Intercultural communication

Every time I think about the intercultural communication, I always treat it as the translation between two languages. Indeed, it is often the case that you need to be able to understand the language first before the communication, however, you may talk about rather different things even if you share the same language.

I will use two example to illustrate that. When I was working in the last summer vocation, my colleagues and I was we complaining the long working hours, and  I said how I wish I could have a “lan jiao” (the pronunciation is in Chinese, which means to sleep late in the morning) while she took that as unacceptable and she told me I was rather rude! I got confused, so I explained as I was saying that I wish I could sleep until the noon. She laughed and told me that, the pronunciation of “lan jiao” is a rude word as it refers to the penis. I was shocked since we were chatting in Chinese and I never thought about the same words in the same languages have two totally unrelated meaning. After that, I started to study the culture differences and I never mentioned about any rude words to her again.

One the other day, I saw a lovely baby and I just said what a smart baby. my colleague and the baby’s mother said “no, no, no.” three time together and she told me never praise a baby as he or she would grow to the opposite, and she said directly to the baby, “you are stupid and ugly.” and then both of the mother and my colleague laughed, leaving me confused again.

After those experience, I learnt that whatever I am going to do, I’d better check out the cultural differences and ask first. It is hard to learn a second language and the same as learn all those cultural difference, yet it is of the same fun to do that as well. 

Interpersonal conflict

According to Donna Bellafiore, people often act in three ways in facing conflict, namely, avoid or deny the existence of conflict;getting mad and blaming the other person; using power and influence to win at the other’s expense.  I think I am the one who always avoid conflict. In my point of view, or as common to many Chinese people, sticking in a conflict is the last thing wanted, and if possible, avoid it or keep away from it.  I may unconsciously avoid or deny the existence of conflict. I even thought about giving up the assignment for writing a conflict. (Ok, I think i shall stop explaining for myself.)

The conflict I am going to describe was from one of my best friends in high school. I think I will use the fake name Jack for him. As many of us may experience before or hear about that situation where parents place such great expectation on the children that they may create a whole list of dos and do nots for them and watch them closely. Jack’s situation may be even worse as his father is the officer of a work camp, where people break the law but not so serious to be sent to jail. Due to the occupational disease, his father would treat him as one of the reeducation people in the work camp and there is almost no private and free time. Worse still, his father seems to have a timetable for him to do all kinds of activities whether he wants or not. For example, I was once a time visiting him in the winter vocation, and his father would get us up at exactly 7am and announce the tasks for today, things like finish reading a certain chapter of a book;  practicing calligraphy; reading newspapers and watching training videos, etc. I was so shocked that I was not able to offer any better suggestions since I was told that his father enjoys the absolute power in the work camp as well as in his family. There is no place for negotiating.  Under that condition, my friend always breaks the rules and gets beaten. Do you still remember the last time you parents beat you? I forgot already. But it should be more than 10 years ago.  What should you do if you are Jack?

Application Letter for IBN

In the requirement from IBN, the application letter should include the following information:  here IBN stands for Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology.  and the letter is sent by email, thus no address information is given.

Write a short essay on what you understand by scientific research and which area of research (those offered by IBN) you are most interested in and why.

19 Lower Kent ridge Road RidgeView Residence BLK C 206
Singapore
(+65) 8285 7124
u0705239@nus.edu.sg

March 20, 2008

To whom it  may concern:

I am writing to apply for a internship position at Biosensors and Biodevices part under your youth research project(YRP). I came to know this internship by the talk given by IBN in the Bioengineering week organized by our bioengineering club and i was one of the organizer.

In explain the scientific research, especially in biological science, I always thought as a student that would be related to test-tubes and pipettes to deal with those cells. Coming to the university brought me a step closer to it but still my research was limited to “expected results”, those lab sessions are to carry out for certain fixed result, if not, then to do the error analysis. I have always wanted to work in a real research environment. In my opinion, scientific research, one has to understand the theory behind, if there is no theory to referring to, we have to develop a hypothesis and later investigate the hypothesis with the designed experiments and proper data processing. In addition, many of the events are not sequential but have to be carried out simultaneously during the process. Although you might be an expert in one area, but you have to continue to develop your understanding and knowledge along the way as today in a world where everything is undergoing integration, knowledge in one area is redundant. Among the four research areas offered by IBN, I’m very interested in the development of Biosensors and Biodevices. During my second year, I have done a similar project, where my group designed a device to measure blood pressure non-invasively in order to monitor the change of blood pressure in real time conveniently and cheaply. Furthermore, I take a module in bio-imaging this semester, and I have realized my interest in biosensors and biodevices. I understand the importance of these devices especially in clinical applications and advancement in quick detection of diseases. I would like to broaden my knowledge further by knowing and working in the field hands on.

I would like to talk with your further on my passion and experiences in research related to biosensors and biodevices.  I am available to meet with you at a time that's convenient to you.Thanks for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Tang Wenlue

 

What is ES2007S really is?

After two lectures on ES2007S, I almost adapted to this course. The whole class structure is quite clear and the workload is onerous too. Although there is no final exam, the course is evaluated in six parts:

- Peer Teaching                      (10%)
- Application Letter                 (10%)
- Proposal                               (10%)
- Proposal Discussion              (10%)
- Oral Presentation                 (20%)
- Oral Interaction                    (20%)
- E-portfolio                            (20%)

Thus, compared to normal modules, which has a final week to catch up, this one requires continues effort throughout the whole semester.  As for me, I think it is necessary as this is communication course where you need to use and improve all the time. Despite of the annoying assessment, this course is really helpful and fun. In the last two lectures, or tutorials or maybe call it as friends chatting and discussion, we were assigned to various groups to discuss on those fundamental topics on communication, like the communication models, channels, listening skills, story telling as well as questioning. As for me, I never consciously thought about communication models or active listening or any communication tips before, while in the tutorial room, I had to observe all those mentioned verbal and nonverbal communication as well as the related skills. By practicing and summarizing those conversations, I really learnt how to listen and reflect actively.

In my point of view, this course is divided into three parts: fundamental of communications; written communication and project communication. In the first part, we are to explore those ignored communication details and strategies on normal face to face communication basis. In this stage, the more study related tips are given and we shall learn and try to apply them into practices. The second stage is more focused on the emails, books, and letters where people transfer their ideas without seen each other. The third stage is the mixture of the previous two where we are supposed to get together to form a small project group to discuss and communicate effectively among ourselves, in addition to that, we also need to express our ideas in black and white where other people can read and decode.

If asked about the reason why I choose this course, I may answer with those common answers by everyone in the class as to build up communication skills, to know more friends or to have fun and fulfill the university education requirements. What is unique to me may be the fact that I am already year four and I have to write my FYP projects and I need to collaborate with my peers, my senior PHDs, my supervisor and lab coordinators. Thus, I need to know more specific effective communication tips to help me build a more effective study and work environments as soon as possible. Besides that I will have to write a lot of those CVs, cover letters and proposals for my future job application. It is kind of more practical for me before I step into a professional engineer.

ES2007S--I want to build my communication skills

I just began my first lecture on professional communication skills building this morning. I am in group 2, and I seems to be the oldest one realize my insufficient in communication skills. This morning we started with a small questionnaire on our previous experiences, for example, whether you have been to North America or Europe. This is a good way for ice-breaking, languages courses shall create as many chances as possible for students to talk to communicate, especially for ES2007S.

I have only remembered two names, Syvester Lee and Thanasak, as they are my group mates and later the blogger group members. Although this course has no final exam, yet the workload is rather heavy than normal language courses. We are to be evaluated on seven parts, and the coming project for our group is the peer teaching on the subject of "wiki NUS", and of course the whole semester we are to blog and comment a lot on peers' writings.

Besides those introduction and ice-break activities, we only discussed a few problems on communications, like the problematic on the telegraph model of communication. A good reading on that topic is written on http://www.work911.com/communication/false.htm and there are a lot FAQ explained, which may be useful for enquirers. We also discussed on the non-verbal communications and the affecting elements for successful communication.

Every tutorial is a small project and we have to read a lot before classes. I have not finished all those list readings for today's tutorial yet. But reading those materials are fun and beneficial. I shall say I like this course and I will try to get the most of this course.

Those are all I want to say for today. I am not sure whether it is considered as proper blog languages, anyway, I would like and ready to receive comments on how to improve my blog writing .