Communicating Across Cultures

by Stella Ting-Toomey

From high-level business negotiations to casual conversations among friends, every interpersonal interaction is shaped by cultural norms and expectations. Seldom is this more clearly brought to light than in encounters between people from different cultural backgrounds, when dissimilar communication practices may lead to frustration and misunderstanding. This thought-provoking text presents a new framework for understanding the impact of culture on communication and for helping students build intercultural communication competence. With illustrative examples from around the globe, the book shows that verbal and nonverbal communication involves much more than transmitting a particular message--it also reflects each participant's self-image, group identifications and values, and privacy and relational needs. Readers learn to move effectively and appropriately through a wide range of transcultural situations by combining culture-specific knowledge with mindful listening and communication skills. Throughout, helpful tables and charts and easy-to-follow guidelines for putting concepts into practice enhance the book's utility for students.

Genres: Communication, Cultural, Nonfiction, Education

310 pages, Paperback

First published January 22, 1999

Reviews

[Jeska · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like kale salad—full of valuable nutrients, even kinda tasty at times, but really hard for me to digest.

Do I agree with the contents? Absolutely yes. Do I ever want to read it again? Sorry, but not really.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book represents a very deep look into intercultural communication in terms of content, and anyone who reads it with the goal of self-improvement will almost certainly find a lot of useful information in it. There are biases present within these pages, but then again, I brought my own biases to the experience of reading it. We're all human, right?

It's not bad for a textbook in terms of presentation. Some sections feel like endless chains of definitions. Maybe it's just me, but this made the book feel unnecessarily challenging to read (I went through a couple of highlighters and pens making annotations, and I had to take a lot of breaks); a glossary version of the book that organizes and presents the many key terms would be pretty handy.

[Colorado Buck · Rating 4 out of 5]

used for a class in intercultural communication. was technical, but still good.

[Amber Kuehler · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book for an English as a Second Language class and thought it was a great book to read coupled with Multicultural Manners, which was another book we had to read. I learned a lot, but I found this particular text to be very repetitive. So many of the concepts taught could have been written in a much more concise way!

[Nenad Knezevic · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good introduction to intercultural communication.

[Novlette Gooden-Castillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very illuminating the role culture plays in communicating with people from other cultures. That culture determines how people from an early age learn about "SELF" and communicating with those outside the "family unit." Thus unless we are open to understanding another culture it becomes a barrier to effectively communicating with others. A must read.