2 Culture and the perspective of others

One of the main objectives of this taster course is to raise your awareness of how we often take our own cultural values to be the norm and how stereotypes of a particular culture can be formed that may hamper communication.

When communicating with individuals that belong to a different cultural milieu, you should be aware of cultural differences, but it is also important to acknowledge the fact that there is usually a great number of overlapping similarities.

It is natural to register what you find surprising, rather than what you find normal, and this creates unconscious generalisations. However, these cultural generalisations and stereotypes are prone to being based on biased impressions and experiences, involuntarily exaggerated or limited to specific environments. Moreover, they usually apply to the most visible parts of culture (the surface of the iceberg), which are the more conspicuous behaviours of cultural aspects such as food, traditions, rites, etc.

Prejudice arises when negative judgements are applied to these stereotypes.

Figure 1 (repeated) The iceberg model image is an adaptation of Edward T. Hall’s Cultural Iceberg

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Image of two icebergs labelled ‘China’ and ‘UK’. Along the surface line one can read ‘Visible Culture: behaviours’. Under the surface, the words that appear are: ‘Invisible Culture: customs, assumptions, beliefs, values’.

Figure 1 (repeated) The iceberg model image is an adaptation of Edward T. Hall’s Cultural Iceberg