Unit Reflection 1

Unit Reflection 1

    Critical Insight: First, I learned the meaning of cultural identity. Actually, I could not completely know its meaning from the texts. Therefore, I researched it on the Internet, and then I think I understand its meaning now. Cultural identity means a sense of identifying a group culture. It is like an individual person is influenced by a group culture. In general, cultural identity is the people who have experienced and lived together for an extremely long time identify the meaningful and valuable behavior, knowledge, and customs in their own communities. Also, I learned a few terms, and I understand them by connecting them to my daily life. I understand and realize the term, Cultural relativism, through my wife’s parents. They have lived in the U.S for 5 years, but they still cannot accept a lot of American customs and behaviors because they always use the Chinese standard to define and value the American cultures. For instance, they do not know why they need to pay the tips to the restaurant services because no one dose that in China. In fact, I think they cannot fit in the American society until they change their Chinese thoughts into American values. In addition, I learned more details about cultural diversity by the CIP. After I heard some Chinese classmates’ speech, I found out that even though they and I are from the same country and even the same city, their cultures are somehow different from mine. It is very surprised me that in the same city, it still have many different local languages that I have never heard. For me, I think the best ways of learning cultures are connecting the knowledge to daily life and communicating with more people who are from different places.

    Aha: My Aha moment was when I understand the meaning of the iceberg model of culture. That is because the model directly reflects the relationship of culture, and it is very easy to understand its expression and implication. It expresses that the deep cultures which have unconsciously affected people already deeply root in people’s mind, and it has formed by different kinds of human activities and experiences for a very long time, so it is the main thought and value to make people to think and react, and it is difficult to change. On another hand, the surface culture extend from the deep culture, and people completely understand what they are, so it will be easily influenced by many factors, such as the impact of different cultures and the change of local cultures. Another Aha moment for me was when I heard the explanation of Culture Shock because I think this is what I am thinking and experiencing now.

    Bumper Sticker: Culture is created by human, but culture also influences on human.

    Now, I did not know that how to define the people are brainwashed by the other cultures or they just fit in the new cultures if they begin to transmit and prize the other cultures? How to prevent the invasion of foreign cultures?