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Hosfstede Dimensions of Culture and figuring foreigners both identify six dimensions to differentiate culture which includes Power Distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, long-term orientation and indulgence. 

The concept interested me most is the individualist vs. collectivist. As the article mentioned, no culture is exclusively individualist or collectivist but all the cultures are tend to be more one than the other. People from individualistic cultures are more likely to have an independent view of themselves, such as those of the United States and other Western countries, emphasizing personal achievement, which results in a strong sense of competition. Collectivist cultures are more likely to see themselves as connected to others, such as those of China, Korean and Japan, emphasizing family and work group goals above individual needs or desires. I believe the similar culture may helps understand Korean better.

I always found the concept of individualist and collectivist culture very interesting. The categories behind the Geert Hofstede Analysis is classified into collectivism vs individualism, power distance, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, and long-term orientation. As a Chinese-American, I have grown up in a somewhat individualist society with strong roots of collectivist culture within my family and culture. Hofstede’s analysis really hits home for me as I live within a stark range of contradictions. The means and categories of analysis is a good way to try to figure out different cultures. The most interesting category to me is collectivism vs individualism and uncertainty avoidance.

A collectivist society views “I” as “we” and societies/groups are integrated into strong ingroups. Everything is in the interest of the group. If a child is to voice the opinion deviating from what is collectively felt between the rest of the group, the child is usually shunned and seen to be bad character. This sums up most of my life with my family, especially since I am the one who deviates from the rest. There is also a large idea In Chinese culture, we are to value our family and put them above everyone else. Chinese families value their family to a greater extent compared to American households. The phenomena is based on the idea that you are born into this “group” and you are expected to be loyal to this group for life.

The minority of the world lives in an individualist society/group, where the interests of an individual is above others. The idea where everyone is expected to have their own ideas and develop their own personalities/ideas (and have support to deviate from the norm) is a foreign concept to me. Individualism also ties into uncertainty avoidance. Many Americans enjoy uncertainty as also shown through family interactions. Whether a child is going to university or just moving out of their parent’s house, many people are willing to move across the country with not much thought. I know many people who just packed up their lives and moved from New York to California without a second thought. Chinese culture is much different, where each step is carefully thought out and often coordinated between your families.

As I really know nothing about Turkish culture, I did a search on Cultural Altas, which is an Australian project with the goal to provide cultural profiles where most have some connections to the Hofstede Dimensions. As society tends to be more collectivist, the younger generations are more individualist, which is also common in China and Russia. Turkish culture is very family-centric and different generations of a nuclear often live together even through marriage. There are similarities to be found in Turkish culture when compared to Chinese culture. There is a strong value in elders, meanwhile in U.S culture, the elderly will prefer to live by themselves or in care facilities in efforts to alleviate the burden on their families. Using the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture and being able to compare it to your own culture is often the best way to figure out the values of another.

Figuring Foreigners Out attempts to identify big categorical differences between cultures, naming the individualist-collectivist and monochronic-polychronic as some of these differences. On a similar vein, the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture is a study that analyses cultural differences using indexes such as the Power Distance Index or the Masculinity Index.

I generally agree with these assessments and think that they can be useful references for people traveling to a new country for the first time. However, it should not be taken as more than a reference. Some of these indicators, like the individualist-collectivist, are historically accurate, but would not apply to every person in the country. For example, many East Asian countries whose governments were based on Confucian principles would historically have collectivists policies, but with increased mobility and improved technology many of the younger generation do not so strictly adhere to these principles. Also, the indexes mentioned by the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture talks about countries as if they are a single unit. However, like in the US, regional differences exist and should be taken into consideration when using the indexes.

Since my target language is a heritage language for me, I think I have the advantage of having a better understanding of the target culture associated with the language I am studying. I think the ideas from the reading can help me in understanding how people in my target culture communicate (direct/indirect) and allow me to estimate what the right word choice in different situations would be.

The “Nonverbal Communication” excerpt from Figuring Foreigners Out was particularly intriguing. Gestures and facial expressions do not come naturally to someone who is speaking a new language. This is because the beginner is so focused on saying the right thing that their nonverbal behaviors are very strained. Another aspect of gestures that I found interesting was that different cultures can assign different meanings to the same behavior (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCo3wSGYRbQ). I remember my mom telling me that sticking up your middle finger was not considered rude in Korea. However, if a Korean person stuck their middle finger up in America, Americans would be offended. I never would have thought that when learning a new language, it is important to not only study the verbal aspects, but the nonverbal components as well. As I am studying Korean, my main emphasis will be on the verbal language, but I want to also learn several forms of nonverbal communication.

I was interested by Geert Hofstede’s dimensions of differentiating cultures. However, after reading his statement, “Culture is more often a source of conflict than of synergy. Cultural differences are a nuisance at best and often a disaster,” I think that his interpretation is flawed. Without cultural differences and diversity, the world would be less advanced, not to mention much less exciting.

I was a little confused while looking at the United States’ data because the U. S. is comprised of people from all different cultures. With this logic, I would have thought that the U.S. would have an average score for all of the categories. This, however, is not the case. The United States’ highest score is for individualism, which makes me wonder if that is the result of having so many different cultures in the same country. What are the differences between homogeneous and diverse societies?

Using the comparative culture tool, I compared the United States and South Korea. The greatest differences between the two are for individualism and long term orientation. South Korea has a score of 18 for individualism, whereas the United States stands at 91. As for long-term orientation, it is not surprising that there is such a stark difference between the two countries, since this dimension was created in order to distinguish the different thought patterns of the East and West. With my limited knowledge of Korean culture, I know that status has an important role, and that status is often recognized by age.

A lot of interesting assumptions were made in the reading Figuring Foreigners Out, as well as the Hofstede's model of cultural dimensions. I have learned about that model in other classes before, for example in sociology and in business communications. I think that Hofstede offered good general guidelines to understand differences in cultures, even though these are not comprehensive and can vary for individuals. However, the comparison I heard about most with regards to Hofstede is Japan vs the United States. Even though not every person in each of these countries have the same values as their fellow citizens or act in the same way, differences are very evident to see. The United States has a far more individualistic culture than Japan. Generally, Japan has a high focus on the long-term success of the group, rather than the temporary improvement on an individual. In addition to this, there are other differences that can be seen in the overall cultures and norms. 

Overall, I have seen this model to be fairly accurate, even though it might not always be spot on. There are further regional differences or variations between different ethical, racial, religious, etc. groups within a certain country. My own cultural experiences have generally confirmed this model and it is a good guide to prepare oneself for the culture, values and norms of a target country. 

This week I had my first meeting with my new language partner, Abhi. He is from Gujarat, and speaks fluent Hindi as a second language. I actually find that encouraging, because, since he also learned Hindi as a second language, it removes the fear of potentially sounding silly by speaking in the language.

For our first meeting, we first reviewed briefly the grammar structures that I had studied from my textbook. These included the postposition "ka", adjective gender-number agreement, and pronouns.

Next we practiced reading by reading a textbook dialogue and then I asked questions and answered them in Hindi about the dialogue.  I felt this was a helpful exercise, because Abhi helped me with pronunciation and also with understanding how to properly phrase and answer questions. We also discussed (in English) cultural things related to the dialogue. I also practiced reading the text on a 20 rupee note he had.

Next we practiced speaking, with simple Q&A's in Hindi about location, items in close proximity, etc. This was a very helpful exercise to help me understand how language is used in real life situations, as opposed to textbook dialogues.

For coming weeks, I plan to continue to study with my textbook and increase my conversational skills. Abhi is also going to find some short videos in Hindi and help me work through those.

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The localization of the cerebral and the brain in general was not particularly unfamiliar to me; some of this was also covered in my psychology 101 class. However, while I can see that there are parts of the brain more essential for the production of speech, I find it hard to believe that the same could be said for comprehension of speech. Comprehension somehow to me seems more of a brain-interactive activity than production, making all parts integral. Furthermore, the reading made me wonder what part of the brain allows you to hear language in your head. When you think of a word like “hand,” you can also hear the sounds associated with it in your head and is the part responsible for audible production the same for production inside your head? On another note, what I found interesting and particularly resonated with me was the idea of a highly sophisticated control system to control language and speech. I’ve found that when I feel brain-tired I tend to make more tongue slips and occasionally, I would even struggle to remember a word and end up having to describe the word I’m thinking of to the person I’m speaking with. For example, I would say “you know…that thing that you use to turn the car and has a horn,” to describe a steering wheel.

Additionally, I found the reading on meaning of words particularly relevant especially the idea that different languages identify and label the world differently. The example used was mother’s sister or father’s sister not being separate in English. I sometimes help edit Asian web novels online into English and those differences between languages makes it particularly hard for translation. The struggle between accuracy and making it make sense in a foreign language usually means that there has to be a ton of footnotes and even then the full meaning might not be conveyable.

While learning a new language, the differences in the meaning of words is something to think about. For me, since my speaking and listening skills are at the advanced level, there would be words that I recognize and think I know the meaning to, but what I think of as the English equivalent might not be what my language partner thinks. For example, the minute differences between the words ‘kind’ and ‘nice.’ For the future, I should think about not only expanding my vocabulary, but also to be more precise in my vocabulary.

Expanding my studies of how to say things in plural, I learned that there were exceptions to the vowel harmony words, especially for some loan words. I also learned how to ask yes or no questions ("Is this a ___?", "Are these ___?"). In Turkish, nouns do not require the plural suffix when they are associated with numbers. So instead of saying "three dogs," an exact translation from Turkish into English would be "three dog" because "three" implies plurality. During my session with Merve, I also learned how to say the names of various countries in Turkish (to answer the question "Where is this place?"). I am very excited that I am now able to ask questions and say things in plural because these skills are so important when communicating in any language. However, I think I need to practice asking and answering questions aloud instead of just writing them down; writing helps me remember and visualize how sentences are structured, but I don't consider myself to have mastered a skill in a foreign language until I am able to speak it without referencing notes. 

This week's reading from Figuring Foreigners Out provided insight into the various ways in which cultures can differ. These included to what degree a culture is individualist or collectivist, how a culture communicates non-verbally, whether they view time as monochronic or polychronic, to what extent they feel they have control over their world, and whether they communicate in a direct or indirect manner. Many of these characteristics seem interrelated in some fashion. For example, a collectivist culture which views the individual only in its relation to a group usually communicates more indirectly in order to promote harmony in the group. While these characteristics of cultures are easily understandable, I find the ways in measuring the difference in cultures (shown by the Geert Hofstede Analysis) to be more problematic. Many of ways in measuring cultural differences (such as Masculinity or Uncertainty Avoidance) seem to be symptoms of multiple cultural characteristics rather than a single one and thus seem to create some inconsistency in describing a culture (i.e. China being one of the most masculine cultures on the scaled map could be attributed to a collectivist society or it could be attributed to strong traditional values or even to the one child policy it promoted in the past). 

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I have organized my self-directed learning plan by what I need to learn in order to have a simple conversation with a Korean speaker. So far, I have looked online for various sources to help me learn Korean. One resource is https://talktomeinkorean.com/. This is a good source for complete beginners who want to learn Korean. They also post YouTube videos of live Korean classes. My studies will allow me to communicate with a large group of Korean speakers who I have never been able to understand. I also want to explore Korean culture more deeply because I am Korean, and I want to learn about my culture. My main motivation in learning Korean is to be able to talk with my grandmother, who does not speak much English. My grandmother and I live together, but we rely on a translator to communicate.

My Learning Plan (Google Slides)

Rough Draft / Original Word Document of Learning Plan

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I have learned Korean Alphabet and numbers in first two classes. Now I am be able to say date, time, and phone number in Korean. When I learned date, I also learned about traditional festival dates in Korean. This help me practice saying dates and also help me know more about Korean culture. I have watched a lot of Korean reality show, they always talk about traditional things. So this makes me want to learn more about its culture and motivates me a lot. 

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