Hi, I'm Julie Tietz. And welcome to Conflict Resolution-- Putting the Pieces Together. Today, we're going to talk about multiple strategies in which we can gain cultural insight into another culture's norms.
So there have been a lot of published works out there on cultural communication. And these can be scholarly work, so work that has been done through academia and research, as well as non-scholarly works. Because we are becoming a more diversified and interconnected society, these have become more available to us to read up on and get a general overview on specific culture's norms
And these materials can be really useful to us. But the best way to go about learning or gaining cultural insight is through participatory immersion. So going in and really viewing firsthand on the specific culture that we are interested in learning about, and seeing what there are norms are firsthand. Or also, through respectful cultural dialogue-- so talking about cultural difference and really coming from the intention to create mutual understanding.
So how can we initiate cultural dialogue? Well, first off, we want to do it in a respectful manner, which means we want to come from a place of curiosity, not justification. So we want to be curious and interested in the other person's culture by not asking them to justify their norms and how they behave in a certain way pertaining to their culture.
If we come at it in a place where we are asking them to justify it, it can become offensive to the other person and really put a wall up against that respectful cultural dialogue we are trying to achieve. And also, we want to be sure that we're not stereotyping, so making sure we're not making sweeping generalizations about that particular culture.
And finally, we want to be sure that we're engaging in those active listening skills. So making sure we are present in the conversation and giving those non-verbal communication cues to the other person, that we are really interested in what they have to say to us.
Because we are so influenced by our culture, we rarely think of our norms or how we're behaving as coming from a part of our culture until we are faced with another person from a different culture and see their norms and we really see that our behaviors are different. And this can come as a shock to us, or we didn't even realize it. And it can cause miscommunication and conflict.
And really, this is an opportunity for us to initiate respectful dialogue and inquiry about that person's culture. And they can do the same about us in our culture. So we can exchange on how we communicate in our specific culture and what our norms are and ask them what their type of communication is like so we can gain that mutual understanding of each other.
Here are your key points before we go on gaining cultural insight. There are several published and non-published works out there pertaining to cultural communication. And they are really good ways to start off in learning about cultural world views.
But the best way to go about gaining cultural insight is through participatory immersion or respectful cultural dialogue. And when we want to have a cultural dialogue, we need to be sure that we are going about it in a respectful manner, so making sure we're coming from that place of curiosity and not asking the other party to justify their cultural norms.
And because we don't realize that our norms are derived from our culture, we oftentimes in communicating with a person from another culture can have some miscommunication and conflict. And really, this is an opportunity for us to open up the gate to have that respectful cultural dialogue so we can gain mutual understanding.
Cultural dialogue is your one key term here today. Feel free to pause and look at this a little closer.
Thank you so much for taking the time out to view this tutorial. I hope that you've learned something. And I can't wait to get to you again next time.