Santa Monica College Communication Discussion

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Santa Monica College

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Discussion Question #2: This discussion question relates to the lecture on cultural identities, which focuses on how cultural identities are formed and the multiple cultural identities within each person. The lecture states that culture is described as a group of people who share meaning (meaning such as clothing, food, language, music, beliefs, traditions, rituals, etc.) Therefore, each person has multiple groups (sub-cultures) they share meaning with; for instance, a person could be a member of an ethnic group, religious group, gender group, sports group, music group, etc. An example from the lecture on cultural identities suggested that a person could be from the Armenian culture, female culture, Northern Californian culture, basketball culture, hip hop culture, and rave culture. This example highlights one of the main points of the lecture that people are multicultural (made up of many sub-cultures).

For this assignment, you will be required to watch the following video and provide your opinion. In summary, the video is a stand-up comedy routine by Trevor Noah that uses humor to explain his experiences trying to learn and apply the norms of his culture. The video highlights the subtle and unconscious ways culture (and cultural practices) are passed on to us, which becomes integrated into our personalities, and then expressed in our behaviors. This assignment will require you to do the following:

1) Watch the Video, here is the link

  • 2) Post a response to all or some of the following questions (your response needs to be about a paragraph long, which would include about 8 complete sentences) (5 points):
  • Do you agree or disagree with the idea that cultural behaviors are learned?
  • Who did you learn your cultural behaviors from, and how where they taught to you?
  • What are some behaviors and values that members of your culture share?
  • Have you ever experienced someone misperceive your cultural identity? Why do you think they misperceived you in the way they did?
  • Have you experienced people expecting you to act a certain way due to your cultural identity? (in what ways?).
  • Do all (or most) people within your culture act the same way? If not, what are the differences and why do you think they present their cultural behaviors different than you?
  • Do you think people are multicultural (have many sub-cultures?). If so, where and how did you learn the practices of your other sub-cultures?
  • What are your sub-cultures? Out of all of your sub-cultures, which ones do you identity with most? (and why?).
  • Why do you think we have been taught to associate "culture" with "ethnicity?" Where did we learn this from? What are the benefits and consequences of associating culture with ethnicity?
  • How can be learn to value people as both members of a different ethnic group and also as members of our same sub-cultural group?

3) Post a response to another classmate's response. Your response can agree or disagree with the classmate, but it must be respectful. Your response to a classmate also needs to be about a paragraph long, which would include about 8 complete sentences (5 points).




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1)I really enjoyed this video as Trevor Noah incorporated his real life and pretty serious issues of racism he experienced but told the stories in a jokingly manner to make it more of a light topic and engage the audience. I do agree that the idea of cultural behaviors are learned through what we see in acts from those who raise us and who we grow up around. For me, personally, I learned cultural behaviors through my parents and how they behaved in different settings like within our own Mexican culture at family gatherings or in Mexico. It's all by observation and children absorb so much through what they are exposed to but even as adults I feel we learn cultural behaviors by observation and implementing those behaviors in ourselves. In our Mexican culture I was taught to always respect our elders, our parents and strangers in the way we speak, and by having love and pride for our people through different traditions and through food! In my Catholic culture, I learned how to behave in Church in how we are quiet unless singing and praying, listen to the priest and take eucharist. We are taught how to be kind, what values to hold and implement in our lives and right from wrong. I have had people misperceive my cultural identities in how Mexicans are viewed as maybe undocumented, field workers, maids or whatever the biases are that revolve around the Mexican Culture, however of course not everyone holds these biases. I think people misperceive my culture in this way based off what is shown in Television, Film and how they hear others around them treat and speak to people. In the past we mostly see Mexicans portrayed as such, however I do feel we are seeing more diversity in that area which is a positive. I don't think I've really felt people expect something from me as a result of my cultural identities, I think the big thing is that people are surprised to find out I am full Mexican and don't even believe me as I am lighter complexed. Latinos don't all look a certain way and I think that is where some biases are seen. I don't think everyone in my cultures acts the same way as everyone has individual minds. I do believe people are multicultural and we learn our sub-cultures through media or in person experiences within that culture. I belong to baseball culture, food culture, film culture, acting culture, arts culture. I think the ones I identify most would be my Catholic culture because it is so much of who I am and the arts culture because I work within the arts regularly. I think we aren't necessarily taught that we are part of cultures unless it's very clear like, "I am Mexican. Therefore I am part of Mexican culture." I wouldn't have even thought, for example, that loving baseball and keeping up with that would make me part of a "baseball culture." I don't think we can connect all of our cultures to ethnicity like I can't really connect my baseball culture directly to being Mexican, or maybe I could I just wouldn't know how to make that connection. It can get tricky if you say something between culture and ethnicity is linked when it offends someone part of said culture as they don't agree with the connection you are making. I think just holding empathy, learning from one another and listening is how we can hold value from people in our sub-cultures who are part of a different ethnic group. 2)Trevor Noah makes a good point about being of multi-cultural background and how it makes it difficult to identify what are your "cultural-behaviors" such that It should be more like your father's or mother's side. It is difficult to concur entirely with the idea that cultural behaviors are learned, however it really depends more so on the combination of what region of the world a person's upbringing is and what kind of ethnical background they inhabit. Sharing a personal experience, I am ethnically Armenian as both of my parents are ethnically Armenian, however there are a great many cultural behaviors that I express throughout my everyday interactions that would be more accustomed to most Americans. This is due to the fact that I am born in the United States, however my cultural roots were maintained, such as my ethnicities' language, history, faith, and customs by attending a private Armenian school where many of those cultural behaviors are preserved; this splits the idea of whether or not cultural behavior was taught to me or not, because as I perceive it, and have witnessed myself conforming to American customs more and more as I have been away from an All Armenian community for 3 years now, cultural behaviors of where I live currently have crept into my mannerisms without my explicit "learning" of them. Some behaviors that members of the Armenian communities share are the closeness and love of family, where it is not common for many members of a nuclear family to live in the same home, and for children of the family to still live at home until they are ready to be wed. Most people that belong to the Armenian community make an effort to adapt to their new homes, while maintaining the core of Armenian tradition. As most of the Armenian community in the world is living in the diaspora, such that a great many live outside of the mother country of Armenia, the Armenian peoples of the United States have adapted to living in the West, and as such pursue the American dream of owning your own business as one of their core values and a metric for success. The Sub-cultures of the Armenian community is quite fun! The community has distinct dialects of Armenian dictated by where in the diaspora you currently are, and explicitly in the US, where your family emigrated from. For example, the main Sub-cultures of Armenian are Armenians from Syria and Lebanon whom speak the dialect of "Western-Armenian" and who primarily descended from Armenians living in the eastern reaches of the Ottoman Empire and have learned Arabic as a result; Persian-Armenians whom were split off from the millet of Ottoman "Armenia" during the 16th century by the Persian Empire at the time and adopted Farsi as a second language, and finally Russian-Armenians or Armenians from the Motherland whom both speak fluent Russian as Armenia is a post-soviet Country and used to belong to the USSR. Both of my parents families ironically descend from the same town in Western-Armenia or "Ottoman-Armenia," the town of "Kharpert" or Fortress of Stone. However, my mother's family fled to the Levant also known as Syria/Lebanon and my father's family had moved to Persia during the early 20th Century Armenian Genocide. As I spend a lot of time with my grandmother from my mother's side, I would say I identify primarily with the "Western-Armenian" sub-culture. 3) Watching Trevor Noah's video was very eye opening to the hardships mixed people have to endure. They must feel torn not being accepted in either group due to them being mixed. Especially being in the spot light and having that be much worse for you, I can't begin to imagine what that is like. I believe that cultural behaviors are learned. Our identities are formed based on our upbringing and being accustomed to the different practices in our cultures. I learned my cultural behaviors from my family and family friends. I spent a lot of time growing up around people from the Middle Eastern culture. This included getting to know our language, food, music, morals, religion, and how to be with one another. For example, one thing I learned from my culture is to never just freeload off of people. If you pay for dinner, I'll pay next time. If you do not let me pay for dinner, I will bring you a gift to thank you for dinner. That is a practice I observed growing up from my sisters and it is something I live by. It is a very courteous gesture that I think is important in showing that you appreciate what others do for you. I've had some people mistake me as Latina even though I am Arab. This may be because I have many Latino and Latina friends that made them think I was one of them as well. People expect me to speak perfect Arabic because of my Middle Eastern identity. I understand the language, but my parents were never very strict on us speaking it to them as children. As a result, my Arabic is not so good. My sub culture would be an education sub culture. This is due to education being so important to me and who I am. I would also say my sub culture is a concert one. This is because I go to concerts so often and it is something I really enjoy doing. It is an escape I have from my reality. We can learn to value people as members of a different ethnic group and as members of our same sub-cultural group by always remaining respectful of them. We can also get to know more about their groups and backgrounds to understand them more as people. 4) I agree that cultural behaviors are learnt from one person to another or from one aspect, event or social practice to another. I learnt culture from my family through close association and through imitation of what they did such as imitating them to speak, to dress and even to take food that they took. Some behaviors that members of my culture share is the language and the manner in which they speak, their dressing code is almost similar, the food they eat and generally the way they live. I have experienced people misperceive my identity due to accent as a Persian person they did not expect me to speak in English as they spoke. All people of my culture do not behave in the same way, some have dressed in a very strange way than what majority of my culture do. Most people are multi-cultural where you find they practice sub-cultural behaviors that are not part of their main culture. Subcultures are groups with distinct patterns both of shared and learned behavior within the main culture and despite distinct traits, they still share commonalities. One can learn to value people as one of the cultural group or even people from other cultures is respect is a learnt trait and should be taught to everyone.
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Running head: COMMUNICATION QUESTION

Communication question
Name of student
Name of professor
Institution

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COMMUNICATION QUESTION

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Trevor Noah's video is very interesting and touching as he talks of how he was born to a
black mother and a white father in South Africa, which was termed as being a crime. Thus, his
mother preferred him to stay indoors to avoid him being taken by the government. I agree with
the idea that cultural behaviors are learned, and no person on earth is born knowing their culture.
Cultural behaviors are learned by having exposure to action, speech, and people's judgment
around us. I learned my parents' cultural norms through their actions; for example, I was s...


Anonymous
Just the thing I needed, saved me a lot of time.

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