This is the first chaoter of O

1. Because learning changes everything.®
Part 1
Foundations of Intercultural Communication
Copyright © 2022 McGraw Hill. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database
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Chapter 1
Studying Intercultural
Communication

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Chapter Outline
• The peace imperative.
• The economic imperative.
• The technological imperative.
• The environmental imperative.
• The demographic imperative.
• The self-awareness imperative.
• The ethical imperative.

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Peace Imperative
Can individuals of different genders, ages, ethnicities, races, languages,
and religions peacefully coexist on the planet?

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Economic Imperative: In the Workplace
• How can companies benefit from cultural differences in the
workplace?
• Diversity is a potentially powerful economic tool for business
organizations.

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Economic Imperative: Global Economy
Global economic development will continue to create demand for
intercultural communication.
• This development will create not only more jobs but also more
consumers to purchase goods from around the world—and to travel in
that world.

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Technological Imperative: Technology and Human
Communication
• What does using technology to communicate have to do with
intercultural communication?
• What is the digital divide and how does it affect our intercultural
communication?
• These inequities of technology have enormous implications for
intercultural communication.

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The Environmental Imperative
Intercultural communication plays a central role in working across
cultures, languages, and borders and the potential conflicts that may
arise.
Environmental challenges that impact intercultural encounters:
• Floods and droughts.
• Wildfires.
• Water rights.

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Demographic Imperative: Changing U.S. Demographics
• How will the workforce that you enter differ from the one that your
parents entered?
• Changing demographics present special challenges and
opportunities for intercultural understanding.

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Demographic Imperative: Changing Immigration
Patterns
• What is the effect of current patterns of immigration on the social
landscape?
• Is intercultural conflict a consequence of diversity?
• Can we profit from being exposed to different ways of doing things?
• Immigration changes along with increasing domestic diversity show
that the U.S. is becoming more heterogeneous, or diverse.
• These demographic changes present many opportunities and
challenges.

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Self-Awareness Imperative
• Why is it important to gain an awareness of one’s own cultural identity
and background when studying intercultural communication?
• Self-awareness that comes through intercultural learning may involve
an increased awareness of being caught up in political, economic, and
historical systems—not of our own making.

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Ethical Imperative: Ethical Judgments and Cultural
Values
Is there any universality in ethics?
Are any cultural behaviors always right or always wrong?
Universalist position.
• An ethical approach that emphasizes the similarity of beliefs across
cultures.
• A universalist may insist that cultural differences are only superficial,
that fundamental notions of right and wrong are universal.
Relativist position.
• An ethical approach believing that any cultural behavior can be judged
only within the cultural context in which it occurs.
• A relativist believes that only a community can truly judge the ethics of
its members.

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Ethical Imperative: Becoming an Ethical Student of
Culture
What skills are important in learning about cultural patterns and identities
of your own and others?
• Practicing self-reflexivity.
• Learning about others.
• Listening to the voices of others.
• Developing a sense of social justice.

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Building Intercultural Skills
Chapter 1: Studying Intercultural Communication.
• Become more conscious of your communication.
• Become more aware of others’ communication.
• Expand your own intercultural communication repertoire.
• Become more flexible in your communication.
• Be an advocate for others.

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Copyright © 2022 McGraw Hill. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database
or retrieval system, without the prior written consent of McGraw Hill, including, but not limited to, network storage or transmission, or broadcast for distance learning.