Cross- cultural Communication This page intentionally left blank

Ethnocentrism
We tend to judge other cultures according to the beliefs, values and tradi-
tions of our own group or culture. We then categorize groups other than 
ours as bad, weak, immoral, stupid, crazy and so on. Ethnocentrism may be 
said to be almost universal. Members of nearly all the world’s cultures regard 
their own way of life as being ‘better’ than even closely related neighbours. 
We often ascribe generalized, unfounded and negative attributes to other 
cultures. Our reactions can be summarized as follows:
Ignorance: we are often very ignorant of other people’s culture – their 
history, religion, art, customs, values and so on.
Fear and anxiety: we are often afraid of novelty, embarrassment and 
conflict. We suffer anxiety and stress because we do not know what to do 
in certain situations.
Laziness: we are often lazy, sometimes for good reasons, such as time 
pressures. This makes us reluctant to learn and practise tolerance and 
understanding. We also often prefer to take the easy way out by assuming 
similarity rather than attempting to understand actual cultural differences.
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What is Cross- Cultural Communication? 13
Our reactions to a cultural situation which differs from our own experience 
often follow the sequence given below:
we observe what is happening;
we try to communicate;
we find it difficult to understand;
we interpret the situation according to our own limited knowledge, our 
own values and possibly limited experience;
we become judgmental and often in exasperation make our prejudices 
apparent.
Cultural diversity
Different cultures have different norms and expectations of behaviour in both 
formal and informal situations, for example, social interaction, meetings or 
negotiations. A lack of awareness and understanding of these differences can 
create misunderstandings and, in extreme cases, even offence.