Page 455 - Cultures and Organizations

420 IMPLICATIONS

the way I was brought up and that others brought up in a different envi-
ronment carry a different mental software for equally good reasons. Max
Pagès, a French social psychologist who went to the United States in the
1950s to study group training, described a situation in which such aware-
ness was lacking:

It became very clear to me that it was I, Max, but not my culture which was
accepted. I was treated as just another American who had this exotic pecu-
liarity of being a Frenchman, which was something like, say, a particular
style of shirt. In general no curiosity existed about the intellectual world I was
living in, the kinds of books I had written or read, the differences between
what is being done in France or Europe and in the United States. 44

Strong cultural awareness was ascribed to the author James Morier.
The quote about him at the beginning of this chapter characterized him
as “gifted with a humorous sympathy that enabled him to appreciate the
motives actuating persons entirely dissimilar to himself.”
Knowledge should follow. If we have to interact with particular other
cultures, we have to learn about these cultures. We should learn about their
symbols, their heroes, and their rituals; while we may never share their
values, we may at least get an intellectual grasp of where their values differ
from ours.
Skills are based on awareness and knowledge, plus practice. We have
to recognize and apply the symbols of the other culture: recognize their
heroes, practice their rituals, and experience the satisfaction of getting
along in the new environment, being able to resolve fi rst the simpler and
later on some of the more complicated problems of life among the others.
Intercultural communication can be taught. Some students are more

gifted at learning it than others. Persons with unduly inflated egos, a low
personal tolerance for uncertainty, a history of emotional instability, or
known racist or extreme left- or right-wing political sympathies should
be considered bad risks for a training program that, at its core, assumes
people’s ability to distance themselves from their own cherished beliefs.
Such persons are probably unfit for expatriation anyway; if a family will be

expatriated, it is wise to make sure that the spouse and children, too, have
the necessary emotional stability.
There are two types of intercultural communication training courses.

The more traditional ones focus on specific knowledge of the other cul-
ture; they are sometimes called expatriate briefings. They inform the future