Intercultural Friendships

Martin and Nakayama (2012) highlight how the concept of friendship varies across cultures. For instance, most western cultures view friendship as a voluntary, spontaneous relationship that is unique from family or work relationships. Essentially western cultures believe that they can choose their friends. 

Conversely, in cultures that value collectivism and view the self in relation to others, construct friendship as less individualistic and spontaneous. In China, friendships are seen as long-term obligations connected to the concept of guanxi. 

According to Smart (1999) guanxi is defined as "relationships of social connection built on shaed identities such as native place, kinship, and attending the same school" (p. 120). Guanxi is how things get done in collectivist cultures. Here's a video that explains the power of guanxi in Chinese relationships.

Cultural differences in friendships are also evident in the development of relational intimacy. For instance, international students have reported difficulty in understanding U.S. performances of friendship (Martin & Nakayama, 2012). International students report that U.S. students appear superficial and keep conversations and interactions at more of the social, surface level rather than developing deeper connections and personal disclosure. What many other cultures view as friends can equate to what U.S. American might label as "close friends" thus creating a disconnect in relational development between U.S. and international students. 

Thus is important that friendship is discussed in terms of intercultural communication. Often these relationships are overlooked in research and class discussions. So for this blog post, I would like you to explore dialectics of friendship. Choose one friend who is different from you. Describe a situation or situations in which you experienced at least one and possibly more of the dialectics discussed in chapter 10. Discuss the ways in which the two of you are both similar and different - age, gender/sex, sexuality, religion, background, interests personality, etc. Furthermore of your, think about the ways your relationship has both changed and stayed the same throughout the course of your friendship.

References

Martin, J. N., & Nakayama, T. K. (2012). Intercultural communication in contexts (6th ed). Boston, MA: McGraw Hill.