Alle Publikationen
2018
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Helmolt, Katharina von; Ittstein, Daniel Jan (Hg.) (2018): Digitalisierung und (Inter-)Kulturalität. Formen, Wirkung und Wandel von Kultur in der digitalisierten Welt. Stuttgart: Ibidem-Verlag. Online verfügbar unter http://www.ibidemverlag.de
Abstract: Dieser Band befasst sich mit der Wechselwirkung zwischen Kultur und digitaler Transformation. Datentechnologien und Künstliche Intelligenz verändern die Arbeitswelt und bestimmen in zunehmendem Maße die tägliche Lebensgestaltung. Gleichzeitig sind sie Ausdrucksformen von Kultur und eröffnen Räume für die Konstruktion kultureller Zugehörigkeit und Abgrenzung. Beruhten Konzeptionen von Kultur bis vor Kurzem auf der Vorstellung lokaler Kommunikationssysteme, ist mit Hilfe des Internets Kommunikation ohne raumzeitliche Einschränkungen zur Selbstverständlichkeit geworden. Aus diesen Entwicklungen ergibt sich eine Reihe von Themen- und Fragestellungen für die Interkulturalitätsforschung: Führt Computertechnologie zu einer globalen Homogenisierung von Kultur? Gibt es kulturspezifische Formen des Umgangs mit Künstlicher Intelligenz? Welche Ausdrucksformen von Kultur sind im Internet zu finden? Müssen wir Interkulturalität im Kontext der Digitalisierung neu denken? Mit diesen und anderen Fragen setzen sich die Beiträge des Bandes auseinander. Dabei greifen sie auf theoretische Konzepte und methodische Vorgehensweisen aus unterschiedlichen wissenschaftlichen Disziplinen zurück. Der Band soll damit zum interdisziplinären Austausch über kulturelle Aspekte der Digitalisierung beitragen. Er richtet sich an Interessierte aus Forschung und Praxis.
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(2018): Greetings as social action in Finland Swedish and Sweden Swedish service encounters – a pluricentric perspective. In: Intercultural Pragmatics 15 (1), S. 57-88. DOI: 10.1515/ip-2017-0030
Abstract: While greetings are performed in all cultures and open most conversations, previous studies suggest that there are cross-cultural differences between different languages in greeting behavior. But do speakers of different national varieties of the same language organize and perform their greeting behavior in similar ways? In this study, we investigate the sequential organization of greetings in relation to gaze behavior in the two national varieties of Swedish: Sweden Swedish spoken in Sweden and Finland Swedish spoken in Finland. In recent years, the importance of studying pluricentric languages from a pragmatic perspective has been foregrounded, not least within the framework of variational pragmatics. To date, most studies have focused on structural differences between national varieties of pluricentric languages. With this study, we extend the scope of variational pragmatics through adding an interactional, micro perspective to the broader macro analysis typical of this field. For this study, we have analyzed patterns for greetings in 297 videorecorded service encounters, where staff and customers interact at theatre box offices and event booking venues in Sweden and Finland. The study shows that there are similarities and differences in greeting behavior between varieties. There is a strong preference for exchanging reciprocal verbal greetings, one at a time, in both. There is also a similar organization of the greeting sequence, where customer and staff establish mutual gaze prior to the verbal greetings, thus signaling availability for interaction. The duration of mutual gaze and the timing of the greeting, however, differ between the two varieties. We have also conducted a multi modal analysis of gaze behavior in correlation to the greeting. We found that the customers and staff in the Finland Swedish data share mutual gaze before and during the verbal greeting, and often avert gaze after the verbal greetings. However, in the Sweden Swedish data, the participants often avert gaze before the verbal greetings. Our results thus indicate that both similarities and differences in pragmatic routines and bodily behavior exist between the two national varieties of Swedish. The present study on greeting practices in Finland Swedish and Sweden Swedish should contribute to the field of variational pragmatics and to the development of pluricentric theory.
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(2018): Lingvo-Sociocultural Specific Of Talk Show Translation As A Tv Discourse Genre
Abstract: ABSTRACT The article is devoted to the linguistic and sociocultural features of the talkshow translationas a television discourse genre. The results of the research in the sphere of mass-media discourse represent a big value for understanding of different field correlation such as media and culture, sociocultural reality and its representation in media. It also has a big value for detecting of mass-media texts complicated semantic structure and different aspects of linguistic personality communicative behavior. The object of the study is television discourse as a linguistic and sociocultural phenomenon. The subjects of the study are linguistic and stylistic, linguistic and pragmatic, linguistic and sociocultural means that detect talk-show as a genre of TV discourse, realized in the situation of interpersonal communication, complicated by the mass communication conditions and institutional status of a TV presenter, who’s main aim is to affect the TV audience. One of the un explored and quite popular genres of television discourse is the talk show genre. In America the linguistic communication in the talk show genre is focused on the personality expression. The key concepts of such linguistic culture are self (self-presentation, self-made man), "challenge", "success" (only the best, geniuses). Thematic preferences and basic concepts of American linguistic culture are among the universal extralinguistic features of the talk show genre that takes in to account the national and cultural specifics of the communication in the American TV show.
2017
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(2017): Repacking ‘Privacy’ for a Networked World. In: Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) 26 (4), S. 453-488. DOI: 10.1007/s10606-017-9276-y
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10606-017-9276-y Abstract: In this paper we examine the notion of privacy as promoted in the digital economy and how it has been taken up as a design challenge in the fields of CSCW, HCI and Ubiquitous Computing. Against these prevalent views we present an ethnomethodological study of digital privacy practices in 20 homes in the UK and France, concentrating in particular upon people’s use of passwords, their management of digital content, and the controls they exercise over the extent to which the online world at large can penetrate their everyday lives. In explicating digital privacy practices in the home we find an abiding methodological concern amongst members to manage the potential ‘attack surface’ of the digital on everyday life occasioned by interaction in and with the networked world. We also find, as a feature of this methodological preoccupation, that privacy dissolves into a heterogeneous array of relationship management practices. Accordingly we propose that ‘privacy’ has little utility as a focus for design, and suggest instead that a more productive way forward would be to concentrate on supporting people’s evident interest in managing their relationships in and with the networked world.
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(2017): ‘What I see is not what you get’. Why culture-specific behaviours for virtual characters should be user-tested across cultures. In: AI & Society 32 (1), S. 37-49. DOI: 10.1007/s00146-014-0567-2
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-014-0567-2 Abstract: Abstract Integrating culture into the behavioural models of virtual characters requires knowledge from very different disciplines such as cross-cultural psychology and computer science. If culture-related behavioural differences are simulated with a virtual character system, users might not necessarily understand the intent of the designer. This is, in part, due to the influence of culture on not only users, but also designers. To gain a greater understanding of the instantiation of culture in the behaviour of virtual characters, and on this potential mismatch between designer and user, we have conducted two experiments. In these experiments, we tried to simulate one dimension of culture (Masculinity vs. Femininity) in the behaviour of virtual characters. We created four scenarios in the first experiment and six in the second. In each of these scenarios, the same two characters interact with each other. The verbal and non-verbal behaviour of these characters differs depending on their cultural scripts. In two user perception studies, we investigated how these differences are judged by human participants with different cultural backgrounds. Besides expected differences between participants from Masculine and Feminine countries, we found significant differences in perception between participants from Individualistic and Collectivistic countries. We also found that the user’s interpretation of the character’s motivation had a significant influence on the perception of the scenarios. Based on our findings, we giverecommendations for researchers that aim to design culture-specific behaviours for virtual characters.
Keywords: Agent-based Modelling, Behaviour modelling, Culture, Design, Disziplin, Evaluation, Favoriten, Interaktion, Kognitionswissenschaft/Social Sciences/Humanities, Kultur, Kultursensibilität, Kulturspezifizität, Kulturtheorie, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Modell, Modelle/Theorien, Modellierung, Realtechnik, social importance dynamics, Soziosensitive Systeme, Technik, User testing, Virtual characters -
(2017): Promises and reservations towards science and technology among South African publics. A culture-sensitive approach. In: Public understanding of science (Bristol, England). DOI: 10.1177/0963662517693453
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29298580 Abstract: Against the background that surveys measuring public perceptions of science and technology are often removed from cultural contexts and do not equally represent all regions of the world, this study investigated attitudes towards science and technology among different publics of the South African population. To apply a culture-sensitive approach, theoretical considerations of cultural distance were combined with methodological considerations of segmentation studies, and representative data ( n = 3183) were reanalysed. The findings show that six South African publics can be distinguished, and that - despite the fact that all publics see more promises of science than reservations - there tend to be sensitive differences between these publics. In the long run, such findings might help to make science communication more effective.
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(2017): Regional languages on Twitter. In: Dutch Journal of Applied Linguistics 6 (2), S. 174-196. DOI: 10.1075/dujal.16017.jon
Abstract: This paper addressed the question how the use of Dutch and the regional languages Frisian or Limburgish differ on Twitter and which patterns in language choice can be identified. Previous quantitative studies (Jongbloed-Faber, Van de Velde, Van der Meer & Klinkenberg, 2016; Nguyen, Trieschnigg & Cornips, 2015; Trieschnigg, 2015) have already shown that people in the Dutch provinces of Friesland and Limburg tweet in Frisian or Limburgish respectively, but most often in Dutch interspersed with some English. In this qualitative study, we compared the tweets from twenty twitterers in Friesland and Limburg who use both Dutch and Frisian or Limburgish regularly in order to get insight into their language use patterns. The following patterns in language use were identified: when a twitterer aims to maximise his/her audience, Dutch is regularly employed. However, as soon as an interpersonal, addressed tweet is formulated, Frisian or Limburgish is often used. General tweets in Dutch may therefore very well get a Frisian or Limburgish continuation. Another mechanism frequently found in responding tweets is following the language used in the original tweet, notwithstanding such a tweet was in Dutch or in a regional language. Finally, the data show that, although Twitter is a global medium which can be accessed at any time and any place provided that one has access to the needed technical equipment and Internet connection, twitterers sometimes construct localness i.e. what is perceived as local culture through using Frisian or Limburgish exclusively.
Keywords: Antworten im Rahmen einer Konversation, Art des Kommunikationsmediums, Design, Konversationsanalyse, Korrespondenz, Kultur, Kultureller Kontext, Lokalkulturalität, Öffentlicher vs. privater Raum, Orientierung am Stil der bereits begonnenen Konversation, Situationsbedingter Kontext, Sozialer Raum, Sprachgebrauch, Wahl der Konversationssprache -
(2017): Doing Psychology With a Cultural Lens: A Half-Century Journey. In: Perspectives on psychological science : a journal of the Association for Psychological Science 12 (5), S. 824-832. DOI: 10.1177/1745691617700932
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28972853 Abstract: My first international publication started out with the following sentences: "Some findings of social psychology may refer to general panhuman relationships, others to relationships that hold only within specific socio-cultural settings. Only systematic cross-cultural comparison can separate these or identify the limits within which particular generalizations hold" (Kagitcibasi, 1970, p. 444). These words still reflect my orientation to psychology and have shaped my work over half a century.
Keywords: Cross-Cultural Comparison, Culture, Humans, Kultur, PSYCHOLOGY, Psychology, Social, Publishing, Research -
(2017): Devianz auf Japanisch. In: Japanstudien 11 (1), S. 165-191. DOI: 10.1080/09386491.2000.11826861
Abstract: Wissenschaftliche Hintergründe des Verständnisses von Norm und Abweichung
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(2017): Kultursensible Aspekte während der Diagnostik von psychischen Belastungen bei Flüchtlingen – Zwei kommentierte Fallberichte. In: Psychotherapie, Psychosomatik, medizinische Psychologie 67 (3-04), S. 109-118. DOI: 10.1055/s-0042-107802
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27706544 Abstract: High levels of mental disorders, especially PTSD, are commonly known among groups of people forced to leave their homeland as a consequence of war-related experiences (e. g. armed conflict, torture or persecution). Depending on the cultural background the perceptions of illnesses vary, different symptom presentation and thereupon different coping strategies respectively expectations towards health care services exist. To minimize the danger of misdiagnosis by different experts working with refugees in the host countries, a culture-sensitive diagnostic approach is needed from the beginning. This article describes important aspects of culture-sensitive diagnostics by means of 2 commented case reports. Special focus is set on the aspect of linguistic and in a broader sense cultural comprehension between therapist, client and if necessary language mediator.
Keywords: Adult, Communication Barriers, Culturally Competent Care, Culture, culture sensitive, Disziplin, Female, Germany, Humans, Kultur, Kulturtheorie, Life Change Events, Linguistik, Male, Mental Disorders/diagnosis/ethnology/psychology, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Pathologie, Physician-Patient Relations, PREJUDICE, Psychologie, Refugees/psychology, Social Identification, Somatoform Disorders/diagnosis/ethnology/psychology, Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic/diagnosis/ethnology/psychology, Suicidal Ideation, Translating -
(2017): Pushing boundaries-culture-sensitive care in oncology and palliative care. A qualitative study. In: Psycho-oncology 26 (6), S. 763-769. DOI: 10.1002/pon.4217
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27429221 Abstract: OBJECTIVE In increasingly globalized societies, patient-centered cancer care requires culture-sensitive approaches in order to ensure patients well-being. While migrant patients' needs are frequently reported in the literature, staff members' perception of work with migrant patients, associated challenges, or individual work approaches are largely unknown. This study addresses this research gap through qualitative exploration of experiences of multicultural health care professionals in supportive oncology and palliative care, working with patients from different cultural backgrounds. This study aims to understand staff experience of the impact of culture on cancer care. METHODS This study was conducted at the Medical University of Vienna, including staff from different settings of oncology and palliative care, in different professional positions, and with a range of individual migration backgrounds. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 21 staff members working with patients from different cultural backgrounds. Interviews explored views on the impact of culture on care were audio-taped, transcribed, and analyzed using a rigorous method of thematic analysis, enhanced with grounded theory techniques. RESULTS Interviews revealed 4 key topics: culture-specific differences, assumed reasons for differences, consequences of multicultural care, and tools for culture-sensitive care. Strategies to better deal with migrant patients and their families were suggested to improve work satisfaction amongst staff. CONCLUSIONS This study identifies relevant staff challenges in work with migrant patients. Concrete suggestions for improvement include measures on an organizational level, team level, and personal tools. The suggested measures are applicable to improve work satisfaction and culture-sensitive care not only in cancer care but also in other areas of medicine.
Keywords: Adult, Attitude of Health Personnel, Culturally Competent Care, Culture, culture specific, Female, Gesellschaftsprofit, Health Personnel/psychology/statistics & numerical data, Humans, Interaktion, Job Satisfaction, Kultur, kulturspezifisch, Male, Medical Oncology, Medizin, Middle Aged, Neoplasms/ethnology/therapy, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Palliative Care, Pflege, Qualitative research, Umgangsformen, Young Adult -
(2017): Perception of (im)politeness and the underlying cultural conceptualisations. In: Pragmatics and Society 8 (2). DOI: 10.1075/ps.8.2.04sha
Abstract: The present study sets out to investigate the role of 'culture' as one of the many important factors that influence the evaluation of (im)politeness in Persian from a Cultural Linguistics perspective. The paper argues that Cultural Linguistics, and in particular the notion of cultural schema, has the potential to offer a robust analytical framework for the exploration of (im)polite use of language. We elaborate on this proposal by presenting examples of data from Persian in which speakers interpret impolite behaviour in light of a number of Persian cultural schemas. The study also offers a novel three-layered approach for the analysis of (im)politeness data that combines metadiscourse analysis with the ethnography of cultural conceptualisations, while highlighting the importance of the notion of 'heterogeneous distribution' of cultural conceptualisations, a pivotal theoretical concept in Cultural Linguistics which accounts for the variations in speakers' evaluation of (im)politeness.
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(2017): Translating the FAITH Frame. A Study of Two Translated Egyptian Novels. In: Complutense Journal of English Studies 25, S. 125-142. DOI: 10.5209/CJES.57598
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5209/CJES.57598 Abstract: This study, which is part of a larger study on the use of frame semantics in the translation of cultural elements from Arabic into English, isolates the instances where the characters from two modern Egyptian novels use language to identify themselves as members of a particular religious group, which corresponds to the frame generic→faith, and examines the manner in which these instances are translated into English. In this sense, faith is a generic frame because it dictates a particular set of behaviors, both linguistic and ideological, that is enforced by the faith community and practiced by the individuals within it. This faith community is a subset of the language community that uses a set of expressions considered typical of this community to the point where its members are recognizable through the use of these expressions. The translation issue at hand is that the TL may not offer the same possibilities to evoke a similar frame reflecting religious identity.
Keywords: Arabic literature, English translation of, faith/religion, frame generic, frame semantics, Frame-Semantik, generic frame, generic frames, Glaube, Identität, Identitätsstiftung, Kognitionswissenschaft/Social Sciences/Humanities, Kultur, Linguistik und Ideologie, Literaturwissenschaft, Religion, semantic frames, Soziale Angemessenheit, translating religious expressions, Ideologie, "Faith Frame" 2016
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(2016): Improving Medical Decision Making and Health Promotion through Culture-Sensitive Health Communication. An Agenda for Science and Practice. In: Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making 36 (7), S. 811-833. DOI: 10.1177/0272989X15600434
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26296619 Abstract: This review introduces the concept of culture-sensitive health communication. The basic premise is that congruency between the recipient's cultural characteristics and the respective message will increase the communication's effectiveness. Culture-sensitive health communication is therefore defined as the deliberate and evidence-informed adaptation of health communication to the recipients' cultural background in order to increase knowledge and improve preparation for medical decision making and to enhance the persuasiveness of messages in health promotion. To achieve effective health communication in varying cultural contexts, an empirically and theoretically based understanding of culture will be indispensable. We therefore define culture, discuss which evolutionary and structural factors contribute to the development of cultural diversity, and examine how differences are conceptualized as scientific constructs in current models of cultural differences. In addition, we will explicate the implications of cultural differences for psychological theorizing, because common constructs of health behavior theories and decision making, such as attitudes or risk perception, are subject to cultural variation. In terms of communication, we will review both communication strategies and channels that are used to disseminate health messages, and we will discuss the implications of cultural differences for their effectiveness. Finally, we propose an agenda both for science and for practice to advance and apply the evidence base for culture-sensitive health communication. This calls for more interdisciplinary research between science and practice but also between scientific disciplines and between basic and applied research.
Keywords: Clinical Decision-Making, Communication, Cultural Competency, culture sensitive, Disziplin, Health Behavior, Health Promotion/standards, Humans, Kultur, Kulturtheorie, Medizin, Models, Psychological, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Pathologie, Risk-Taking, Social Norms -
(2016): A cross-cultural comparative analysis of small group collaboration using mobile twitter. In: Computers in Human Behavior 65, S. 308-318. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2016.08.043
Abstract: This study was undertaken to determine the distinctive user behaviors and patterns of participants communicating using Twitter on a mobile device in a small-group collaborative setting. Participants were from Western and Eastern cultures (the United States and Korea). Tweets were coded and classified and the results analyzed. Several cultural dimensions were utilized to detect subtle differences between participants from these two different cultures in their dynamic mobile exchanges. Systematic differences in microblogging behaviors were found mostly in the direction predicted by the findings of previous studies on differences in national culture; however, we also report new and interesting findings that contribute to the knowledge base. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings and how this mobile communication information technology can be leveraged to the advantage of individuals and organizations.
Keywords: Art des Kommunikationsmediums, Disziplin, East-West divide, Informations- & Kommunikationstechnik, Interaktion, Kultur, Kultursensibilität, Kulturspezifizität, Kulturtheorie, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), microblogging behaviours, mobile communication technology, national culture, Realtechnik, Technik, Twitter, user behaviour -
(2016): Don't Be a Stranger-Designing a Digital Intercultural Sensitivity Training Tool that is Culture General. In: IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies 9 (2), S. 120-132. DOI: 10.1109/TLT.2015.2456912
Abstract: Digital intercultural training tools play an important role in helping people to mediate cultural misunderstandings. In recent years, these tools were made to teach about specific cultures, but there has been little attention for the design of a tool to teach about differences across a wide range of cultures. In this work, we take the first steps to create a digital self-contained culture-general training tool. In the first part of the article, we focus on different aspects and methods of intercultural training. This information is then used in the second part to evaluate the effect of these different methods on the perception of behaviour in misunderstandings. We found that experiential and story-based approaches may lead to different perceptions of participants. In the third part, we expanded on these critical incidents, and incorporated virtual characters, to evaluate if experiential incidents in an embedded story can lead to an attribution of perceived differences in behaviour to specific differences in culture and to users becoming less judgemental of inappropriate behaviours by people from different cultures. The results suggest that the tool had some effect, but that a debriefing relating the general differences to specific instances would be beneficial.
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(2016): Smell in Polish. Lexical Semantics and Cultural Values. In: JOURNAL OF SLAVIC LINGUISTICS 24 (2), S. 273-299
Abstract: Verbs of perception have been typically classified into three semantic groups. Gisborne (2010) calls the three categories agentive (listen class), experiencer (hear class), and percept (sound class). Examples pertaining to the sense of smell in English use the same lexical item (smell), while in Polish, the three senses of smell are expressed with different verbs: wąchać (agentive), czuć zapach (experiencer), and pachnieć (percept). In metaphorical extensions of the verbs of sensory perception these verbs often stand for mental states, as meaning shifts typically involve the transfer from concrete to abstract domains. I show that the metaphorical extensions of pachnieć and percept to smell are quite different. Not only does pachnieć not suggest bad character or dislikeable characteristics, it actually conveys the opposite, as in the expression coś komuś pachnie ‘something is attractive to someone’ or when used without a modifier. These differences stem from the positive meaning of pachnieć and the negative meaning of to smell. Since the percept verbs of smell seem to be intrinsically positively or negatively valued, they do not lend themselves to universal Mind-as-Body extensions. I also consider some of the dramatic frequency contrasts between Polish and English smell constructions and show they can have their root in different cultural scripts underlying modes of speaking (pachnieć jak vs. smell like), framing of experiences (czuć zapach vs. experiencer to smell), polysemy, and different constructional capabilities (wąchać vs. to sniff).
Keywords: Agent, Agentive, Biologische Marker, Disziplin, Erlebender, Experiencer, frame semantics, Geräuschhören, Gisborne, Hear, Hören, Kultur, Kulturdifferenz, Kulturspezifizität, Kulturtheorie, Kulturvergleich, Linguistik, Listen, Percept, Perzept, Riechen, schnüffeln, Semantik, Semantische Gruppen, Smell, Smell like, Sniff, sound, Sprachgebrauch, Sprachverstehen, Status, Verben, Wahrnehmung, Wahrnehmung und Sprache, Wahrnehmungsverben, Zuhören -
(2016): Address practices in academic interactions in a pluricentric language. In: Pragmatics 26 (4), S. 631-652. DOI: 10.1075/prag.26.4.05for
Abstract: Following the recent development of address research in pluricentric languages (Clyne et al. 2006), the present study describes address practices in English-speaking academic settings and pursues two main objectives: (a) to provide a profile of address patterns in academic interactions in Australian English; and (b) to compare address practices in higher education across the three dominant varieties of English, namely American English, Australian English, and British English. The data on Australian English are drawn from 235 questionnaires completed by students, who reported on the address strategies adopted by students and teaching staff in classroom interactions in an Australian university. Data on American and British academic settings were retrieved from the research literature on the topic. The findings show a high degree of informality and familiarity in student-teacher relations in Australia, where reciprocal first names are the default pattern of address at all levels. By contrast, in American academia the hierarchical organization of roles and the different professional positions are foregrounded and reinforced through an asymmetrical use of titles, honorifics and first names. Finally, the British university setting displays a non-reciprocal usage of first names and titles between lecturer and students, which gradually evolves into a more generalised reciprocal use of first names, usually after extended contact and collaboration. We argue that the distinctive patterns of address observed in the three varieties of English reflect diverse social and cultural values systems at work in different speech communities.
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(2016): Effects of culture-sensitive adaptation of patient information material on usefulness in migrants. A multicentre, blinded randomised controlled trial. In: BMJ open 6 (11). DOI: 10.1136/bmjopen-2016-012008
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27881523 Abstract: OBJECTIVES To evaluate the usefulness of culture-sensitive patient information material compared with standard translated material. DESIGN Multicentre, double-blind randomised controlled trial. SETTING 37 primary care practices. PARTICIPANTS 435 adult primary care patients with a migration background with unipolar depressive disorder or non-specific chronic low back pain were randomised. Patients who were unable to read in the language of their respective migration background were excluded. Sufficient data were obtained from 203 women and 106 men. The largest group was of Russian origin (202 patients), followed by those of Turkish (52), Polish (30) and Italian (25) origin. INTERVENTIONS Intervention group: provision of culture-sensitive adapted material. CONTROL GROUP provision of standard translated material. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Primary outcome: patient-rated usefulness (USE) assessed immediately after patients received the material. SECONDARY OUTCOMES patient-rated usefulness after 8 weeks and 6 months, symptoms of depression (PHQ-9), back pain (Back Pain Core Set) and quality of life (WHO-5) assessed at all time points. RESULTS Usefulness was found to be significantly higher (t=1.708, one-sided p=0.04) in the intervention group (USE-score=65.08, SE=1.43), compared with the control group (61.43, SE=1.63), immediately after patients received the material, in the intention-to-treat analysis, with a mean difference of 3.65 (one-sided 95% lower confidence limit=0.13). No significant differences were found for usefulness at follow-up (p=0.16, p=0.71). No significant effect was found for symptom severity in depression (p=0.95, p=0.66, p=0.58), back pain (p=0.40, p=0.45, p=0.32) or quality of life (p=0.76, p=0.86, p=0.21), either immediately after receiving the material, or at follow-up (8 weeks; 6 months). Patients with a lower level of dominant society immersion benefited substantially and significantly more from the intervention than patients with a high level of immersion (p=0.005). CONCLUSION Cultural adaptation of patient information material provides benefits over high quality translations. Clinicians are encouraged to use culture-sensitive material in their consultations, particularly with low-acculturated patients. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER German Register for Clinical Trials: DRKS00004241, Universal Trial Number: U1111-1135-8043, Results.
Keywords: Adult, Aged, Cultural Competency, culture sensitive, Depressive Disorder, Major/therapy, Disziplin, Double-Blind Method, Female, Focus Groups, Health Literacy, Humans, Italy, Kultur, Kulturtheorie, Language, Low Back Pain/therapy, Male, Medizin, Middle Aged, Pamphlets, Patient Education as Topic/methods, Patient Participation, Poland, Psychologie, Quality of Life, Rolle (Beruf), Russia, Transients and Migrants, Translating, Turkey -
(2016): The Detour of an Obstetric Technology. Active Management of Labor Across Cultures. In: Medical anthropology 35 (1), S. 17-30. DOI: 10.1080/01459740.2015.1091817
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26484745 Abstract: Active management of labor (AML) is an obstetric technology developed in Ireland in the 1970s to accelerate labor in nulliparous women. This technology achieved rapid success in Great Britain and in English-speaking countries outside America, which adopted it before many other states around the world. In this article, I explore AML's technical and social characteristics when it was first designed, and then examine its local inflections in a Jordanian and a Swiss maternity hospital to shed light on the ways its transnational circulation modifies its script. I argue that its application is shaped by local material constraints and specific sociocultural configurations, gender regimes, and hospital cultures. Finally, I make a comparative analysis of AML practices in these two settings and in the foundational textbook to disentangle the technical and sociocultural components modeling its local applications.
Keywords: Active management of labor (AML), ANTHROPOLOGY, Disziplin, Ethnology, Female, Geburt, Gender, Human Body, Humans, Jordan, Konventionen, Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Kultur, Kulturdifferenz, Kulturspezifizität, Kulturtechnik, Kulturtheorie, Kulturvergleich, labor, Medical, Medizin, Normen, Observablen, Obstetrics, Pregnancy, script, Switzerland, Women -
(2016): ON DECORUM. FROM THE CLASSICS TO POSTMODERNITY. In: QUAESTIO IURIS 9 (3)
Abstract: Considering that the observance of decorum is important to assure good human relationships, especially in the public sphere, and, also, that episodes of breach of decorum are recurrent in Brazilian public life, I propose to recover this classical concept, since its re-evaluation is opportune and urgent. I present therefore a historical revision of the concept of decorum starting from the classics and find that, although this concept has undergone changes, its fundamental aspect, the intimate connection with ethics, has been maintained until the present day. Evidence that this classical concept still survives is the existence, in many countries, of “codes of ethics and decorum” of legislative, judicial and other organs. I find, however, that this concept is sensitive to culture, which is proven in the contrastive analysis of a sample of episodes of the violation of decorum by judges of the American Supreme Court and of the Brazilian Supreme Court. I found that, although violations of Americans are less severe than Brazilians, the reactions of the media and American citizens are much more energetic, because decorum for the Americans is a value that they hold dear, while in Brazil it is a dead letter, lacking be ressurected. I also present some reflections on the arrogance of those who hold power, an attitude to which I attribute the cause of many occurrences of the breach of decorum nowadays.
Keywords: Brasilien, Breach of decorum, decorum, Decorum in der Öffentlichkeit, Ethik, Fehlverhalten, Gericht, Grenzen, Grenzüberschreitung, Judikative, Kommunikation, Kultur, Kulturvergleich, Macht, Medien, Medienwirksamkeit, Öffentliche, diskursive Aushandlung von Anstand, Öffentlicher Diskurs, Rechtswissenschaft, Rhetorik, Richter, Soziale Angemessenheit, Umgangsformen, USA, Werte -
(2016): Cultural intelligence (CQ) in virtual, cross-cultural interactions. Generalizability of measure and links to personality dimensions and task performance. In: INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INTERCULTURAL RELATIONS 50, S. 29-38. DOI: 10.1016/j.ijintrel.2015.11.001
Abstract: Previous studies have focused on investigating CQ in face-to-face contexts but very few have assessed CQ in virtual, cross-cultural interactions. This study highlights the relevance of cultural intelligence (CQ) as an intercultural capability in cross-cultural communications that are virtual. This two-study research (study 1: n = 274; study 2: n = 223) conducted in call centers in the Philippines (a) assesses the generalizability of the four-factor CQ model (i.e., cognitive, metacognitive, motivational and behavioral CQ) as applied in the virtual context and (b) tests the relationship between CQ personality dimensions (i.e., openness to experience and extraversion) and supervisor's ratings of task performance. Study 1 results show that the structural validity of the four-factor CQ model was supported with minor issues in some of the items indicating the need to modify the CQ measure when utilized in the virtual context. Study 2 results show that CQ is positively and significantly related to openness to experience and extraversion. In addition, results show that CQ predicts task performance highlighting the importance of developing CQ among call center representatives and other working professionals who virtually engage and interact with clients and customers from culturally diverse backgrounds.
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(2016): Polite like an Egyptian?. Case Studies of Politeness in the Late Ramesside Letters. In: Journal of Politeness Research 12 (2), S. 149-153. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2016-0007
Abstract: The Late Ramesside Letters, a corpus of over 70 personal communications written in Late Egyptian, form one of the most complete letter collections from ancient Egypt (c. 1099-1069 BCE). A key feature of ancient Egyptian letter writing is the adherence to the social positions of, and relationships between, the interlocutors, allowing scholars to reconstruct the hierarchical network of individuals directly and indirectly included in the corpus. From this understanding, how can modern scholars discern what was considered to be 'polite' communicative behaviour within these relationships and how can developments in historical politeness help us do this? This article will explore three case studies surrounding different aspects of politeness research: first-order politeness, facework, and discernment politeness in order to explore the phenomenon of 'politeness' in Late Egyptian and reflect on the suitability of current politeness frameworks for the analysis of the Late Ramesside Letters.
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(2016): Special Issue: Case studies in historical politeness (ancient languages): Introduction. In: Journal of Politeness Research 12 (2), S. 149-153. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2016-0020
Abstract: The collection of papers included in this Special Issue represents the first contribution of its kind to the study of politeness, bringing together studies from across many different historical disciplines to collectively assess and challenge the concept of ‘politeness’ in the ancient world. Here, the authors of the papers experiment with modern politeness frameworks, assessing the different ways in which historical politeness can be understood and pursued. What becomes clear in these studies is that the modern concept of ‘politeness’ needs to be better defined when it is applied to the ancient world, especially if the culture or language system under study has no direct terminology or understanding of ‘politeness’ as it is defined today.
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(2016): Culture-sensitive psychotraumatology. In: European journal of psychotraumatology 7
Abstract: BACKGROUND Although there is some evidence of the posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) construct's cross cultural validity, trauma-related disorders may vary across cultures, and the same may be true for treatments that address such conditions. Experienced therapists tailor psychotherapy to each patient's particular situation, to the nature of the patient's psychopathology, to the stage of therapy, and so on. In addition, culture-sensitive psychotherapists try to understand how culture enhances the meaning of their patient's life history, the cultural components of their illness and help-seeking behaviors, as well as their expectations with regard to treatment. We cannot take for granted that all treatment-seeking trauma survivors speak our language or share our cultural values. Therefore, we need to increase our cultural competencies. METHODS The authors of this article are clinicians and/or researchers from across the globe, working with trauma survivors in various settings. Each author focused on one or more specific cultural aspects of working with trauma survivors and highlighted the following aspects. RESULTS As a result of culture-specific individual and collective meanings linked to trauma and trauma-related disorders survivors may be exposed to (self-) stigma in the aftermath of trauma. Patients who are reluctant to talk about their traumatic experiences may instead be willing to write or use other ways of accessing the painful memories such as drawing. In other cultures, community and family cohesion are crucial elements of recovery. While awareness of culture-specific aspects is important, we also need to beware of premature cultural stereotyping. When disseminating empirically supported psychotherapies for PTSD across cultures, a number of additional challenges need to be taken into account: many low and middle income countries have very limited resources available and suffer from a poor health infrastructure. CONCLUSIONS In summary, culture-sensitive psychotraumatology means assuming an empathic and non-judgmental attitude, trying to understand each individual's cultural background.
Keywords: Beeinflussung der Bewertung moralischer Urteile, Bewertung von sozialem Verhalten (/sozialer Angemessenheit), Culture, culture sensitive, dissemination, Disziplin, evidence-based treatments, Kultur, Kulturtheorie, low and middle income countries, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Pathologie, Psychologie, psychotraumatology, stigma, Trauma