CultureShock文化冲击

Culture Shock As we all know, it is defined as culture shock that someone who comes to a

completely new cultural environment will experience a psychological anxiety and

confusion. Culture shock is a long-term topic under the trend of globalization.

Culture shock is a common phenomenon that reflects the lack of direction, the

feeling of not knowing what to do or how to behave in a new environment, and not

knowing what is appropriate or inappropriate. The feeling of culture shock generally

appears after the first few weeks of coming to a new place.

For example, Lucy was transferred to work abroad, when her family moved to

Mexico from California after a period of time, she tried to understand people

speaking a different language, to go to the store, to make new friends, to overcome

the confusion and helplessness. So she began to suffer culture shock.

What situations Lucy met is a miniature of all people who suffer culture shock.

They are like fish out of water, away from familiar motherland and close relatives,

lonely struggling in a strange country that differs from the original country in values,

ideology, communications, eating habits, styles and so on.

Meanwhile, new things threaten the basic belief in the subconscious mind that

the original cultural customs, assumptions, evaluation and behavior is always "right".

What you are familiar with are taken the place of something new. You would feel as if

your heart was suddenly stolen leaving a gray blank and losing in a helpless, lone and

cold circumstance. Like the shadow of your original culture disappeared all of a

sudden. Maybe you like to do something based on the adult, but you always feel like an ignorant child. In the end, you would become vulnerable, frustrated, upset,

irritable, may also suffer from homesickness and depression.

Culture shock and change in degree depends on the following conditions:

firstly, the length of your stay. The longer time you stay in a strange atmosphere, the

more serious shock you will stand. Secondly, the purpose of your trip. If you travel as

tourists or for business, either temporary living in another country, perhaps you can’t

be interrupted by culture shock, on the contrary, you can enjoy different meaningful

journey. Thirdly, degrees of contact between the local culture and the new culture

have a significant effect on your feeling including happiness, sadness. One example is

that Bush paid China a visit and he may be welcome by many of Chinese, companied

with some American officials, besides he lived only few days, so he needn’t concern

about what culture shock is.

The consequence of culture shock is obvious and predictable. If you can’t handle

the culture shock in a positive way, you probably become victims of cultural

differences, which destroy your most important business relationship, cause friction,

even break you dream. You stay away from the crowd, and you cry, you're angry; by

day you are drowsy, but can’t sleep at night. At the same time, it’s effective to your

career and makes you lack of sense of accomplishment. Individual cases, culture

shock can lead to serious depression and personal problems.

There are some reasons for shock that we can seek methods available to

overcome shock and thereby enhance our strength and reduce weakness. Firstly,

someone is addicted to original culture and seldom broadens their horizons, as a result, he isn’t sensitive to what different matters he will meet. Secondly, with heavy

burdensome works on the shoulder, one who has one's hands full can hardly fit in

with a quite fire-new culture because of lack of energy or time. Thirdly, as an

essential reason, the basic differences of the culture lead one difficult to entirely

comprehend and grasp the core of a culture in terms of its language, values, brief and

so forth. Furthermore, taking China culture and America culture for example, it’s

acknowledged that America which consists of external culture has only several

hundred years while China is a profound ancient country with a brilliant history,

gestating countless wonders in arts, science. No matter what a Chinese or an

American goes to the other country, he will make necessary adjustments to blend into

a brand-new circle.

There is a typical case for differences in culture leading unnecessary

misunderstanding. Professor Wang had written a book on Chinese but knew a little

English. Last year he got to know an American professor Johnson who was to learn

Chinese culture in a seminar. One day before professor Johnson went back to

America, he decided to give him his book as a gift. Prof.Wang said to Prof.Johnson

that this was a clumsy book written by your humble servant. Prof.Johnson was

confused that who his humble servant was and he thought Prof.Wang was kidding.

In the example above, the problem is the use of clumsy book and humble servant.