Singapore is a multicultural and multiracial country and
it is not surprising that people from all around the world gather in Singapore.
With 30% of Singapore residents who are foreigners, fostering intercultural
understanding is extremely important and essential to ensure social cohesion
here.
Cultural differences are the basis for
misunderstandings between people from different backgrounds. For example, when I first saw Bangladeshi guys hold hands in public in Singapore I felt it was extremely unacceptable. To them it was their norm to hold hands to represent brotherhood
and/or sign of respect between the males. In Singaporean’s context and in many
other cultural contexts, holding hands is also the sign of friendship but usually
restricts to children and females. Hence when my friends and I saw them
holding hands together, we will always associate them as homosexuals or even despise
them. After we knew the truth, we show more tolerance towards guys holding
hands and eventually accepted it.
Picture
taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holding_hands#cite_note-0
Apparently, according to CBS news, the Americans show less approval to this act when the two leaders, President Bush and Saudi
Crown Prince Abdullah holding hands as they strolled in a 2005 diplomatic
meeting. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/27/eveningnews/main691413.shtml I think what President Bush did is a form of respect to their culture and by indicating they are friends by holding hands. It was acceptable to me when I knew the reason behind this practice of the Arabs.
Fundamentals of effective communication
In order to stimulate effective communication
between people from different cultural groups, I think we should first identify
what are the problems we face as different individuals when interacting. Then
we should gather more information on it to draw the reasons behind these
differences in cultural practices. I think once we know the reasons for the differences in cultural practices, we will tend to accept it. Well at least for me.
I think our greatest mistake is stereotyping people which
leads to more misunderstandings and resentments between different individuals.
For example, Singaporean always stereotype foreign Bangladeshi workers as being
uneducated people and all of them are bad who ogle at girls at Sentosa beach. I hate
to say it but I think I am guilty of this too. We ended up despising and discriminating them.
However, not all of them are behave this way and they in fact put in a lot of effort
in helping to build our nation. In fact most of them are polite and friendly as I always saw them offering their seats in MRT to those who need it. I
had read a recent article that had being circulating around at Facebook where a
Singaporean shared a different perspective on them while working together with
them. http://newnation.sg/2012/01/working-with-the-banglas-on-new-years-eve/
Lastly, we should all be more ethnorelative rather
than ethnocentric so that we are able to adapt into a new environment quickly and also
produce a more conducive place to embrace people from different parts of the
world. Being open-minded is essentially important to foster a good intercultural communication.
