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Hi everyone, I can't believe it's already been one month since the start of our course. Time flies!! Culture's Influence on Perception In this week's class, we looked at how culture influences our perception. First, we looked at “sensing” plays a role in influencing our perceptions. Differences in our environment and culture can affect sensation. We also looked at how our senses are limited in the sense that there is too much stimuli for our senses to catch and up to 20% of what we see and hear doesn't get transmitted to our brains. We then learned about the three steps of “perception”: (1) selection; (2) organization; and (3) interpretation. The key point is that our reactions are culturally learned interpretations. This was especially evident in interpretations of how dogs are treated in different cultures. Writing Exchange Program I collected your letters at the end of class. Your partner will get them this week. When we come back on May 12 after the short break, you'll get your first letter from your partner. Homework: 1. Reflection Topic #3 2. Blog Posting #4 3. Readings ch. 4 (pp. 81-102) Blog Question #4: What was something interesting that you learned about how culture affects our perception in our lesson today? * Write 8-10 sentences. * Use capitalization, punctuation & spelling correctly. * Submit by Monday, May 4 by 6:00pm. Reflection Topic #3: In today's lesson, we reviewed stereotypes and prejudice. We didn't have enough time to look at prejudice in Japan, so you'll reflect on it as your journal topic this week. This topic may be uncomfortable for some of you to think about in our course. However, prejudice exists everywhere -- it is not limited to just one culture. In order to recognize prejudice, it's important to understand it in your own culture. Then, we can make comparisons to other cultures, and if necessary, make criticisms. In 2005, the United Nations conducted an investigation of the treatment of non-Japanese (e.g. foreigners) living in Japan. The report concluded that Japan has "deep and profound" racism and xenophobia (=a strong feeling of dislike towards people from other countries). After the report was released, the Asahi Shimbun was one of the only media outlets that ran an article on racism in Japan. Since this article, Japan still has no law against racial discrimination and non-Japanese are still excluded from society. Keep in mind that the majority of "foreigners" living in Japan are long-term residents, are married to a Japanese spouse, have full-time jobs, and speak the language. For this week's reflection topic, read the Asahi Shimbun article "Opening the Nation: Time to Make Choices." You can read the original in Japanese or you can read the translated version in English. When you write your journal entry, answer these two questions:
8 Comments
IE3S-Manami
5/3/2015 01:17:28 pm
I was quite surprised that our senses are limited and 20% of what we see and hear doesn't get transmitted to our brains.
IE3S-Saya
5/3/2015 04:49:56 pm
Before class, I didn't think much about how cultures can affect perceptions. However, I learned that there are many things that are seen differently by cultures. The example of the signals was interesting to me. If we are just asked what color it is, we might say green but we Japanese say blue because the signals are called blue, yellow, and red. That is just how it is. Learning the culture's effect on perceptions realized me that there are many more. It made me think that there is always culture behind perceptions. We have to be cafeful when we look at things in new cultures.
IES-Yuma
5/3/2015 05:43:58 pm
IE3S-Yumi
5/3/2015 06:23:04 pm
I missed our last class, but Satomi taught me the summary of our last class, which really helped me to understand the contents of the last lesson besides the presentations of the lecture. The first impression towards the last class is that it seemed pretty scientific since there were many scientific words like sense and perception. It was interesting because it was very new for me to learn sensing or the process of perceiving when learning cultural communication, which is not scientific.
IE3S-Kohei
5/3/2015 06:48:23 pm
We learned that each culture has each perspective of colors. We don't say the traffic light which means "allowed to go" is "green", we call it "blue". I thought it really interesting because we never be conscious of it. It's very natural for Japanese to call blue "green" (e.g. Aojiru, Aoba). It was also interesting that, in some countries in Africa, have much less names for all colors than we have. We tend to think these cultures are inferior to other cultures. However that is not true. I noticed that we have to respect each culture.
IE3S-Jumpei
5/3/2015 06:49:20 pm
Las week I learned about cultures influences and perceptions. Specifically, we learned how much image differs in other cultures like dogs in Japan and China. The most interesting part for me was that I learned that police officers in Japan are very diligent, kind and what's even more surprising, this isn't a stereotype but a generalization. All my life I thought that police are dirty but Nicole told us about the reality of police officers in Cambodia was worse. Citizen had to pay them money, and they even kill people sometimes.
IE3S-Jumpei
5/3/2015 06:51:05 pm
*Last
IE3S-Misato
5/3/2015 07:19:50 pm
From the lesson, I realized most of the feelings we get when we see, hear or read something are affected by culture. I thought it was interesting that things we think it’s normal are not normal for people in other cultures. When I saw the picture of dogs in the lesson, I thought anyone would think they were cute as pet dogs, though I got to know people from different country might think they were foods. Though I was surprised and shocked to know that some people see dogs as food, I also learned it is not appropriate to judge them as they are awful. Instead, I think it is important to try to understand other cultures. Therefore, when we want to understand people from different culture, I think we must learn the culture before judging them. Also, to communicate with people from different culture, I think it is important to know that we need extra explanation for things we think it’s normal. I would like to remember these things above I learned from the lessons when I communicate with people from different cultures. Leave a Reply. |
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