Communication Cultures

COURSE OBJECTIVE
.The main goals for this course are:
- to increase your cultural awareness on a practical level in differentsettings, such as the international classroom, website design,face-to face encounters and media texts;
- to increase your cultural awareness on a theoretical level byexploring the key concepts used in the field of intercultural communication;
- to explore how these key concepts translate to research incommunication and discourse analytic research by performing your own small-scale analyses of different settings in which intercultural communication occurs.

COURSE CONTENT
In this course, the role of culture in both online communication and offline communication is examined. Much of what people do, say, think, and prefer is influenced by culture. This relationship is evident in cultural stereotypes, pop culture, verbal communication, non-verbal communication, online discourse, and so on. Drawing inspirations from everyday examples, we will identify common communication patterns, which will be analysed based on prominent theories in cross-cultural communication and discourse analysis. We will explore a range of communication phenomena, addressing questions such as:
- In what ways do members of different national cultures produce and interpret communicative acts differently, and why?
- Is communication gendered? How? Why?
- How is non-verbal communication shaped by cultural norms?
- How do communicative cultures emerge?

The examples we work with during the course may vary and students will be asked to collect data for their own small-scale research analyses. Presentations, assignments, and discussions will always link to theories addressed in the course literature, actual (professional) practice, and to the real-life learning environment of the international classroom.

TEACHING METHODS
The meetings for this course will be interactive lectures, and seminars in which you will apply theory to data examples (in total 3 meetings of 2 hours each, per week)

TYPE OF ASSESSMENT
Two assignments (30% of your final grade; no resit for the assignments) and an exam (70% to your final grade). You have to pass the exam in order to complete this course. We expect all students to actively participate in the course.