of the ingroup rather than individuals' own goals, needs, and views.