ARTIFACTS IN INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION

Abstract

Artifacts have made intercultural communication inevitable. Communicating with other culture characterizes today’s way of life and encourages good relation and bonding. Technologies like the internet, television and radio has increased the probability that whatever is documented will be used by someone from another culture. Intercultural communication is important in our lives thus the art of knowing and understanding how to communicate or interact with other cultures (artifact) should be a skill to be emphasized.

Introduction

Artifacts have made intercultural communication inevitable. For us to understand artifacts and how it impacts intercultural communication we have to understand what culture and intercultural communication is all about. Culture has been defined in a variety of ways. Culture is a “system of belief, values and assumptions about life that guides behaviors and is shared by a group of people and these are transmitted from generation to generation, rarely with exploit instruction” Peace Corps (2002)

“Culture is a system of shared beliefs values customs, behaviors’ and artifacts that the members of the society use to cope with their world and with one another and are transmitted from generation to generation through learning.” Bates and plog (1976)

Intercultural communication is a form of global communication. It is used to describe the wide range of communication problems that naturally appears within an organization made up of individuals from different religious, social ethnic and educational background (Wikipedia)

In simple terms it is a form of communication that aims to share information across different cultures and social groups. It is mostly used to describe the wide range of communication processes and problems that naturally occurs within an organization made up of people from different background. It also tries to understand how to perceive the world in general.

Intercultural communication serves a very important role in preventing misunderstanding and miscommunication. Because of increased intercultural interdependence, people are rethinking cultural communication in order to acquire good intercultural communication competence. Arasaratnam (2005) states, is becoming more relevant in the increasingly multicultural communities that people live in today.

From what we understand of culture and intercultural communication, we can say artifacts are vital as they ensure culture exist and through them understanding and harmonious co-existence is evident through intercultural communication.

Artifact

An artifact is a Latin phrase arte factum (something) made with skill. The Oxford student dictionary defines artifact as an object that is made by a person especially something of historical or cultural interest. It is also something observed in scientific investigation or experiment that is not naturally present but occurs as a result of the preparative or investigative procedure.

The free online dictionary defines artifact as any handmade object as a tool or the remains of one as a shared of pottery, belonging to an earlier time or cultural stage especially such an object found at an archaeological.

According to the definition of culture by Kroeber and kluckholm (1952) culture refers to all characteristic common to a particular group of people which are learned and not given by nature. If members of a group have two legs is not a cultural characteristic but a natural one, but a special and common way of walking would probably be cultural. From this we can have four primary cultural dimensions which are pattern of through, pattern of behavior, pattern of artifact and imprints in nature. For our case we will deal with pattern of artifact, which is the common way of manufacturing and using of materials. Where artifactural dimension of culture is given a special attention is in museums.

Culture is a system of shared beliefs, values, custom, behavior and artifact that the members of the society use to cope with their world and each other, transmitted down through learning. From this I agree that the shared meaning that members of a society attach to the various phenomena, natural, intellectual, ideology, religion and artifact (tools, houses, machinery, work of art and the culturally transmitted skills and techniques) are vital and together they ensure intercultural communication is possible through fastening and  understanding on how things are done.

Artifacts are objects or thing often used to communicate information about oneself and they may include clothes, jewelry, trinkets, accessories like handbag, umbrella, fans, hats and colours to express ones interest hobbies, status or lifestyle. With artifacts one can be distinguished from others by demonstrating his or her own taste of life and philosophy. However, different culture has different interpretations of these artifacts. The most influential artifacts a person has is one’s own wardrobe. Research in psychology and communication states that clothes usually make a man or woman in the eyes of the observers. Colour as artifact usually tells something about your personality. Red indicates a passionate, assertive and enthusiastic nature. Yellow indicates optimized, cheerfulness and originality. Blue shows peaceful nature, coolness and calm.

Media as artifact are infrastructure with three components; the artifacts or devices used to communicate or convey information, the activities and practices in which people engage to communicate or share information and the social arrangement or organization forms that develop around those devices, activities and practices (slide share) from this we say the devices, activities and practices people are involved in as the interact brings about cohesion.

Media artifacts are media collected which are collected and available to be re-represented. The media used usually diverse from video, sound to interview, magazines and photos. If you want to have something documented and you cannot write it down with words then it can be used as your media artifact. An example of a media artifact was done by Michael Lesy who stumped on a collection of photography of late 19^th century taken in a small town Wisconsin called black river falls. Michael was intrigued by this and started reaching the town newspaper from the same period. He artfully arranged the photos and newspaper fragment in a sequence. He published the under the little “Wisconsin Death Trip” in 1973. This audio slide show includes an interview with Michael Lesy and images from the book, together with other image of Victorian post- mortem photography.

According Wikipedia cultural artifact also known as social artifact is a term used in the social sciences like anthropology and sociology for anything created by humans which gives information about culture of its creator and user. Current objects of modern or near –modern society are also cultural artifacts. For example 17^th century lather or a Television each may provide a lot of information about the time in which they were manufactured and used. Cultural artifacts usually provide knowledge about technological processes, economy and social make up.

The study of artifact should be insisted within the social relations and system through which they are produced and consumed and thus their study is bound up with study of society economic and politics. The study of artifacts is valuable because it provides tools that enable someone to read and interpret one’s culture. It also allows the examination and critically analyzing the whole range of artifact without prejudices towards one or another sort of cultural text, institution or practice. It opens the way toward more differentiated political rather than a esthetic valuation of cultural artifact in which one attempts to distinguish critical and oppositional from conformist and conservative moment in a cultural artifact. For example the studies of Hollywood film shows how key 1960 films promoted the views of radical and counter culture and how film in the 1970s loss a battleground between liberal and conservative position.

Intercultural communication brings about openness among individual of different background with different view points on matters. But because of the drive to try and understand the different culture (artifacts) of our neighbour which are in the media, the world has now been made a small village. Artifacts have a major role in shaping  the society and encouraging unity through people coming together to make and use them.

Conclusion

“Cultural communication research tends to focus on understanding communication within one’s point of views” Gudykunst and moody (2002). From this, we can say for us to understand the different cultures (artifacts) and be one with them. Then we have to get closer to comprehend what they mean.

“Although intercultural communication is not new, what is new is the systematic study of exactly what happens when cross-culture contacts and interaction takes place, that is when the message producer and a message receiver are from different culture.” Gao (2006) The contacts and interaction usually binds the different point of views together.

References

Arasaratnam, L.n. and Doerfel, M.L. (2005).Intercultural communication competence: Identifying key components from multicultural perspective, International Journal of Intercultural Relation.

Bales, O.G. and Plog , F.(1976) Cultural Anthropology, (3^rd). New York: Mc Graw Hill.6.

Gao, F. (2006). Language is culture : On Intercultural Communication Journal of Language and Linguistics.

Gudykuns L. W. B. and Mody, B. (2002). Handbook of International and Intercultural Communication (2^nd Ed). Thousand Oaks, C A: sage

Intercultural communication Retrieved March 12, 2014from http://en.wikipedia. Org/wiki/intercultural- communication

Kroeber, A.L. and Kluckholm, C. (1952). Culture. A critical review of concepts and Definitions. Harvard University Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology paper

Media Artifacts Retrieved March 12, 2014, from www.slideshare.net/../media-artifacts

Oxford student Dictionary. (3^rd Ed) (2012). Oxford university press.

Peace corps. (2002) .Building bridges: A peace corps classroom guide to cross- cultural understanding Washington, DC: Author Retrieved March 12, 2014, from http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws.