Learning a foreign language is just one aspect of learning to communicate with other nationalities. English is well established as the language of international business, but, when we travel and meet people from different backgrounds we find that linguistic obstacles are not the only barriers to understanding. Our first experiences of a new culture can be deceptive. We think we know how the new culture varies from our own because we have observed the outward signs: the way people dress, the food they eat, the language, perhaps differences in the way they work or worship. Yet these surface differences are not the ones that cause real difficulty. It is the hidden attitudes that can cause us frustration or anger and that can lead us to misinterpret people's behaviour. Some of the basic cultural oppositions are outlined below.
Attitudes to time
I used to think that the unpunctuality of my French colleagues was very insulting, but being British, I now accept that I come from a 'monochronic' culture, which is very time-oriented. In the south of France attitudes are very 'polychronic', which means that attitudes to time are very flexible, and so being late by fifteen minutes or so is perfectly normal.
In a monochronic culture, people will be punctual, respect deadlines and resent any interruptions. They will set schedules and stick to them and they will be upset by lateness in others. In polychronic cultures, people are routinely late for meetings, they have flexible attitudes to working time, they don't mind if meetings are interrupted by phone calls or other people. They may not take deadlines very seriously and often will not be good at time management and forward planning, frequently leaving everything until the last minute.
Collective or individual?
Some cultures, especially those whose laws and customs are based on a religious creed, such as Muslim countries or Catholic countries, or a single political movement such as Communism, are essentially collectivist while others are highly individualistic. In collectivist cultures people expect to conform to the rules of the group; they will probably observe strict dress codes and they will see idiosyncratic behaviour as disruptive and anti-social. When decisions have to be made, then a committee or anonymous authority may have the final say rather than one person. The individualistic culture is much more tolerant of eccentricity of all kinds and people are encouraged to take personal initiative and it is easier generally for outsiders to be accepted. Conformity to the group may be a very obvious requirement in such countries as Saudi Arabia or mainland China, where dress codes and behaviour patterns are in clear evidence, but in fact many southern European countries, which do not have obvious rules, also have a strong group identity and it can be more difficult to be accepted as an outsider than in North America or Northern Europe.
