Intercultural Communication

Going to a few different cultures in my lifetime, I’ve realized that intercultural communication is highly important when being in other countries.  While in Panama, I found it was incredibly difficult to communicate with other people from the cultures we visited and it showed me just how important it is to learn how to speak different languages, even if it is only a few words.  This encounter changed me in a way that I want to be more proactive and learn other languages to be able to better communicate with other languages.  There are a few movies that portray the ideal of intercultural communication, but the one that sticks out the most is the Disney movie “The Color of Friendship”.  This movie is based during the time the apartheid was going on in South Africa.  A student (white) participating in an exchange program comes to America to experience a different culture.  She is quickly startled when she sees that she has been placed with a black family, as is the family that she is placed with.  Soon after though, the two girls in the family slowly become friends when they realize that they have a lot more in common than they think when they see past each other’s skin color.  This movie allowed us to make intercultural concepts visible, as well as expose and undo stereotypes.  Although we have a lot of bridges we must get over to communicate with other cultures, having just a small amount of intercultural communication can benefit us dramatically.