Republic of the Philippines

Pangasinan State University

SCHOOL OF ADVANCED STUDIES

Urdaneta City, Pangasinan

TAKE HOME EXAMINATION in CAE 213:

CROSS CULTURAL PRAGMATICS AND INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Victoria Psalm M. de Guzman Professor: Dr. Luzviminda Ramos

Master of Arts in Education - Communication Arts – English

1. What is intercultural communicative competence?

Intercultural communicative competence, or ICC, refers to the ability to
understand cultures, including your own, and use this understanding to communicate with
people from other cultures successfully. For example, ICC could include understanding
how gestures and the distance between speakers very from culture to culture. In the
classroom, ways to develop this competence include learners producing a written or
outline guide to their own country and culture for visitors, reading and discussing guides
written by visitors, researching aspects of a target culture in various media including
cinema, literature and television, giving presentations on aspects of the target culture, and
exploiting the teacher’s own expertise of their own culture.
“Effective intercultural communication requires: empathy (an understanding of
other people’s behaviors and ways of thinking), respect (genuine admiration and
appreciation of different ways of thinking and communication), tolerance (the ability and
willingness to accept and acknowledge different behaviors and ways of thinking, the
existence of opinions or behavior that one does not necessarily agree with), sensitivity
(the awareness and responsiveness to other people’s behaviors and ways of thinking), and
flexibility (willingness to adapt and open to change and different ways of thinking).”
–Byram 1997, 2009; Alptekin, 2002; Kohn, 2013

2. What is cultural conversation? Differentiate transactional with interactional talk.

Small talk and conversation are examples of interactional talk, which refers to
communication that primarily serves the purpose of social interaction. Small talk consists
of short exchanges that usually begin with a greeting, move to back-and-forth exchanges
of non-controversial topics, such as the weekend, the weather, work, school, etc. and then
often conclude with a fixed expression. They serve to create positive atmosphere and to
 create a comfort zone between people who might be total strangers. Topics that are
appropriate in small talk may differ across cultures, since topics that are considered
private in some cultures can be considered as appropriate topics for small talk in other
cultures. Learners who cannot manage small talk often find they come away from social
encounters feeling awkward, or that they did not make good impression, and,
consequently, may avoid situations where small talk is required.
Another important communication skill is the ability to use English to accomplish
different kinds of transactions. A transaction is an interaction that focuses on getting
something done, rather than maintaining social interaction. A transaction may consist of a
sequence of different functions. Two different kinds of transaction are often
distinguished. One type refers to transactions that occur in situations where the focus is
on giving and receiving information, and where the participants focus primarily on what
is said or achieved. The second type refers to transactions that involve obtaining goods or
services.

3. What is the role of ethnography in different research disciplines? in language education?

Ethnography is the systematic study of people and cultures. It is designed to
explore cultural phenomena where the researcher observes society from the point of view
of the subject of the study. Ethnography is a means to represent graphically and in writing
the culture of a group. The resulting field study or a case report reflects the knowledge
and the system of meanings in the lives of the cultural group. As a method of data
collection, ethnography entails examining the behaviour of the participants in a certain
specific social situation and also understanding their interpretation of such behaviour.
In language education, ethnography gives one a chance to: explore and reflect our
own or a foreign culture; learn things at every time, in every place; develop observancy;
formulate more conclusions; develop understanding and tolerance; and have a first-hand
experience. Teachers see the worth of doing ethnography in the directness of the
experience, in the personal involvement in the data collection process. In teacher’s
opinion, ethnography can help them teach cultural issues in the classroom.

4. What is the role of assessment in intercultural learning and ELT?

Assessment occurs in many contexts and is done for a variety of reasons.
Traditionally, the most common way to measure achievement and proficiency in
language learning has been the test. Even though alternative forms of assessment are
growing in popularity, most teachers still use this old standby.
Testing, as a tool, can help teachers identify students’ strengths and weaknesses
and evaluate the effectiveness of their programs. Teachers must design or choose tests
that are practical, reliable, and valid.
 Assessment is perhaps one of the most difficult and important part of our job as
teachers. Ideally, it should be seen as a means to help us guide students on their way to
learning. No single procedure can meet the needs of all learners and situations, so we
need to remember to incorporate a variety of tools to help our students know how they
are progressing and to gauge the effectiveness of our own methodology and materials.

5. How will you design activities in the intercultural classroom?

First, explore what is intercultural learning all about. We, teachers, can be the real
change agents in schools that are open to integrating intercultural learning into our
classrooms. Second, use the news for reflection and debate in the classroom. Global
citizenship and intercultural competences are practiced everyday, start by facilitating
discussions about the news to explore topics. Pick a news story, get thoroughly informed
about the topic and create list of questions relevant for the students to reflect about,
respond to and propose change actions. And of course, use the existing diversity in the
classroom to learn about different cultures. Diversity can be useful resource for us,
teachers, to teach culture and diversity and for the students to get to know and relate to
each other better, exploring what they have in common and ways in which they are
different. By reflecting on the diversity within the classroom, students will become more
conscious that they don’t have to cross national borders to experience diversity.