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District 9 Intercultural Communication Analysis

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Intercultural communication is a crucial aspect of global stability and interaction that creates the ability to connect diverse social and cultural groups, however, due to the ongoing rise of international tensions and conflicts across the world, the necessity for proficient and effective intercultural communication is emphasised (Neuliep, 2018). Film is an invaluable tool utilised to convey meaningful and insightful messages that often reflect upon intercultural issues prevalent in modern society. This essay presents an analysis of two key concepts of intercultural communication that are highly applicable to Neill Blomkamp’s sci-fi film District 9. The two concepts that will be analysed and subsequently applied are ethnocentrism and acculturation. …show more content…

This theme is particularly prevalent throughout the entirety of the film. The aliens themselves can be said to personify human-like cockroaches and are derogatorily referred to as “prawns” by the likes of all peoples: the ‘bottom feeders’ of Johannesburg (Kapstein, 2014). Because of this sheer prejudice exhibited towards the aliens, they are shown to be nothing other than an exaggeration and reflective rendering of how racist discourse has depicted its subjects throughout history, much like how apartheid ideology referred to the non-white South Africans as the ‘coloureds’. The cultural domination and speciesism applied to the aliens explicitly infer that the humans have the control and the rights to segregate the creatures into District 9 and to then subsequently evict them from their homes by will. Much like the theories present in ethnocentrism, we have a situation where the dominant peoples (humans) forcefully yields its own will upon the inferior group (aliens) disrespecting their lifeways and their longing and self-determination to return to their home …show more content…

Led by a sadistic warlord Obsandjo, the ‘Nigerians’ are rendered as outlandishly horrendous, due to their formation of a variety of scams, including “illegal arms trade, interspecies prostitution, and the ‘cat food scam’ where tines of cat food are sold to the aliens as a delicacy [for] exorbitant prices” (Jansen van Veuren, 2012). Furthermore, they ‘Nigerians’ are also perceived as exiles due to the assimilation of their original culture, instead, preferring to integrate themselves with the aliens in District 9. This is demonstrated by their choice to only interact and arrange deals with the aliens instead of the human population, extending our knowledge of how acculturation is depicted within the

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