Confronting Intercultural Difficulties. How might you deal with any one or two of the following obstacles to intercultural communication? If you have the opportunity, share your responses with others in the class. Youll gain a wealth of practical insights.

a. Youre in an interracial, interreligious relationship. Your partners family ignores your couplehood. For example, you and your partner are never invited to dinner as a couple or included in any family affairs. You decide to confront your partners family.

b. Your parents persist in holding stereotypes about other religious, racial, and ethnic groups. These stereotypes come up in all sorts of conversations. Youre really embarrassed by these attitudes and feel you must tell your parents how incorrect you think these stereotypes are.

c. George, a colleague at work, recently underwent a religious conversion. He now persists in trying to get everyone elseyou includedto undergo this same religious conversion. You decide to tell him that you find this behavior offensive.

Confronting cultural insensitivity is not an easy task; most people do not see their own insensitivity. So approach these situations carefully; rely on all the communication skills presented throughout this text and in your course.

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Dealing with intercultural difficulties requires a delicate balance of assertiveness empathy and respect for the perspectives of others Here are some approaches to dealing with the situations describe... View the full answer