Introduction
In this case scenario Martha came to make some assumptions about Reza so as to justify what she thought of him.When Reza started talking with Martha at the Cafeteria, she was astonished when he told her he was a judge, he had a sister who was a university professor in the United States and he had a daughter who was specializing to be a gynecologist in Moscow. Martha’s astonishment was due to the fact that she had assumed that Reza was just another typical newly arrived refugee who was unsure of himself.
Martha must have assumed that Reza’s culture also encouraged people to freely talk and socialize with other people and tell people about themselves freely. This is because in her classes she made efforts to make her students to express their identity freely, but could not understand why Reza was not willing to do so.
Knowing that Reza was from Afghanistan and having read or heard some biased information about the country, Martha thought that the people there must have been facing a lot of problems in terms of lack of freedom of expression, suppression of the citizens by the authorities and lack of freedom of association. This is why she felt that coming to the west was going to give Reza the opportunity to ‘express himself and articulate his identity in ways that he had never been able to before’.
Martha also made the assumption that in Kabul, Afghanistan, people lived a worthless life as they had absolutely nothing. Martha like everybody else assumed that Reza was ‘terribly prejudiced against basic freedoms and he seemed to resent having a female teacher. They considered this unexpected from a culture ‘where women were not even considered second class citizens’. After sometime she heard him say that he would never let his daughter marry a Canadian and when he came from the hospital and kept talking about the nurse who had stitched his finger, Reza came across to her as though he could not tolerate being touched by a woman.
All these misperceptions made her give up on Reza as a hopeless bigot. This is an assumption as confirmed by the fact that Reza actually has a sister who is a university professor in the United States and his eldest daughter is actually specializing to be a gynecologist in Moscow. These are high ranking professions which Reza’s sister and daughter have taken to. This confirms that Reza is not at all bigoted. He further told Martha that his greatest achievement in Canada was seeing his teenage daughter doing well at school and taking part in the full range of activities that young people deserved. He is truly happy for his daughters and sister to have the freedom to do whatever they wished with their lives.
Martha assumed that there are no decent medical care facilities in Kabul when Reza told her he had only wanted to go home and get his finger treated after he had had an accident with his finger. Reza disputed this assumption by informing Martha that there were excellent health facilities in Afghanistan where he would not be treated like a refugee. According to Reza, his implication when talking with Martha was that she had treated him like a refugee who could not think.
Why Martha made the assumptions
Martha lacks cultural competence. Cultural competence is the ability to understand one’s own culture and those of others by acquiring information about that particular culture. This enables an individual to be able to look at things from a bigger perspective with an open mind and therefore not steer clear of making generalizations and making assumptions. (culturediversity.com). In Martha’s judgment of Reza, she was influenced by stereotypes. According to Heidi Burgess, “Stereotypes (or “characterizations”) are generalizations or assumptions that people make about the characteristics of all members of a group, based on an image (often wrong) about what people in that group are like”.(2003). This influenced her view of Afghanistan in general and the treatment of women in that country. Webster’s New World Dictionary defines stereotypes as:
“… an unvarying form or pattern; a fixed or conventional notion or conception, as of a person, group, idea, etc., held by a number of people, and allowing for no individuality, critical judgment…”
Ethnocentrism is another fact which contributed to Martha’s assumptions. Ethnocentrism can be defined as a mind-set conveying the idea that an individual’s own ethnic group or culture is better than other ethnic groups or cultures, and that one’s cultural values can be applied universally. (Marc Hooghe, 2008). This made Martha assume that in Afghanistan the people had nothing and there was no proper hospital where Reza could get any treatment. Comparing the standards of her country to those of Afghanistan she thought it must be very poor. This also influenced her thought of Reza as coming from a country where women were less than second class citizens.
My similar experience
Sometime back when I was still in Junior high school, my parents and I went to visit my uncle who lives in Mexico. When there I was interested in traveling around the small town in which he lived. Since my parents were always busy with other things, I always had to go on most of these trips either alone or with one of my younger nephews.
When making the trips we had to use public buses which were the main mode of transport there. The buses were always full and most of the time they could carry standing passengers. I did not really understand why the passengers got into the buses in the first place when they could clearly see that the buses were already full. I was later told that they were actually allowed to carry the passengers standing. Getting a seat in those buses was always a problem and if you were going somewhere far then you would really have a rough ride since the roads into the interior parts were not all that good.
One day I decided to go very far away from the local town just to see the countryside. As usual, the bus was completely packed. Since my journey was going to take long, I was on the lookout for a passenger leaving an empty seat so that I could sit and relax during the journey. At one of the bus stages, a passenger alighted and I made a fast rush for the seat. I kept getting curios looks from the other passengers but I could really see nothing wrong with anything so I just relaxed on my newly acquired comfort. It was not long before the bus conductor came across me and gave me a thorough reprimand on why I was seated while other older passengers were standing.
At first I was totally confused and tried to argue my case which only made him more furious and threatened to evict me from the bus unless I surrendered my seat to an older passenger. I later came to understand that in that society it is mandatory for the youthful passengers to let the a bit older ones sit in the buses.
The story of Martha and Reza illustrates some of the problems that can occur when there is no proper communication between people with different cultural backgrounds. I was coming from a place where most of the time we used private cars and I had not been informed by anyone that the practice was to let the elder ones sit first. The bus conductor did not know my background and instead assumed I was just being rude and thus his shouting at me. This lack of understanding of other people is the main similarity between the two scenarios.
Understanding someone like Reza better
In order to understand someone like Reza better one needs to understand that today the world is becoming a global village with an ever expanding cultural diversity due to the increased mixing of people from different backgrounds. This is contributed to by refugees from war torn countries, general immigrants, tourists and also international students. When one has this knowledge, he/she is better placed to make rational judgments when she comes into contact with someone like Reza and not just make assumptions about his behavior.
To understand others one should be culturally competent. By increasing ones knowledge of his/her own culture and the cultures of other societies. Cross, T. and others state that for an organization to be culturally competent there are some principles which must be upheld. These same principles can be applied to individuals as they are the ones who make an organization.
One should be able to value diversity of the different groups of people around him/her and their cultures; one should be have the capability for cultural self-assessment to see how much we know and understand about other cultures. In this line we should also be aware of the dynamism of culture especially when different cultures interact. It is also helpful for one to have ‘institutionalized cultural knowledge’. Perhaps one of the most important abilities is to be adaptable to suit the cultural diversity of different societies. It is important to be able to understand the cultures of other societies know and understand their values, beliefs and behaviors. It is invaluable in understanding other people to be able to tolerate their differences from us.
It also helps to avoid ethnocentrism which can be broadly defined as an attitude whereby you judge other societies by the standards that apply in your society. Ethnocentrism can also refer to the way the lifestyles, experiences, values and norms of one group in a society are assumed to be common to everyone in society. (Sociological pathways, 1997).
Having communication competence is also one of the most effective ways of understanding other people. One of the main reasons as to why Martha made these assumptions is lack of communication competence. According to Richard Rowley, communication competence is being able to communicate while achieving objectives and also upholding social acceptability. It can also be defined as “Communication competence is the degree to which a communicator’s goals are achieved through effective and appropriate interaction.” (Lane, 2000). Since she was not able to communicate effectively with Reza she was not able to get to know what she wanted to know about him thus ended up making her own assumptions.
Lessons from this case about cross cultural communication
Though cross cultural communication has been viewed by many people as quite a difficult experience for someone to go through due to the various differences that may exist between their cultures and other peoples cultures, it is portrayed that cross cultural communication experiences can actually be made much easier and more friendly by ourselves if we take the time to improve our cultural competence and our communication competence.
These are skills which enable us to understand other people’s behavior and be able to communicate with them better. Initially Martha did not have nor really had the time to talk with Reza on a face to face basis and therefore she made up her own assumptions about him as a suppressed hopeless bigot from a poor country where women were looked down upon. When she finally had the opportunity to talk with Reza and know about him, she was actually astonished to find out about his sister and his daughters and farther more the excellent state of affairs in his home country of Afghanistan.
This case clearly illustrates some of the barriers that bring out conflicts in cross cultural communication. Some of the barriers highlighted in this case are: interpersonal conflicts which generates from ethnocentrism and dominant or subculture intolerance. From this case we also learn the importance of cross cultural communication as: maintaining healthier communities through the development of relationships which have fruitful results.
There is a lesson on reducing clash of opinions in a cultural diverse setup through communication. This is by encouraging cooperative cross cultural communication. This is demonstrated when Martha finally got the opportunity to talk with Reza and know about him. This dispelled her thoughts of him being a hopeless bigot and of his country being made of male chauvinists. When people take the time for cross cultural communication, they can be able to achieve personal growth by putting up with other people’s behaviors and striving to understand them thus enabling them to interact objectively. This enables one to overcome ethnocentrism and accepting variety in cultures. The other lesson from this case is that it is vital not to be too quick to judge when dealing with societies or people with whom we are not familiar.
Reference
Cross, T., Bazron, B., Dennis, K., and Isaacs, M. Toward a Culturally Competent System of Care, Volume 1. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University.
(1989.) Burgess, Heidi. “Stereotypes / Characterization Frames.” Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Research Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Web.
Hooghe M. (2008). International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Philadelphia: MacMillan Reference. Web.
Lane D. (2000) Communication competence Defined. Communication Resources. 2008. Web.
Millet J. (2002). The Dangers of Stereotyping: A Risky, Offensive & Non-Productive Exercise. Cultural savvy. 2008. Web.
Richard D. (1999). Communication Competence: The Essence of Aligning Action. 2008. Web.
Sociological Pathways (1997). From culture to identity. 2008. Web.
Tran cultural nursing, (2000). Cultural diversity in nursing. 2008. Web.