We'll see what happens there, but it doesn't seem like I should have to pay for the whole year.
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Anyway, our next text is:
Abe, H. & Wiseman, R. L. (1983). A cross-cultural confirmation of the dimensions of intercultural effectiveness. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 7(1), 53-67.
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"ABSTRACT. This study attempted to further our understanding of the construct of 'intercultural effectiveness.' Specifically, the study compared the dimensions of intercultural effectiveness found in Hammer, Gudykunst, and Wiseman (1978) using American sojourners with the dimensions found using Japanese sojourners. The results revealed five dimensions for the Japanese sample: (1) the ability to communicate interpersonally, (2) the ability to adjust to different cultures, (3) the ability to deal with different societal systems, (4) the ability to establish interpersonal relationships, and (5) the ability to understand another." (p. 53)
Some of these things will be elaborated upon a bit (but not a whole lot) later on, but this gives us a good idea of what the article is about.
My purpose is to consider whether there is anything I can glean from the article that would be helpful to explain my situation in Vienna, especially vis a vis my relations with the mission there. Obviously, it's not necessarily wonderful science to assume that the same categories would fit an American, let's assume that they might be similar to what might be relevant for an American such as myself. I'll take them in order.
(1) I certainly had the ability to communicate interpersonally with Austrians and I attended an Austrian church. Although my German wasn't the best at the beginning by the time I left I was able to carry on a pretty good philosophical or theological discussion in German, and by then was able to maneuver the local dialect tolerably well as well.
(2) I'd spent reasonably lengthy times in various countries and never had a problem. Since then I've lived in Russia and S. Korea and got around in those countries as well. In Korea I didn't even know the language but I volunteered and was involved in a grassroots adult education group that I found out about on my own.
(3) I think I dealt with the Austrian society all right. I never had a problem in it or with the culture. There was never anything that I can remember that ever particularly bothered me or was a problem.
(4) I developed a friendship with a woman from church and we did several things together and she had me over. I had my landlady and neighbor over for dinner once too. So I did have friends and acquaintances with Austrians. It was harder after the mission started moving me around, though, especially when they sent me back to the States, which really disrupted things.
5) I'm not sure what they mean by "ability to understand another." I assume it means more than just language. But there is something that when you really know the language then you can start to understand people better than you can through translation. And if you live with them and sort of become one of them then you understand even more. That's how I feel with the Russians. I feel sort of at home with Russians in a way that I don't now with Americans any more. Maybe it sounds corny, but it's true.
So did I have culture shock in Austria? What do you think? Personally... I don't think so. What I think, and what I've always thought from day one is that the mission wanted to brain wash me to make me like one of them. And I tell you and I've said it before here that two of the other wives of leaders were also sent back to the USA for counseling more or less like I was (I don't know the exact details).
So what they do is scare the bajeebers out of you because no one is going to believe you if you tell anyone about what you've been experiencing while at the mission, so then you'll really be put away. Or the other option is to just concede and return to Vienna a mindless blob (you get the picture). I don't take to force kindly, and my values are to precious to me to be won over in that manner. I won't say what that implies about the women who preceded me.
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"In their analysis of personnel destined for international work, other cultures should possess four personality characteristics: (1) they should be 'resourceful and buoyant,' (2) they should have 'environmental mobility' in their background,' (3) they should possess 'intellectual curiosity,' and (4) they should have a talent for 'building institutions..." (p. 54)
So how to I did I stack up to these qualities at the time I was with the Vienna mission?
1) Just what I went through to get to Vienna in the first place took a lot of resourcefulness and buoyancy, I think. I think it was pretty unusual to find someone who would go so out of their way on their own to prepare for ministry to study the language, visit missionaries, visit believers in East Germany (when I was studying in East Berlin), apply to volunteer at a research center, etc. And a lot of these were abroad, so I could be resourceful abroad. I think I was buoyant because it was often difficult and I was pretty poor and other people would have given up but I stuck with it, so I think I buoyant in continuing and not giving up. I took these traits with me to Vienna, but, to be honest, I wasn't given a lot of opportunity to use them, but I tried the best I could. Mostly, I'm afraid, the resourcefulness and buoyancy would have to apply to activities outside the mission.
2) I think they mean by "environmental mobility" that I've moved around geographically (i.e., not just within the building). I definitely had some background of this nature, although I was starting out as a full-time missionary.
3) I definitely had intellectual curiosity. This one is almost too easy to show. Before I arrived in Vienna I went back a second year to Bible school because I had questions that I wanted to address in my studies. Before I went into missions I felt that I had studies the major theological, philosophical, political and ethical issues regarding missions in Eastern Europe. This is probably why when the issues came up with the mission I was all the more not willing to budge; because I'd already studied the issues, thought them through, came to my own conclusions, and disagreed with the mission. But the thing was that I had been curious enough to study the issues in the first place.
4) I don't know that I have a tallent for building institutions. You may have me here. I would like to have started an ESL school in Russia where I was living, but I was certain that the city I ended out living in wasn't big enough or strategically enough situated to be able to sustain such a school. A couple years after an Australian school made an offer to work with me on such an effort the local technical college tried to set one up, but it didn't last long, so I was right.
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Here's another approach"According to Kleinjans (1972), the effective intercultural communicator: (1) sees people first, representatives of culture second; (2) knows people are basically good; (3) knows the value of other cultures; and (4) has inner security and is able to feel comfortable being different from other people." (p. 54)
Again, I'll take them one by one:
1) The thing is that once you know another language you sort of forget that they're "foreign". They're just people. Of course, it's frustrating when you're only nominally fluent and have trouble saying what you want. But the thing is that you eventually get so that you really do forget and you're just all people. But that doesn't mean that feeling is universal. For example, in Russia for something foreigners might be given special treatment and then all of a sudden you remember you're a foreigner again because you're being given special treatment. Some things you can protest and eventually they might change their ways, but other things will just continue the way they are.
2) I guess you can say this in a sort of basic general way, but theologically I don't believe it and a lot of other Christians won't either, including Orthodox Christians (a large part of Russians). As for me during the Vienna mission days, that wouldn't have been a problem. The main problems there would have been my believing that mission people didn't seem to be basically good and mission people didn't seem to believe that people are basically good (because of their security concerns). So, if anything, the mission was more likely that I was on this score to have culture shock problems.
3) I definitely knew the value of other cultures, especially since my undergraduate degress was in European Studies with a minor in Russian Studies. So that's not too much of an issue. The Vienna mission saw the value of other cultures in instrumental terms only, I think; that is, in terms of what they should know to be culturally sensitive in their teaching and textbook preparation.
4) I definitely had inner security and was comfortable being different from other people. The whole time I was in Vienna I stuck by my beliefs and did not faulter and I think I was probably different in many ways because I didn't really fit in well anywhere, with any group, particularly well. Since then I've proven repeatedly that I'm not afraid to be different. You never know, though, when it can be a blessing to someone. Remember that adult education group in Korea? I was the oldest in that group, but one time we went to the museum/residense of some of the survivors of the WWII Comfort Women. When we were there we found out one of the women had been in the north of China near the Russian border and she knew a bunch of Russian folk songs that she remembered from all these years! So we sang Russian folk songs but I only remembered the choruses and she remembered all the verses and it was absolutely amazing and I couldn't help but wonder. She couldn't have had that many Russian speaking visitors come through. I couldn't speak Korean but it was like a moment that sticks with you. So if I had not had the "inner security" to be with that group and go there that day then neither I nor that former comfort woman would have had that experience, right?
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"Drawing from the literature on communication competence in the United States, Ruben (1976) identified seven behavioral dimensions related to intercultural effectiveness: (1) display of respect, (2) interaction posture, (3) orientation to knowledge, (4) empathy, (5) role behavior, (6) interaction management, and (7) tolerance for ambiguity." (p. 54)
Again, let's look at these one-by-one:
1) I think I've always shown respect for foreign culture. The only possible exception to this is when I lived in Korea I had problems which I understand is due to my being blonde, even though I was well past my 20s and I dressed way conservatively even though I was sweating like a pig in the heat and humidity. I even went to a town meeting sponsored by the mayor of Seoul for foreigners and I voiced my frustration (on this rather taboo subject matter). I was molested twice on the trains and it was basically because of the men there that I left Seoul. I couldn't take it any more. Since I was a bit in a protest culture there, someone helped me with a protest of my own on this, so this might not be that respectful, but there were a lot of people who agreed with me and it isn't the kind of thing that anyone should have to put up with, in my opinion.
2) I think by this he means attitude. Since I've had a good track record of being able to get along well with people in different countries wherever I've lived I think that speaks well for me having a good attitude. People would pick up on a bad attitude and that would reflect on my relationships, but I've never had a problem.
3) I'm not exactly sure what Ruben means by this, unless he means whether I was knowledgeable about the people and places I lived. For the most part I did have a pretty good knowledge of this sort, although that varied. I knew the least about Korea going over, and I knew the most about Russia goin over. But while I was in these various places I also learned more about them. In Korea I read about the history of the country and language. But I also learned about adult education in the country, for example. In Russia I learned that one of my favorite poets had been in prison camp not far from where I was. I also to recognize very confidently about half a dozen local mushrooms in Siberia and later found one of them in Indiana.
4) I recently had a couple pictures enlarged on canvas on my photo mantage wall, and one of the pictures is my Russian friend at the cemetary. Every spring on "Den' Pamyat'i" (Day of Remembrance) I used to go to the cemetary with Nina to go to the grave of her son. Now she has passed away too. When I first got to Russia and about my third month into being there I had a teacher in-service course and it was mostly all instructors from the local technical college, so it was a tight-knit group. Part way through the month of intensive coursework one of the instructors' only son drowned in the local lake. He had a wife and young child. We collected money for flowers and the class dismissed early the day of the funeral and we had a discussion at their request on American death traditions. We did what we could as a class and it seemed to be the right thing anyway and I think the teachers appreciated it. It was a difficult time, especially, of course, for the mother who lost her son.
5) I think this means how well one carries out one's role(s). I have always been able to carry out my roles just fine, with the one exception of the Vienna mission. That is because the problem was with the Vienna mission itself. That is, the problem was isolated to the mission. The mission is the one and only, the unique instance in my whole life where anything of the nature has happened that happened wherein they sent me back to the USA for counseling. That is why I am going to all this trouble to bring it to question. Especially since a couple of major university psychologists have recently have just proclaimed me very sane. The other thing is, the mission kept moving me around like a revolving door that how was I supposed to know what role behavior I should discuss here?
6) The only way I'd know what interaction management is is because I taught it in teaching ESL. Basically, it's conversation management. Can you carry on a decent conversation? But it's more than conversation management is. I think I'm pretty good at this. My main weakness is small talk. I'm ghastly weak at small talk, at chit chat. Now, if you want to talk about talk of substance, anything about really wanting to know how someone is doing and what they've been up to all the way to theological finer points, then I'm more interested. (I should clarify that, up until recently I would be interested, but now my health is such that although I hate it I'm just sort of engrossed in taking care of myself and it seems that I'm not up for much more than that, although I do try to do a bit more from time to time. You might not be able to tell that from this blog, but it's easier to write than to talk free style.)
7) Up until vary recently (cf. no. 6 above) I think I had a very great tolerance fot ambiguity which explains why I was able to to make it so long in the Vienna mission when they were making conditions so difficult for me.
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This section continues, but I'm tired, and I think I'd better continue in the next post.
