| 8 April 2003 | 2003 4 8
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| 8 April 2003 | 200348
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One of the teachers at the college introduced me to an excellent book called Doing Culture: Cross-cultural Communication in Action (by Linell Davis), which particularly focuses on the difference between Chinese and Western cultures. For me, this was like God's Will finally revealed, and as I read it I experienced an ecstatic feeling of enlightenment. I decided to include a few lessons on intercultural communication in a class of mine which goes by the name "A General Survey of English Speaking Countries".
One of the case studies I wanted to present involved inviting some new friends to your home for dinner. Australians and Americans think that heart-to-heart communication is the best way to strengthen a budding friendship, and any sort of formality makes them suspicious. Chinese, on the other hand, place great store in etiquette, which in this case means treating guests with great care and attention, even if it limits the opportunity for casual chatting.
I know this, and you know this, but do the Chinese know this? When I asked my students about the role of hosts and guests, they gave me a wide range of answers, but unfortunately nothing so extreme as the image I had in mind, and some answers were the complete opposite! It seems that I had erected a caricature as my model of Chinese culture.
One of the complications is that Chinese culture is not homogeneous across the country, and I have students from north, south, east and west. For example, consider the custom of taking gifts when visiting someone: this is quite rare in the north, but very common in the south (one student from Hainan said that you might take a chicken or duck, as well as fruit or other food). In fact, cultural differences within China are so great that one teacher told me southerners who move to the north, or vice versa, may experience culture shock.
I also have a feeling that Chinese culture is in a period of rapid change, and that the younger generation in particular behave differently to their parents. There is undoubtedly some Western influence. For example, birthday cakes are quite popular, although in typical Chinese fashion the appearance is all-important: iced with coloured cream, these elaborately decorated carapaces all contain the same bland spongecake inside. The custom of taking flowers or wine when invited to dinner, which is starting to emerge in Northern China, may ironically be due to Western influence rather than Southern Chinese influence (according to one local opinion).
The bottom line is that when it comes to culture, no rule is absolute. I had always been told that Chinese never reply "thankyou" to a compliment, but it turns out that this is possible after all, although often followed by a humble comment such as "You overpraise me". Conversely, Chinese students have apparently been taught to reply "thankyou" to all compliments in English. On one occasion, a student complimented me in English and I gave a modest reply. Fancying themselves an expert on cultural norms, they said indignantly: "You should say thankyou!"
All the same, we keep trying to find rules. But just because the rule can explain something, doesn't mean that the explanation is correct. We might fool ourselves into thinking we understand, when in fact we do not. For example, American culture is often classified as "low context", meaning that words play a more significant role in communication than contextual aspects such as social relationship, nonverbal signals, and so on. Syed Zafar in this article presents the following example:
One time, I was asked to speak in Austin. The woman responsible for programming sent me a map explaining how to get there. The map was drawn by hand. It contained highways and little streets. There was a line at the bottom of the map, "map not drawn to scale." By looking at the map, it was rather obvious that there was not a chance that the map was drawn according to scale. But an American has to write it down.
Indeed, we even have a term for this phenomenon: "anal retentive". Well, perhaps this woman's attention to detail deserves more praise than that, but my point is that not every American would add such a disclaimer, and most American readers would find it just as redundant as Mr Zafar does. It's possible to give an isolated example like this one to support virtually any theory of culture. (Actually, the map itself is a better example of low-context communication—in a high-context culture it's more common to meet the new arrival at the airport, rather than rely on a piece of paper).
When I first started working in China, I was anxious about how I would cope if any serious problem arose. I found some comfort by telling myself that no problem was so serious that it couldn't be solved by simply being honest with everyone involved. Some time later, I realised that this just isn't true. In Chinese culture, sometimes telling the truth can be extremely insensitive and inappropriate if it causes further damage to personal dignity and social harmony. At least, that's what I read in a book. The value of these books and theories is that they point out cultural assumptions which might otherwise go unexamined. I am now aware that honesty might not always be the best policy, but learning what behaviour is appropriate in various situations is something I can only achieve through observation and experience. There is no book in the "For Dummies" series that can teach you. Ms Davis was aware of this when she chose the title "Doing Culture" for her book.
Yesterday I bumped into a couple of my students near the dining hall, and the first thing we said was, simultaneously, "Have you eaten yet?" I didn't have to think about this, it just felt like the right thing to say. This is a trivial example, but given time my intuition in other situations will hopefully develop too. I have been a bit worried that after almost two months in China I have learnt very little about culture and etiquette, but perhaps I am learning without consciously realising it. It may be that a person does not know how much understanding they have gained, until they observe a newcomer from their home culture making mistakes which they themselves have long since outgrown.
Comments
Subject: two things
1) You're starting to sound like a teacher.
2) I can't believe you had to go to China to discover that honesty is not always the best policy!