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Barriers to entry : overcoming challenges and achieving breakthroughs in a Chinese workplace
This book offers a unique perspective on the challenges that non-Chinese employed by Chinese companies face and provides insight into the issues foreign employees working for Chinese management encounter. As its source of content the book analyzes the experiences of those currently working for Chinese companies both inside and outside China and in exploring the dimensions of that experience lifts the veil on the inner workings of a Chinese company. By supplementing this primary analysis with secondary research that encompasses a wide range of disciplines (cross-cultural relations, Chinese management philosophy and practice, human resource management, linguistics, and aesthetics, etc.) the book serves as an invaluable resource for those engaged in the study of Chinese enterprise culture and management, cross-cultural relations, international business and human resource management.
Book
Through a Screen Darkly
What does the world admire most about America? Science, technology, higher education, consumer goods-but not, it seems, freedom and democracy. Indeed, these ideals are in global retreat, for reasons ranging from ill-conceived foreign policy to the financial crisis and the sophisticated propaganda of modern authoritarians. Another reason, explored for the first time in this pathbreaking book, is the distorted picture of freedom and democracy found in America's cultural exports.In interviews with thoughtful observers in eleven countries, Martha Bayles heard many objections to the violence and vulgarity pervading today's popular culture. But she also heard a deeper complaint: namely, that America no longer shares the best of itself. Tracing this change to the end of the Cold War, Bayles shows how public diplomacy was scaled back, and in-your-face entertainment became America's de facto ambassador.This book focuses on the present and recent past, but its perspective is deeply rooted in American history, culture, religion, and political thought. At its heart is an affirmation of a certain ethos-of hope for human freedom tempered with prudence about human nature-that is truly the aspect of America most admired by others. And its author's purpose is less to find fault than to help chart a positive path for the future.
eBook
International students: a vulnerable student population
This study examines the experiences of international students at The University of Toledo, where international students comprise approximately 10% of the student population. It highlights problems international students experience such as adapting to a new culture, English language problems, financial problems and lack of understanding from the broader University community. Recommendations for improvement include initiatives to raise the profile of international students, improved financial assistance and scholarships, and creating opportunities for international students to improve their spoken English skills.
Journal Article
Technology as Pharmakon: The Promise and Perils of the Internet for Foreign Language Education
Globalization and networking technologies have transformed the contexts, means, and uses of foreign language learning. The Internet offers a vast array of texts, films, music, news, information, pedagogical resources, sounds, and images from around the world as well as unprecedented opportunities for direct communication with native speakers in real time. However, the very technology that delivers these materials and interactions can produce subtle mediational effects that can influence how learners evaluate and interpret them. Focusing first on technological mediation broadly, and then on the specific context of desktop videoconferencing in a telecollaboration project, this article outlines the benefits and the potential pitfalls that computer mediation presents for the learning of languages and cultures. Specific attention is given to the question of what it means to mediate the foreign culture through interfaces that are familiar from one's home culture. The principal argument is that the dynamics of online language learning call for a relational pedagogy that focuses on how medium and context interact with language use. The goal of such an approach is to expose students to a broader scope of symbolic inquiry, to connect present text-making practices with those of the past, and to foster a critical perspective that will prepare young people to understand and shape future language and literacy practices. (Verlag).
Journal Article
Cross-cultural learning in virtual reality environment
Cross-cultural learning projects were carried out in learning environments created using Web 1.0 or Web 2.0 technologies in previous related studies. However, such environments have a limited ability to provide learners with immersive learning experiences of a foreign culture and fail to make them feel virtually present in a foreign cultural context. In this study, we aimed to create such an environment, one that enables not only communication among learners from different cultures but also gives them a sense of presence and provides an immersive experience in a foreign culture without their being physically there. To this end, based on the cultural convergence theory, we designed a cross-cultural learning activity in virtual reality (VR) using a 360-degree video technology. Two groups of university students, one from China (n = 10) and the other from Uzbekistan (n = 11), who exchanged culture-related information with each other, participated in the activity. We investigated whether cross-cultural understanding and the trait emotional intelligence of the participants was facilitated after their participation in the activity. In addition, we explored the participants sense of perceived presence in the VR environment and their acceptance of VR technology. A mixed methods research approach was adopted. We analyzed the reflective journals of the participants, administered three questionnaires, and interviewed the participants. We obtained the following four findings: First, the participants had no prior knowledge of their foreign partners’ cultures and traditions before the learning activity; however, they had knowledge that they could summarize, explain, compare, and contrast at the end of the activity. Second, the comparison of the results of the pre- and post-questionnaires showed that the two trait emotional intelligence constructs (i.e., self-control and emotionality) were significantly improved from the beginning of the activity to its end. Third, the participants perceived a high level of presence in the VR environment. Finally, the participants accepted VR technology in terms of its usefulness for cross-cultural learning and ease of use. The originality of this study lies in creating cross-cultural learning environments based on a 360-degree video technology that enables communication across cultures and gives learners a sense of presence and an immersive experience. The value of the study for the literature and its contribution to theoretical knowledge is that it creates virtual cross-cultural learning environments based on a 360-degree video technology and presents evidence suggesting that the cross-cultural learning environments created in this study can facilitate cross-cultural knowledge and perceived self-control, emotionality, and sense of presence.
Journal Article
Do Chinese subordinates trust their German supervisors? A model of inter-cultural trust development
In this qualitative study based on 95 interviews with Chinese subordinates and their German supervisors, we inductively develop a model which advances theoretical understanding by showing how inter-cultural trust development in hierarchical relationships is the result of six distinct elements: the subordinate trustor’s cultural profile (cosmopolitans, hybrids, culturally bounds), the psychological mechanisms operating within the trustor (role expectations and cultural accommodation), and contextual moderators (e.g., country context, time spent in foreign culture, and third-party influencers), which together influence the trust forms (e.g., presumptive trust, relational trust) and trust dynamics (e.g., trust breakdown and repair) within relationship phases over time (initial contact, trust continuation, trust disillusionment, separation, and acculturation). Our findings challenge the assumption that cultural differences result in low levels of initial trust and highlight the strong role the subordinate’s cultural profile can have on the dynamics and trajectory of trust in hierarchical relationships. Our model highlights that inter-cultural trust development operates as a variform universal, following the combined universalistic-particularistic paradigm in cross-cultural management, with both culturally generalizable etic dynamics, as well as culturally specific etic manifestations.
Journal Article