Overview

The unit covers how people from different cultural backgrounds communicate or miscommunicate and how they can overcome any difficulties, resulting from cultural diversities. Today, intercultural interactions are part of everyday encounters in most work places. It is essential for future workforces to be equipped with knowledge and skills for cross-cultural … For more content click the Read More button below. For effective learning outcomes, the unit employs interdisciplinary insights from communications, anthropology, cultural studies and psychology (e.g. E. Hall, W. Gudykunst). The unit also touches upon how ethnic groups utilise the media to express their identities, with reference to migrants in Australia, e.g. Chinese, Korean, Southeast Asian migrants.

Rules

Enrolment Rule

Contacts

Chief Examiner(s)

Professor Gil-Soo Han

Unit Coordinator(s)

Professor Gil-Soo Han

Learning outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, you should be able to:
1.

Have been exposed to, and have a competent understanding of contemporary scholarship on the relationships between communications and culture;

2.

Have acquired an informed understanding of how different worldviews impact on communications;

3.

Have come to understand the processes of immigrants' economic and cultural adaptations as part of their development of effective intercultural communications;

4.

Have obtained in-depth understanding of nonverbal communications;

5.

Have developed greater capacities to deal with inter-ethnic tension for effective communications;

6.

Have come to understand a range of theories on intercultural communications, e.g., cultural convergence theory, identity management theory, identity negotiation theory, communication accommodation theory, and cultural schema theory;

7.

Have acquired an informed understanding of how ethnic identities and immigrant life are represented through a range of media.

Assessment summary

Within semester assessment: 100%

Assessment

Quiz
Participation
Essay
Essay

Scheduled and non-scheduled teaching activities

Tutorials

Workload requirements

Workload

Availability in areas of study

Communications and media studies
Media
Monash Intercultural lab
Public relations