MODULE 7: Cultural Awareness

1. Cultural Awareness

Understanding Cross-Cultural Communication

Goal

The recruiter will understand and respect the diversity of migrant children and youth, and their families, in order to interact with them effectively, and how to assess interactions with the community, the recruitment network and migrant families, and make appropriate adaptations to improve future interactions and communication.

Objectives

After completing this section, the participant will be able to:

• Recall reasons why families move to the U.S. and the impact of these reasons on their MEP eligibility;
• Explain how culturally distinct non-verbal communication and cultural factors can influence communication;
• Identify potential differences within the local migrant population; and
• Identify strategies for bridging difference and breaking down communication barriers.
• Identify common communication barriers;
• Assess the effectiveness of past interactions with the community, recruitment network and migrant families; and
• Recommend ways to improve future interactions by removing communication barriers.

Materials:

• “Cultural Communication and Awareness” PowerPoint
• “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint

Reasons Migrant Families Move

Think about the migrant families with which they work. Why do these families move to, or within, the United States?

Likely answers are: in search of a better lifestyle, religious freedom, political asylum, economic necessity, better education or to join family members already living in the United States.

Points to be noted:

• Migrant families often move for the same reasons the rest of us do.
• It is important for a recruiter to know the reason a migrant family moves, as this will determine whether they may be eligible for the MEP. However, to qualify for MEP services, they will also have had to move in order to obtain qualifying work within the last three years.

For example:

• If they are coming for political asylum, they do not qualify for MEP services.
• If they are coming for economic necessity to seek employment in agricultural or fishing work, they would potentially qualify for MEP services.
• If they are coming from an inadequate housing situation they will probably not qualify, unless they qualified with a previous move within the last three years.
• If they are coming to join other family members already living in the US, they may or may not qualify, depending on their circumstances and past moves.

Cultural Building Blocks

When people come to this country, they not only bring their physical selves, but also their culture.

Post “Cultural Awareness and Communication” PowerPoint slide 5

Points to be noted:

• One way to think about culture is as an iceberg. There are both visible and invisible parts of an iceberg.
• A small percentage of what we see on the surface represents those things about a person’s culture that we can see. For example: food, dress, crafts, literature and games.
• However, most of what we don’t see – the unspoken and unconscious aspects – is what affects how we view and conduct ourselves, and communicate with others. For example:
• Concept of time;
• Perception of personal space;
• Conversational patterns;
• Roles in relationship to age, gender, and class; and
• Body language, to include eye contact.
• These items, called “cultural building blocks,” make up our culture.
• Our culture impacts how we communicate with others and how we understand their communications with us.

Post “Cultural Awareness and Communication” PowerPoint slide 6

Questions to think about:

1.  How could this aspect of culture have an impact when you communicate with migrant families?
2. How could it present a barrier to communication?

Answers will vary, but may include:

1. Miscommunication about a time to meet can trigger emotional responses of anger and frustration which can impact relationship-building.
2. A person that emphasizes current social interaction over being on time for a future meeting may consider you rude if you insist on a meeting starting on time if they are speaking to someone else at the time.

Post “Cultural Awareness and Communication” PowerPoint slide 7

Questions to think about:

1. How could this aspect of culture have an impact when you communicate with migrant families?
2. How could it present a barrier to communication?

 Answers will vary, but may include:

1. Standing too close to someone from a culture that prefers more personal space can be intimidating, making that person fearful and less reluctant to speak openly.
2. Standing too far away from someone with a preference for closer physical distance between speakers can indicate that you are distant and don’t care about helping them.

Post “Cultural Awareness and Communication” PowerPoint slide 9

Questions to think about:

1. How could this aspect of culture have an impact when you communicate with migrant families?
2. How could it present a barrier to communication?

Answers will vary, but can include:

1. It is important that you respect both the mother and father’s roles in relation to each other and their children’s education when you approach a new family. In some cultures, the mother will be comfortable answering your questions with or without her husband present. In other cultures, the mother may be wary to answer your questions and uncomfortable inviting you into her home while her husband is away. If this is the case, you should offer to return at a time when her husband is present to make her feel more comfortable.
2. Some cultures grant a great deal of respect to class structures and authority and a family may view you as an authority figure when you first show up at your door. You may have to set the family at ease by slowly building their trust and establishing a relationship before pressing them for information about their children.

Post “Cultural Awareness and Communication” PowerPoint Slide 10

Questions to think about:

1. How could this aspect of culture have an impact when you communicate with migrant families?
2. How could it present a barrier to communication?

Answers will vary, but may include:

Maintaining eye contact while speaking may be a sign of honesty and openness to one culture, whereas in another it may demonstrate a lack of respect or even confrontation. You may want to adjust your normal use of eye contact to make the family more comfortable.

Some cultures will use lots of physical contact and hand gestures when speaking, while others may cross their arms over their chest or stand with a rigid, more formal posture. If you are with a family who is more formal, you may want to adapt the same respectful posture to let them know you are granting them the same respect.  At the same time, if you are with a family who is very warm and open and using lots of physical contact when speaking, you may want to relax your posture so they do not think are distant and aloof.

Here is smoe info from wikipedia about eye contact:

In human beings, eye contact is a form of nonverbal communication and is thought to have a large influence on social behaviorCoined in the early to mid-1960s, the term has come in the West to often define the act as a meaningful and important sign of confidence and social communication.^[2] The customs and significance of eye contact vary widely between cultures, with religious and social differences often altering its meaning greatly.  For more informationgo to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_contact

Differences Within the Local Migrant Population

Questions to think about:

• Identify where the families within their local migrant population typically came from.
• Based on the cultural building blocks we previously discussed, what kind of communication barriers might you encounter in communicating with these families?

Answers should address concepts of time, personal space, conversational patterns, roles in relationship to age/gender/class, and body language.

What kinds of people do they come into contact with as recruiters?

Answers should include the following:

• Employers;
• Local school staff;
• Community contacts, organizations, commercial establishments;
• Other government agencies; and
• Migrant families themselves.

Describe an experience where you interacted with one of these people of which you are most proud? 

Possible responses could include:

• The conversation took place in an appropriate setting,
• You were able to convey the information in a clear way,
• You were able to convey the importance of the information,
• The person with whom you were talking became passionate about following through on the information you presented, or
• You established a good rapport with the other person.

Describe an interaction that you felt was not effective as it should have been?

Possible responses could include:

• Many distractions took place,
• The other person couldn’t understand what you were trying to communicate,
• The other person was in a highly emotional state, or
• You were in an inappropriate location.

You will now examine the communication process and discuss the possible barriers to communication that were reflected in the experiences they just discussed.

Communication Barriers

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint Slide 2

Points to be noted:

• The communication process consists of the message you are trying to convey, how you convey that message, and the message the recipient receives.
• At each step, a miscommunication can occur because of communication barrier that arises.
• Some barriers can arise as a result of the environment in which the message is communicated.
• Other barriers can arise as a result of the backgrounds, experiences and culture of the people communicating. For example:
• Every person you come into contact with has a different background, experiences, and culture that couldaffect the way they perceive you or your message.
• Your personal background, experiences, and culture could affect the way you convey a message.
• We will now look at some common communication barriers in more detail.

Post workbook page 8 (take notes)

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint Slide 3

Additional note on the definition:

• There is a saying, “There’s my version of what happened, your version of what happened, and the actual event itself.”
• This is because everyone’s senses, values, and interpretation of events based on past experiences are different and therefore, each person processes an event and sees the world in a unique way.

Post workbook page 9

Pleae complete attached page

Points to be noted:

Answers to these questions reflect your personal perceptions of people, events, and the world around them. Our perceptions are always in relation to ourselves.

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint Slide 4

Points to be noted:

• There can be confusion or misunderstanding caused by words that have more than one meaning.
• Confusion can also occur when the wrong word is chosen, or when abbreviations and acronyms are used (e.g. MEP, ID&R, SEA, etc.)

Think of an examples from your own experience of times when using the wrong word created confusion or a misunderstanding. For example, the use of the word “migrant” with a Mexican family may cause confusion because “la migra” is a Mexican term for immigration police.

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint Slide 5

Example of how verbal emphasis can lead to barriers in communication:  Read the following sentences below seven times, each time with the emphasis on a different word. (Read the first statement without emphasis on any particular word.) After reading each sentence consider how the meaning of the sentence changed each time a different word was emphasized.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

I never said he stole the candy.

The purpose of this excerise was to show; it is easy to confuse the intended meaning by emphasizing the wrong word. They should be especially careful about emphasizing the correct word when speaking with people whose primary language is not English.

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint slide 6 and 7

Points to be noted:

•  People are more likely to understand what you are trying to convey if your information is provided in the right context.
• You may want to consider providing them with a bigger picture before getting into more detail in order to avoid misunderstandings.
• Internal interference can take place when a conveyer or recipient is preoccupied with thinking about another topic, has preconceived notions about the intent of the conveyer, or is angry or upset.
• Internal interference can cause the conveyer to use the wrong words or display body language that confuses the message.
• Internal interference can cause the receiver to misinterpret the message by preventing him/her from hearing the actual words said.

It is very important to be aware of possible internal interference that may keep the recipient from receiving the message that is meant to be conveyed.

Post “Communication Barriers” PowerPoint slide 8

Points to be noted:

• External interference is caused by external forces that distract us from correctly hearing what another person is saying.
• Some examples are: a barking dog, a passing car, or a needy child.