Written by Cross-cultural barriers.
That’s what you’re facing when ethnocentricity enters into international communication.
You’ll run into every communication barrier imaginable, some variables of which include:
- Language, itself
- Nonverbal communication norms
- Authority ranks
- Technological environment
- Social environment
- Natural environment
Understanding the cultures with which you are working and studying up on these variables will help you combat your own innate ethnocentricity, allowing cross-cultural communication to go infinitely more smoothly.
Let’s take a look at how these misunderstandings arise.
Linguistic Misunderstandings
It goes without saying that language is paramount to communication.
But when you work cross-culturally, you may not speak the same language, which means you and your counterpart will be relying on translators to assist communication.
Hiring a good translator can make or break communication, especially considering, even without a language barrier per se, linguistic understandings can still occur.
Take American versus British English, for instance.
Both cultures speak English, with minor differences in vocabulary, so you might assume communication would be cut and dry. But the culturally-grounded differences in vocabulary, phrasings, and accents have the potential to throw a wrench in communication.
Sociolinguistics
Enter, sociolinguistics.
Sociolinguistics creates rifts in cross-cultural communications via the social patterning that sometimes distinguishes class, inflates stereotypes, or highlights other national prejudices.
In fact, the differences between American and British English actually stem from class distinction, itself.
In the 16th and 17th centuries, the British exported the English language to America.
Those who settled in America pronounced the ‘r’ in words, something known as “rhotic speech.”
Meanwhile, in the UK, to distinguish themselves from the commoners, the upper classes began softening their ‘r’s. But the distinction didn’t last long as the masses naturally followed, thus creating a profound difference in pronunciation between British and American English.
The change in spelling and vocabulary was more intentional.
Without standardized spelling, dictionaries were necessary to preserve the pronunciation of words.
Those in the UK were created by scholars in London, while those in the US were compiled by lexicographer, Noah Webster.
According to some, in order to establish cultural independence from the motherland, Webster changed the way American words were spelled (no ‘u’ in colour, for instance), thus creating further differences in the English language across the two cultures.
Minor Details are of Major Importance
Minor details are crucial when it comes to business negotiations, therefore the fine print might be blurred by minor differences in language.
The more minor the detail, the more difficult it is to correct.
For instance, you can spot a major translation error from a mile away. Although correcting such errors may consume a lot of time, look unprofessional, and put stress on negotiations, at least they’re easy to catch.
However, accents, dialects, and cultural language choices can strain international negotiations between two cultures who are, more or less, linguistically on the same page.
We’ll talk more about this next week.
Success Across Cultures 