英国Intercultural Business Communication coursework代写:What are(2)

There are also some shortcomings in the concept of small culture. First, according to the concept of small culture, it advocates defining and understanding culture from a more microscopic perspective, such as understanding culture from the perspective of groups and even individuals rather than countries. According to this standard, there are too many culture types in the world, which brings great difficulties for people to understand and discover culture. Second, the concept of small culture emphasizes the differences between the various subcultures in a same country, while ignoring the similarity between them. Large culture tends to reflect the cultural identity of a country as a whole than small culture, while small culture can only reflect the cultural characteristics of a small group within a country.

From the perspective of existentially, small culture consider that culture emerge and grow. In a sense, this is accurate, but such a view ignores the inherent nature of culture itself. That is to say, although a culture will develop and change, this change will not be arbitrary and unfounded, and it will still maintain some core values of the original culture. The cultural dimension identified by large culture concept often refers to the core values of culture. These core values are often stable and have not changed much for a long period of time (Laitinen and Suvas, 2016). From this point of view, small culture concept often describe some superficial phenomena of culture, while large culture concept can describe some of the more core and deeper phenomena in culture.

2.3 Ways to conceive culture

Both large culture concept and small culture concept have their own shortcomings and advantages. Applying large culture concept can help people to quickly grasp the important characteristics of a culture (Mazanec, Crotts, Gursoy and Lu, 2015). But large culture may also make it easy for people to form a stereotype of a certain culture. Small culture concept can help people to avoid stereotypes about a certain culture, but it is not conducive to people’s grasping and understanding the core characteristics of culture, and increasing the difficulty of people's cognition of culture. Therefore, the two viewpoints have defects in people’s understanding of culture, but they all have value. One of the best ways to understand culture is to use these two viewpoints comprehensively. It should both use large culture concept to understand the background knowledge of a certain culture and the cultural dimension, and use small culture concept to understand the emerging characteristics of a certain culture and characteristics of its subculture, more importantly, analyze the relationship between the traits and their core values of these new or subcultures. For example, in the face of a Chinese, he may be influenced by collectivism because of the influence of Chinese traditional culture, but it should be seen that as China's economy develops and opens up, Chinese people are increasingly showing individualistic tendencies. However, it is worth noting that there will be some differences between Chinese individualism and American individualism. Chinese individualism will still be influenced by collectivism in Chinese traditional culture, and Chinese individualism will behave differently, for example, more and more Chinese young people usually wear some fashionable clothes to show their personality, but when there are elders, he may wear some conservative clothes to express their respect for the elders.

2.4 Ways to approach culture in a business environment

Based on the above analysis, the implications for cross-cultural communication and cross-cultural management include the following three aspects. First, it should pay attention to the cultural background of communication objects and management objects. The cultural background behind them will have more or less influence on them. In particular, it should pay attention to the influence of the core features in background culture on objects, for example, in the process of management and communication, it should not avoid offending other people’s religious beliefs, it should respect their customs and habits, and understand their personality traits and preferences. Second, it should pay attention to personality characteristics of communication objects and management objects, although sometimes people have same cultural background, their performance and preferences will be very different, it should avoid forming a stereotype towards them. For example, people from China are also open-minded, willing to accept new things, and good at expressing their opinions, while some Chinese are conservative in their thinking, unwilling to accept new things, not good at or unwilling to express their opinions. Therefore, even in the face of objects from a same cultural background, it should take different measures in the management and communication process. Finally, although individuals will show different qualities from their original culture, this trait will still be influenced by the core traits of the original culture to varying degrees. It cannot be simply assumed that they are completely divorced from influence of their original culture. For example, although some past religious countries have become secularized, many of their habits have changed a lot and the people are not different from ordinary people. However, they still observe some basic teachings. Therefore, in the process of communication and management, it should be careful not to offend their religious beliefs.

3.0 Conclusion

Both large culture concept and small culture concept have their own shortcomings and advantages. Therefore, when applying these two concepts to define and understand culture, as well as carry out cross-cultural management and communication, it is necessary to carry forward their advantages and avoid their shortcomings. Large culture concept can reflect the core values and deep features of a certain culture. These characteristics may make a certain culture remain stable for many years. Therefore, applying large culture concept can help people to quickly grasp the important characteristics of a certain culture. But large culture may also make it easy for people to form a stereotype of a certain culture and give people a bias towards knowing a certain culture. While small culture concept can help people to avoid stereotypes about a certain culture because it emphasizes the cultural differences between groups and values the new characteristics and trends of culture. Of course, small culture concept also has problems, that is, it is not conducive to people’s grasping and understanding the core characteristics of culture, increasing the difficulty of people's cognition of culture, because each culture has its own different surface features, understanding culture from only its surface features rather than the core characteristics will greatly increase the difficulty for people to understand a culture. Therefore, the two perspectives are flawed in people’s understanding of culture and in cross-cultural management and communication, but they all have value. When people understand culture and conduct cross-cultural management and communication, one of the best ways is to use them comprehensively, it should not only use large culture concept to understand the background knowledge and the cultural dimension of a certain culture, but also use small culture concept to understand the emerging characteristics of a certain culture and characteristics of its subculture. More importantly, it should analyze the relationship between the traits and the core values of these new or subcultures.

 

References

Baskerville, R. F. (2003). Hofstede never studied culture. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 28, 1.

Bird, A. and Mendenhall, M. E. (2016). From cross-cultural management to global leadership: evolution and adaptation. Journal of World Business, 51(1),115-126.

Ehrenfreund, P., Peter, N., Schrogl, K. U. and Logsdon, J. M.. (2010). Cross-cultural management supporting global space exploration. Acta Astronautica, 66(1–2), 245-256. 

Gieve, S. and Clark, R. (2005). The Chinese approach to learning: Cultural trait or situated response? The case of a self-directed learning program. System, 33(2), 261-276. 

Hampden-Turner, C. and Trompenaars, F. (1997). Response to Geert Hofstede international Journal of Intercultural Relations, 21(1), 149-159.

Hofstede, G. (2003). What is culture? A reply to Baskerville. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 28(7–8), 811-813.

Hou, N., Fan, J., Tan, J. A., Hua, J. and Valdez, G. (2018). Cross-cultural training effectiveness: Does when the training is delivered matter? International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 65(6),17-29.

Holliday, A. (1999). Small cultures. Applied Linguistics, 20, 237-264. 

Jameson, D. A. (2007). Reconceptualizing cultural identity and its role in intercultural business communication. Journal of Business Communication, 44(3),199-235.

Laitinen, E. K. and Suvas, A. (2016). Financial distress prediction in an international context: Moderating effects of Hofstede’s original cultural dimensions. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, 9(3), 98-118.

Mazanec, J. A., Crotts, J. C., Gursoy, D. and Lu, L. (2015). Homogeneity versus heterogeneity of cultural values: An item-response theoretical approach applying Hofstede's cultural dimensions in a single nation. Tourism Management, 48(6), 299-304.

McSweeney, B. (2002). Hofstede’s model of national cultural differences and their consequences: A triumph of faith – a failure of analysis. Human Relations 55 (1), 89-118.

McSweeney, B. (2013). Fashion founded on a flaw. The ecological mono-deterministic fallacy of Hofstede GLOBE, and followers. International Marketing Review, 30 (5), 483-504.