Cross-cultural Communication Course

Languages and Culture: English as a Foreign Language G lobalization has unified people all around the globe. Media, especially social media, have destroyed physical barriers to allow humans to be in contact with the rest of the world. Now people have unlimited access to knowledge, entertainment, and socialization. This globalization process has created many needs for individuals. The most noticeable need that humans have developed lately is the necessity to speak a foreign language. People need to be able to communicate with others not only from their own region but also abroad. Communication serves two important functions: commercialization and socialization. There are hundreds of spoken languages around the world, and we know that learning a new language takes time, so learning all the world languages to communicate with the most people possible sounds not possible.  Consequently, it seemed that humanity needed a language that all citizens from different places coul...

Language Variations     Languages have special and essential functions. There were created by humans to  fulfill relevant needs including the transmission of ideas, feelings, and beliefs. Languages promote self-expression and social interaction, that is why every group of individuals in this world use a language to interact with other.      Knowing the role of language in people´s lives, it is a great to explore an interesting aspect of languages: speakers of a particular language (eg., English) don´t speak exactly the same language.      A single language usually presents variations. Therefore, the fact that a person knows a language doesn´t guarantee that one is going to be able to communicate successfully with all the speakers of the same language.   I explored the types of variations that a language can have, and I want to share with you this knowledge.  Among the variations that languages present are di...

Communication Between Cultures  By Samovar et al. (2017) Book Review    Humans are for nature interactive beings. This interaction is supported by the process of communication in which individuals express their ideas, opinions, feelings, and emotions. If we were not able to communicate with each other, interaction will not be possible. One example that supports this fact is the biblical myth “The tower of Babel.” This myth narrates that God could avoid humans from building the tallest tower ever, just by keeping them from communicating. According to this story, since people could not communicate with each other anymore, they could not continue the building. This story also suggests the origin of languages which are an essential part in communication.   Nowadays, human society is going through a globalization process that is connecting people from all over the world. This process allows people from distinct cultures to interact with each other. Consequ...

Learning Culture Through Media By: Karolay Araya Leiva People acquire culture since birth through many different ways. Some of the most common ways are proverbs; folktales, legends, and myths; and through art. However, nowadays people are acquiring cultural aspects through an innovative way called media.  Media is unquestionably influencing people and the world in general. Social media are affecting cultures because it links people from different places and permits them to interact and learn about their habits and beliefs. Even though, it was after the 2000´s that media started to expand around the world and being available for more people in more diverse ways, television, which is a medium of communication, has being an influencing factor in culture acquisition for many years. Through television, individuals have access to a variety of products such as movies. Societies have used movies in order to communicate cultural and historical features to their individuals...

Learning about Generations By Karolay Araya Leiva  Our professor asked us what we know about generations. When I started thinking about that, I realized that the only think I knew was that there have been a lot of generations in human history, and that all of them have been characterized by specific aspects. However, I learned that there is much about human generations.  For instance, I did not know that since 1944, human society have been divided into four generations, and that this year 2020 a new one emerges. This new knowledge made realized that since this world is constantly changing, it is necessary to group people in generations because the generation each human belongs to says a lot about her or him, and that that is the best way to understand each individual. To analyze that, I thought of an example: it is complicated for elderly people to understand younger people, and they usually feel more comfortable when talking to people of their same generation be...