The Importance Of Intercultural Communication

Before any word, any statement that may be said, understanding the term “culture” should be a start. Many people translate culture in their own interpretations without referring it to the world and the people that surround them. What is culture? What is culture all about? Culture, to be specific: “is the characteristic and knowledge of a particular group of people, defined from everything like language, religion, cuisine, social habits, music and arts.” (Ann Zimmermann, 2015) Now that we got a clear idea of culture, what happens with intercultural communications? What does it mean? How do we tolerate this term in our everyday life? Intercultural communication is translated as a situated communication between different people or groups that …show more content…
in his book “Intercultural communication for everyday life”, is not as what many think as being a fairly simple concept. In fact, it is a complicated concept and it is related to communication effectiveness, as understanding the valued goals or rewards that are accomplished. For many years and several studies and researches made, intercultural competence was isolated into …show more content…
It is also divided into four important parts, as follows, first, having knowledge, that is, knowing about the different cultures and other people’s behaviors. Second, having empathy, known as having the ability to understand the feelings and the needs of other people, thirdly, having self-confidence, this is translated as having knowledge of you own desires, strengths, weaknesses, and of course, emotional stabilities. Finally, the most important is having cultural identity, in other words, having actual knowledge about your own belonging and culture. Looking back from the hours now, thinking about a course I took that had a great influence in developing my own intercultural competence, I could not think of a course other than “Intercultural communication” taken at the Empire State College. This course was not just written words and works that had to completed to take high points that will count up for graduating, rather, it was one of the most important courses taken in my field of studies all along. Learning different cultures, bringing together students that although are from my own country, Lebanon, have different backgrounds and come from several villages and towns. I was taught about different languages, different religions, different types of communications, different values, traditions and even norms, this was a huge step in building an understanding and knowing how to