Inter-cultural and International Communication= Otherness

Intercultural communication might be defined as the sending of a message (or messages) from a persons in one culture to a person or persons in another; and to be effective, the message (es) must be received and understood as the sender(s) intended.
The idea of intention here is complex. For Intention involves not only the words, thoughts and behaviour patterns of the people of one culture, but also the many hidden subtleties of tradition and expectations which may not be immediately apparent to the receiver (s). Liang Ho (1990.35) says "It is very important to communicate in a way in which both parties understand what is being communicated, the meaning behind given signals, and to flush out into the open what was probably intended but never said. Communication covers everything, including the entire history of those persons and cultures before any contact or exchange is made. If we can increase our knowledge of each culture which stands behind a person, the degree of accurate cross-cultural interpretation and communication will definitely rise" I really like these words.

I am also interest on what Martin Luther King, Jnr. says

 People don't get along

because they fear each other.

People fear each other

because they don't know each other.

They don't know each other

because they have not properly communicated with each other.

What is culture?

* our total set of beliefs

* our values

* our conventions

* our language

* ways of behaving

* ways of thinking

* ways of communicating

* ways of dressing , building our homes and

*expression through the arts, music and literature.

How are we going to communicate with others who got one of the above criteria? What I learned through out this course help me to understand some guideline will help me to communicate with others.

* Recognise that people from other culture are different. Not better or worse, good or bad, but just different

* Learn as much as you can about the culture of the other person with whom you are communicating ( consulting with people experienced in the culture or country, reading books, viewing indigenous film and studying the literature or art of the native country.

* Be aware that there will be differences between you and the person or people from other culture and thatyou will need to be patient and open in your efforts of communicate with them. It may well take longer to understand their message/s.

Otherness takes many forms. The Other may be someone who is of....

• a different race (White vs. Black),
• a different nationality (Samoan vs Pakeha),
• a different religion (Protestant vs. Catholic or Christian vs. Jew),
• a different social class (aristocrat vs. serf),
• a different political ideology (capitalism vs. communism),
• a different sexual orientation (heterosexual vs. homosexual),
• a different origin (native born vs. immigrant).

 

To conclude: To be able to understand and work with the people of other cultures, it is important to first know one's own culture. This provides a reference point, a basis from which to be able to recognise and appreciate differences.



2011 RUGBY WORLD CUP

First of all, I do apologise to all our communication class of 2011 as well as our lecturer about delay update on  this particular topic, as you all know my  team Manu Samoa went home early not making any quater finals, from there I am not interest to the World Cup anymore..Anyway this is what I thought about on this spectacular world events.

2011 Rugby World Cup

I enjoy the heading of Raymond's blog about the world cup: The good, the bad and the ugly :

Throughout this six weeks we saw and experience the good, the bad and the ugly from all 48 games from the strong and experienced 20 teams around the world. What I am concern and very interest about, How New Zealand provide a brilliant services to host this special event.

1) The arrival of every teams in Aotearoa, the supporters have time off from work and heading down to several airports to welcome their heros. There are many team by I will only attched 2 videos from spectacular team from the Pacific :

The arrival of Manu Samoa and the Ikaletahi from Samoa and Tonga.

The whole six weeks of the tourrnment was very significant. The opening ceremony was great, the pool games to quater finals, semis and the final match on the 23rd of October 2011 between the All Blacks and France. 

and the moment the world is waiting for:

I enjoy watching the very top eight teams competing for the Gold Cup, I remember  Saint Paul letter to Corinthians  (1 Corinthians 9: 24-25) says: Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown.

The reason I choose this passage to write about, because this is how exactly we are here in this world for! All of us Christians our journey in this world is not that easy, we face a lot of temptation and weaknesses to the way to obtain that Heavenly Crown. Some us can't made because of several reasons like my team Manu Samoa can't make to the top 8 teams due to the lack of preparations and many more reasons as you may aware of. But to me the most popular mistake in every match is COMMUNICATION.Why I choose this as a number one mistake ?

Firstly, we all communicate, we all talk and listen, read and write, use body language and other forms of non- verbal communication.

Every players must communicate well with each other and all of the team member. Commuication is mostly a two way process. It invloves feedback in which the response of the receiver of the message is conveyed to the sender. Such feedback may take the form of physical action taken by the receiver and hence the observable or it may be subtly expressed in body language and be barely discernible.

For example: If we watch the All Black team, from their training session, the coach is always deliver the message, the team members are the receivers and respond provide feedbacks. If we look into the whole game and take a scrum for an example: The forwards including the props, hooker, flankers, no 8, make sure the scrums must be solid and the ball must be deliever to the half back, the half back works closely with the first five eight, first five to second three quater, the center must communicate with the second five and the wingers, if the communication channel flow clearly within this process, there will be a try, But it will a trouble if the communication break down some where on the line. Body language can be seen and heard.

More message are conveyed without words than by the words themselves. Through out this world special event, New Zealand provide to the world lots of Non verbal communication includes graphic representation and all forms of art, it includes music, artefacts, interior decoration, dress and groomimg, and all of human behaviour. Competent communicators expect their messages to be misunderstood by their receivers, So God Himself expect us to receive and must understand His message and this message we are now proclaiming in this world is about the Jesus Christ , the Way and the Truth to the Eternal Life where we will receive our ropes, and an imperishable crown forever!



London's Long Burn

An outbreak of arson, looting and lawlessness caught Britain and its leaders by surprise. Why they should have seen the troubles coming.

The Standard link below comments on how this is started.
http://thestandard.org.nz/london-riots/

Bostons newspaper published some of the photos taken at that time, it is very sad to view it but we have to see it, so that will give us glue and how we interpret it.
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2011/08/london_riots.html

There are several things happens in our world today such as  natural disasters, famines, wars, economy recessions, killing of innocent people, and the Riots in London. What is happen in our world today?

Outcast and Outraged: The looting was not, as some observers too swiftly concluded, a race riot. Yes, Duggan was balck, and there are strong correlations between race and class in Britain. But some of the worst violence happened in majority white neighborhoods like Croydon. This is much broader than race. This is about a whole group.- black, white, brown who live just outside the law.

In my own opinion, I think all of these happens because of each individual and how they communicates with one another. The communication between locals and the government is fail here. The message is not clearly received by the locals because of poor communication. Not just communication is failed BUT people's values, beliefs and culture are not fully understand by others. It was a good alert for everyone to fully understand other people's culture and how we interrogating it. In the begining God create the Universe and HE saw it was Good, He created the first human and gave him the authority (the first role) to look after it. What is happen now? The beautiful world is badly damage by human beings, because in my own understanding the communication between the created human beings and their CREATOR is completely fail. NOT by the Creator, but all of us, created human beings. Once we fail our communication with God, we end up ignoring others (neighbours) and we still continuing to do what we think is right, it will end up affecting others.

Save space, just one church should cover it: Martin Van Beynen

I am very interesting on the above article by Martin Van Beynen. Firstly, if I have a good look at the name of this city "Christchurch" its clearly spell the message the Church of Christ. As an immigrant, I am still trying to work it out the meaning (name) of this city.
Beynen's writing to save space and just build one big church for all the churches in this region to use it, to me it is brilliant thoughts,  I think this idea will bring everyone together under one roof and concentrate on worship our Living God. It is time to forget about our church differences and how we keep our own church's doctrines and being ONE.
I enjoy and happy to share about Rosco article: http://www.soulwinning.info/bd/christs_church.htm for every believers to remember His One and only church where Jesus created the members (Colossians 1:16), He purchased it with His own blood ( Acts 20:28). He is the head and it is His body (Ephesians 5: 22-32) and there is one body.

As Paul's letter to Corinths in (1 Corinthians 1:1- 18) where he heard of divisions  in the church, he remind them to concentrate only in preaching the gospel- not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.So I think there will very interesting if Beynen's ideas come in shapes soon based on the above Bible scriptures.

The other point comes into my mind, Our government and our people failed in their reconstruction's plan of the Christchurch city, the rebuilding of the whole city, shopping centre are first piority but not churches, and I remembered the last verse of our National Anthem, "God defend New Zealand!...but to me , if we depend on God to defend our land , our people, we need to put God first in everything especially rebuilding of churches because That is where we see the Power and Glory of our Almighty God.

Norway Tragedy

The event of the last week shock the world. It has come out that the killer had planned this for two years . Tributes to the victims have poured in:

I really liked what Tim said over at his blog. Lots and lots of lives, (human beings) images of God ended in this way. The question I need to ask, What is happening in our world today? We experienced violent weather, killing, Where is God? Over recent months the world has been repeatedly stricken by devastating tornadoes, floods, wild fires, earthquakes, tsunami, volcano acids etc... Is there are message for us in these events? What is the biblical perspective on such disasters? I was shock when my little son age 6 years old asked me another night before bed, How could a God of love allow such disasters to occur? Did God allowed other people to kill other people? I replied to him, It is a long story son but remember God is always love us, so whatever things happen in our lives, we don't know, it might be a reasons.
About the Norway incident happened it was horrific, it was illegal and murder in its most reckless form. Yet many agree with the core idea the suspect put forward. Point, it does not make the idea illegal, the guy was insane but what made an intelligent man come to the conclusion that was the only way to draw attention to the perceived problem of Muslims. Well he is got the point, but in reality, we are all human beings, created in the image of God, God of Nations and God of all races, God of Christians and also non Christians.
Well there is only one way, we have to remembers the families of those who lost in our prayer and I think this problem cause by the Lack of Communication. so we have to keep communicate, starts from the person next door to you!