A Cultural Barrier!

When interacting with other cultures we expect there to be communication barriers due to differing language, but people are less likely to anticipate nonverbal differences, often times resorting to use of hand signals or gestures that may infact represent somethign totally different in other cultures.

We talk a lot in class about how the middle finger in America is a negative thing, whereas in other cultures the middle finger is used as simply a pointer finger or something else that is less confrontational.

I havent had much personal experience with this but simply as a barrier I think nonverbal communication is the most tricky thing, because language's meaning can be found in definitions, but nonverbal communication has much to do about social cues and simply being in a culture. They are much harder to pick up on and understand as they as so integrated in a given culture and aren't taught in conventional ways, like a language can be taught.

1 comment:

  1. I agree, but I think you really need to use both when trying to break down the barrier between cultures. Eventhough using nonverbal communication is difficult to comprehend sometimes, I believe it's beneficial when defining something that's the same word but in different languages. Say for example, fag. If someone from England asked me if I had a fag but moved his hand towards his mouth signing a cigarette, I could easily tell what he's asking for. Otherwise I might just direct him to a good friend of mine, who often calls himself a fag, lol!

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