High and low context cultures

After reading the chapter on high and low context cultures, it immediately occurred to me how easily you can spot these in our day to day society. It’s also very cool to notice that whether you are at a small party with friends or at a family get-together or even at church, these same characteristics are all taking place. These are all examples of high context, informal cultures. If we take a look at low context cultures which are much more formal and rule oriented, we can all tell which one is the most appealing to us. However, can it really be that hard to turn low context cultures into high context cultures? And aren’t there already many similarities between the two? Let’s take a look at the characteristics:

Low context:

-          Rule oriented -> Are you really that rule-oriented when you are in a cafeteria?

-          More knowledge is public -> I don’t see how knowledge gets more public than at a party with friends?

-          Knowledge is more often transferable -> Do I really need to answer this one?

The only big difference between the two is the way tasks and activities happen. It’s true that when you go on excursion with a travelling group, there are many formalities and a lot of administration that needs to be dealt with where as a party with friends can be arranged with a few 20 second phone calls.

It seems to me that since everyone is much more comfortable in high context cultures, that these should be taking place much more often.

What are your suggestions for turning low context cultures into high context cultures?

The effects of multicultural education

After having read the second chapter of the course on intercultural education, I found the part on the effects of multicultural education the most interesting one. Why, you ask? Well, for the obvious reason that it is very important to evaluate everything we are doing and to look at the results we are receiving while doing so.

The first sentence that got my attention was: “Negative racial and ethnic attitudes toward others can be changed through deliberate intervention, but the process is longrange.” It is clear to almost everyone that deliberate intervention is necessary because at this moment we can hardly even use the world “intercultural” when talking about our educational system. As you may remember from my previous post, what I find most important in the whole multicultural society is that we all learn to live with one another in peace. The prejudices that go around in this world about different cultures can only be dismissed through some sort of intervention. And what better place to start than during students' education? We all know that in this period of time in Flanders, there are barely any classes left with people of one same culture and/or ethnic background. Now don't me wrong, this is a magnificent start, but there is more that needs to be done. As an aspiring language teacher myself, I always look for ways to integrate different cultural factors in the lessons I am giving. When students have to take a listening or reading exam for instance, it's very easy to choose a text that talks about global cultures. Students are always very attentive during these so they subconsciously learn a lot about the culture too rather than just the language. This way, we can improve the students' tolerancy toward the unknown.

While it was not one of my biggest motivations for becoming a teacher, I am very happy to now notice that I and my classmates are effectively contributing to the global village.