Monthly Archives: September 2011

The most dangerous person in China

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No, this kid is not the most dangerous person in China. In fact, he was quite innocent and rather excited to have a conversation, in Chinese, with a foreigner.

The most dangerous person in China is the foreigner with excellent language skills but is clueless when it comes to culture, especially behavioral culture. The problem is that if you have really good Chinese, the Chinese will expect that you know how to play the game; they will expect you to behave like they do. Cultural coherence refers to speaking and acting like Chinese expect people to speak and act. If someone has good speaking skills but acts like a typical American, they will undoubtedly offend people. In fact, the Chinese will most likely believe that you intended to offend them. Again, to the Chinese good Chinese means that you should know how to behave yourself. For example, the American with good Chinese uses typical American sarcasm with his Chinese colleagues and they are offended because they simply don’t understand American sarcasm. Sometimes we call this speaking English in Chinese.

It is simply impossible to separate language from culture. All communicative situations are situated within a cultural context. For language learners it is essential to pay close attention to context. It’s not just about what to say, but also when to say it, with whom it is appropriate, and so on. You must understand why certain language is used in certain situations. Language and behavior in all communicative situations are governed by the following conditions:

  1. time
  2. place
  3. roles of the individuals involved
  4. script (which includes dialogue and actions)
  5. audience (those around not directly involved)

Our behavior certainly changes from the boardroom to the classroom to the street corner. Likewise the many roles we play in life will also determine our linguistic and social behavior—from student to employee to boss to friend, classmate, and so on. Even something as simple as a greeting must be contextualized. How you greet someone depends on where you are, when the greeting takes place, and your relationship with the person you are greeting. If you change one of these conditions, then the greeting will likely change as well. Greeting your teacher or your boss will be very different from greeting your roommate or your mother.

The Rules Change

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Crossing international borders can be traumatic. This is especially true traveling to a country like China. Even with Chinese language skills in hand, it can be challenging knowing exactly what to expect. In China the rules are different.

I remember a few years ago sitting in a small restaurant on Qingdao Rd. near Nanjing University when three of my students walked in. We had only been in country for about two days. They did not see me so I decided to stay quiet and observe. They stood just inside the door waiting for someone to greet them and show them to a seat. As they waited I could see their frustration growing. At the same time I could hear the two servers saying,

“What are they doing?”

“I don’t know, maybe waiting for someone.”

The servers seemed just as perplexed as my students. These students had two years of formal Chinese study at my university, so I knew that linguistically that they could handle themselves. The problem was that they did not know what to expect in a Chinese restaurant. As such, they had no choice but to fall back on their American cultural experience with restaurants—you are usually greeted and shown to a table. In small restaurants in China that is not the case; you simply find an empty table yourself and the servers will bring you a menu.

Being successful in China requires that one learn a new set of rules or behaviors. It’s like learning how to play a new sport. You may be familiar with other sports and be pretty good at them, but if you don’t know the rules of the new game, you probably won’t be a very good player.

An analogy might help. Let’s say that American culture is like baseball and Chinese culture is like tennis. Both sports have a good share of similarities—playing fields, boundaries, a ball, an instrument to hit the ball, and so on. If you are only familiar with baseball and show up in China and find yourself on a tennis court, you’re in for trouble. The ball is served to you and your first inclination is to hit the ball as hard as you can, preferably over the fence. This is your frame of reference. And if you hit the ball over the fence, the Chinese will find this very strange. If you continue to do this, they will eventually take their ball and go home, and will probably not invite you to play again.

China can be a pretty rough place if you don’t know what to expect. These rules can be better understood as cultural and social behavior, and this goes beyond traditional language training. Even without Chinese language skills, knowing what to expect in typical situations you are likely to encounter will make a huge difference in your interactions with others and your ability to get around and understand what is going on around you.

This blog is an attempt to discuss various aspects of learning the Chinese language, explore Chinese culture, and analyze the intricacies of intercultural communication.