Culturally sensitive topics
Many people talk about Westerners being more direct than people from Eastern cultures. Westerners are known for speaking what is on their mind. I personally don’t think this description is very accurate and I think that it totally depends on the topic. Westerners generally are very careful about commenting on other people’s physical appearance. We usually won’t tell someone they are fat, ugly, or poorly dressed. Even if we think someone is too fat or unattractive, we often lie about it. Even if someone asks us directly we will still often lie. If we do tell the truth we will try to be really sensitive about it and make some excuse. In China, many people comment on my appearance all the time. This happens to my friends too. I have one friend that girls always say is “really handsome, but he would be even more handsome if he loses some weight”. Sometimes people tell me that I am a little too fat, or they tell me they don’t like my clothes. In Canada, no one would ever say that. They might think it but they keep it inside.
I also notice that people here ask me the question, “What do people in your country think about…..?” This question is very strange to me. It is a big cultural difference. When I answer that question I always say, “I don’t really know what most Canadians think, but I think…..”. We think of ourselves as individuals and we usually answer questions in terms of ourselves. In China, people often tell me, “Chinese people believe…..”. That kind of sentence is a big cultural difference that I notice. Because of this difference it seems that people from Western countries are more sensitive about comments about themselves and less sensitive about comments about their country or culture. For example, if someone told me many things about Canada that they don’t like, it wouldn’t bother me very much. I might agree with them, I might not. The point is that it wouldn’t make me feel bad. If someone told me something bad about me personally it would bother me much more. If they told me I was fat, ugly, or boring, I would feel much worse than if they told me they didn’t like Canada. My feeling is that it is reversed in Eastern countries.
I think it is important that we remember these differences when we talk to each other to avoid hurting other people’s feelings. On the other hand, I think it’s also important that we all try to toughen up and learn how to talk about all kinds of topics.
Please share your thoughts.
Andrew
East West Cultural Differences
July 16th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
For the most part I agree with Andrew. I’m from Switzerland, and I think that we are also more sensitive about comments about ourselves than comments about our country or culture here.
As you can see, I speak about my poeple by begining the phrase with : “I think that” which was also an aspect that has been picked out by Andrew.
Indeed, I think that I speak this way because in our culture you are first an individual and only after a part of a society. It is an egoisitc view, in comparison to Eastern cultures, where the society has more importance than the individual. But there is also an other reason to avoid speaking in the name of your nation, you can’t involve them in your opinions.
Everyone has the right to think what he wants. If I would speak for my poeple, I would certainly hurt the feelings of one of them because we don’t all have the same opinions. Tolerance is very important, in any kind of relation (from Western to Western, from Western to Eastern, from Eastern to Eastern).
To illustrate what I’m saying I can tell you how it’s like here in Switzerland. We are 7 millions (not many and it’s a tiny tiny country) we have four official languages (which means that we often can’t understand us each other), two official religions (but there are about ten different all over the country) , and the territory is politically divided in 26 areas. These are many barriers for such a small country (41.000 km2). There are more poeple living in Paris than in whole Switzerland.
The inhabitants of each area have their own way of thinking. So here we have to manage everyday with misunderstandings and cultural differences, but it works ! We are one and the same country ! We just have to be very careful with what we say and how we say it, because of our multi-cultural situation. We know that things can be quickly misunderstood.
It’s wonderful to communicate with other poeple, whatever their language is, whichever their culture is, it’s always enriching, and I think that is the most important thing to keep in mind.
If the two parts have an open mind and tolerance, and take a little care of how they say things, everything can be said without hurting the feelings of the other. It’s a team work ! ;o)
Aronne
July 17th, 2007 at 1:07 am
Interesting topic.
It’s true that in China “the society has more importance than the individual”. Well, sort of. Generally people try to keep the same as others rather than be individual.
July 19th, 2007 at 1:54 am
one day I notice that many people in korea meet someone for a long time, they don’t say “how are you”, instead of that, they say “you look like you gain weight or lost weight” -_-
I can say .. it is true for people in Korea to pay too much attention on beauty things or appreance..
August 2nd, 2007 at 5:50 am
One time, I talked with my German colleague about my roommate.
“Didn’t you remember my roommate. the lovely girl who is a little bit fat?”( of course, I won’t say that in front of her. The reason I said in that way was trying to recall his memory actually..hehe)
“You think she is fat? I don’t think so…maybe she is just like the western size…haha”
Here, we can see different way of thinking…:)
November 26th, 2007 at 7:38 am
I have to agree with Andrew on this. I often get questions in the form of “what do Canadians think about this or that?” or very general questions about Canada which I find so hard to answer because from the East coast to the West coast things are so different. I always have to respond with “well, generally where I am from it’s like this.”
Also on the issue of commenting on apearence I have had people come up to me and ask me if I would like some tips and ideas on dieting and others tell me that eating little will not make me lose weight when in fact I was eating little because I wasn’t hungry. I found this very odd but figured it was part of their culture!
One last thing, the weirdest comment I got was from a new “friend”. We were walking in the main part of the city and we saw a McDonald’s (which I hate and makes my physically sick) and she asked if I wanted to have supper there and when I responded with no she was surprised and said, “oh, I thought all westerners eat that and KFC 3 times a day.” I was shocked.
November 27th, 2007 at 11:43 pm
Hi, hello, privet
calochortus
December 15th, 2007 at 9:45 pm
very interesting, but I don’t agree with you
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