2007-02-13 01:55:27葉子媽媽

Ways culture influence us

These are very interesting................
If you are an English teacher in Taiwan, you may not have too much experiences about this. But when you are in a multicultual society, it makes big differences.


How we greet each other.

What considered common courtesy of impolite.

How we show respect and disrespect

What is embarrassing

Waht make us feel good

What we eat and how we eat

What we wear

What we buy and how we behave in stores

How often we touch each other and how we teach each other

The holidays we celebrate and the way we celebrate

How we use money, credit and bartering

What is risk

How we seek and use health services and what we consider appropriate health care and personal hygiene

What we find humorous

How we use mass transit

Seating placement in a room

What is beautiful or ugly

What are worthwhile goals in life

The nature of religious beliefs

Whether a person is in control of one’s own life or whether fate determines one’s life

Common sense

Our perceived needs

Whether privacy is desirable or undesirable

The langague we speak

What should be said; what should be left unsaid

What is appropriate ”small talk”

Whom we speak to and whom we should not speak to

Whether communication should be direct or indirect, formal or informal

The meaning of hand guestures, facial expressions and other nonverbal communication

How often we smild, whom we smile at and the meaning of a smile

The role of the individual

The roles of each gender and how each gender should behave

The importance of harmony in a group

The importance of competition

Social class system

Hierarchy in business relationships

Interactions betweens strangers

How to interact with a person in authority or a person who is serving us

Relationships and obligarions between parents, children and other family members

Crowd or audience behavior

How time is scheduled and used

Whether schedules are imprtant or unimportant

The importanc eof meintaining tradition

The importance of preparing for the future

Whether old age is valuable or undesirable



Adapted from Multicultural Customer Service