Importance Of Culture In Communication

2270 Words10 Pages
Name: Thao Phuong Nguyen
Student ID: 4622926 Programme Title: Media and Communication
Unit Title: Communication Theory
Unit tutor: Dr Nael Jebril

ACADEMIC ESSAY
Essay Question: Discuss the influence of cultural norms on interpersonal communication.

In the context of globalization, the opportunities of communication, sharing experiences and mutual learning between cultures across the world are strongly increasing. Language can be seen as a barrier to intercultural communication - communication between communities with different cultural ways of life and different world views - because spoken language is a mean of expression and conveying culture and culture is a lifeline for language development. This essay looks into the importance of language in intercultural communication, base on previous perspectives of scholars throughout the centuries on language, culture, communication and the relationship among them. From those, solutions are drawn to overcome this barrier of language through intercultural effective communication.
Although the concept of culture is becoming increasingly popular in all areas of social life, but so far no scholar can give an absolutely accurate definition of culture. Nevertheless, many researchers (Levine and Adelman 1982; Banks and McGee 1989; O’Sullivan 1994; Valdes 1995) agreed that culture is structured by two main categories: tangible elements and intangible elements. Levine and Adelman (1993) compared culture to an iceberg. The tip of the