ESSAY :: Cross-Cultural Communication.

Communication can be defined as the conveying of or exchange of information between two people. Cross-cultural communication can be simply looked at as the study of how persons from varied cultural backgrounds communicate amongst themselves and also across the different cultures. This is of great value as it allows us not only to appreciate the diversity in culture but also provides us with the opportunity to learn from the various cultures. The understanding of someone else's culture smooth's the progress of cross cultural communication and this is so because the basic principles and processes describing the other forms of communication also apply in cross cultural communication.

The cross cultural communication started due to the advancements in economic growth and technological developments which led to breaking down of cultural barriers as businesses looked for ways to expand and seek foreign markets. This was so as companies had to cope with the new set of dynamic issues as they considered the global market. As a result, language training was initiated so as to overcome the cultural barriers and this has led to a demand for these languages and in turn educational institutions have been forced to incorporate intercultural understanding and knowledge into their curriculums. With the advancement in cross cultural communication, the social relations have changed significantly as it has allowed people to move across borders and also led to intermarrying.

For successful communication to be effected or said to have taken place between the parties involved, both within a given culture or between cultures it necessitates that the intended message or information issued by the sender is precisely received and deduced by the receiver. The information sent from speaker to listener always entails huge array of features, such as expressions, sentence structure, idioms, tone of voice, emphasis, speed, emotion, and body language, and the interpretation requires the listener to attend to all of these features, while at the same time constructing an understanding of the speaker's intentions, emotions, politeness, seriousness, character, beliefs, priorities, motivations, and style of communicating. Additionally, the listener ought to also appraise whether the remark is a question or a declaration and how and to what extent a statement matters to the speaker