Verbal Communication

Hi! I'm Belle and I will be talking about verbal communication. Of course, it will be quite long and boring for me to explain it all to you. So, I'm going to show you this short and simple video presentation that I made. Hope that you'll be able to understand it :)

So let's get to it!

gif credit to tumblr

Hope that my notes would be able to help you. I do, however, want to highlight about high context and low context communication.

To put it simply, the people that practice low context communication are those who are straight to the point. For example, if you're in a meeting, the meeting will begin right away without any interruptions or useless small chats. Some of the countries that practice low context communication is USA and Israel.

Meanwhile, for those that practice high context communication, they tend to beat around the bush and use a lot of gestures. For example, in a meeting, they will start eating and make small talk before officially starting the meeting. Malaysia and Japan are two among many countries that practice high context communication. Generally, as Malaysians,  take our time when talking and we are not usually straightforward. There is a term called "berkias" which is what we do instead of flat out saying what we want to say.

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Our I-Friend

Previously on [insert Culture here].....

Okay, so on our very first post we made, we mentioned a little something on this new segment we like to call "My I-Friend". Well now, its called "Our I-Friend" due to the reason that you're probably thinking about now; there's two of us. 

So ladies and gentlemen, bloggers, surfers and potatoes... Introducing our friend...... RAY!!!

credits to giphy.com

Ray:

credit to giphy.com

*Okay so this isn't really a picture of him, but we respect his choice of anonymity. 

So here's the thing, Ray isn't actually as awkward as the gif above might led you to believe. He's actually really friendly and cool. In fact, this wasn't our first time meeting him. We met him once upon a time ago. But this is our first time getting to know him even better. And here's what he shared with us about himself:

First, Ray is also an IIUM student, just like us. 

Second, he was born and raised in Saudi Arabia. (huh, I never knew that about him.)

Third, he likes to eat rice and curry most of time. Turns out we do have something in common between our cultures; Malay's love to eat rice too! Heck, we eat rice like 3 times a day. Maybe that's why he doesn't have much difficulties studying in Malaysia.

To get it even more interesting, remember our recent post? The one on Stereotypes? Well, we wanted to know him better and so we asked him on his opinions of "stereotypes". And being the awesome guy he is, this is what he kindly shared:

The stereotype people have on him is that people assume he's very rich. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that he was born in Saudi Arabia? 

Friendly advice: don't just assume a person's financial background before you even get to know the person. 

credit to GIFSec.com

Now, the stereotype that he had on people (the Malaysians or Malays) was that before he came to Malaysia, he expected people to be "A+ smart, short and shy". Well speaking on behalf of majority of Malaysians; we are short. There's no denying that and to those who do deny that; YOU'RE LYING TO YOURSELVES. 

Not so sure about the shy part, but on one of our recent Intercultural class we (me and Belle) had with our awesome lecturer Dr. Smart and Beautiful (name is classified),

credit to tumblr.com

...we came to realise that the Malays don't accept or handle compliments very well. We like to deny when people compliment us. For example:

A: Eh, cantik la baju you. (Hey, your shirt is pretty)

B: Takdelah. Gitu-gitu je. (Nahhh. Its just simple/ Its nothing much)

So I guess we are shy in some ways. And lastly, about the "A+ smart" stereotype. In my opinion, EVERYONE is smart in their own way. No one is not smart. Some knows things that others don't. A doctor might not know how to bake a cake, and a baker might not know how to cure a cold. The key word here is MIGHT. When there's a might, there's a possibility. 

credit to 24.media.tumblr.com

So I guess thats it for today. We hope to "X-Ray" Ray even more. *wink

credit to tumblr.com

I shouldn't have done that. I should stop. like right now. okay i'm stopping.      

                                                                                                                           credit to bustle.com                                                

Until we meet next time. This is Ima signing off. Have a nice day!

credit to tumblr.com

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Stereotype vs. Discrimination vs. Prejudice Part 2

Belle's Story

Now, it's my turn!

Okay, you know the Britney Spears' song? I'm not a girl, not yet a woman? Well, that's me; somewhere in between a girl and a woman. I don't know about other countries, but here in Malaysia, women are stereotyped as bad drivers. Now, I wouldn't say that it is completely wrong, (because trust me I had had my fair shares of dealing with bad female drivers) but, it is not completely accurate either. 

Unfortunately, since I am a female, people tend to see me as a bad driver. Usually, I give people (usually guys) a ride, they would underestimate my driving skill by telling me go to slow, to stay on the left lane, to not overtake cars, and basically always ordering me to be "careful". I find it to be irritating and sometimes, I just want to give them a good ol' smack to the head. 

But after they've experienced my driving skills, they take back what they said. Some of my guy friends actually said that I am a good driver and they trust me with their life. They said that most girls are usually scared and they often tend to panic, but not me. Some of my female friends said that I drive like a man. You might ask why. Well, because I drive fast and I don't hesitate. I also tend to yell at people when they suck at driving even if they can't hear me. I also honk a lot mostly to cars that want to change lanes without signals. I am not proud of that, but in my defense, if I don't honk, we would end up with getting into an accident so I'm basically saving my life and the other driver's. I personally do not like stereotypes, but I get it and I know that even without realising it, we always stereotype people.

So, that is all for my stereotype story. What kind of stereotype have you dealt with personally?

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Stereotype vs. Discrimination vs. Prejudice

These three words can be misread and misunderstood easily without proper knowledge. People often confuse stereotypes with discrimination, or prejudice with stereotype, or discrimination with prejudice. Yeah, I do admit that it can be quite confusing, so here's a brief summary for you to understand the three concepts properly.


Stereotype = our thoughts

Prejudice = our feelings

Discrimination = our treatments/actions

Now here's how I view these three. I see it as a chain. If I let my thoughts conquer me, my feelings will be affected; and if I let my feelings conquer me, my actions will be the result of it. So what I'm trying to say is, stereotyping and even having prejudice is okay, as long as you KEEP IT TO YOURSELF.

However, do not let it overcome your mind and your emotions, because if you lose control, it will lead to discrimination; and that's BAD. Everyone has his or her own stereotypes, but not everyone will discriminate because of it. Stereotyping doesn't make you an evil human being; it just makes you human. RESPECT is very important and we must always give people the benefit of the doubt because sometimes, they'll turn out to be completely different, but since you already have a specific mindset, you would not be able to see it.

We will divide this part into two. The first part is a story shared by Ima on her experience stereotyping of others and my "twin" (Belle) will share her own story on being stereotyped.




Ima's story
Yes, like any other walks on this earth, I have had several stereotype moments on people, past and present. But I still respect them. So let me share one story that you might be able to relate to. Over the past years, I have had this stereotype on people who speak good English. My stereotype was that people who are good at conversing in English are terrible in their hometown dialect. For example; MYSELF. I was born in Kelantan and I can say I'm good in English. But, I cannot speak in my Kelantanese dialect.

*For those who don't know, Kelantan is a state in Malaysia and is located in the northeast of the Peninsular Malaysia. The Kelantanese dialect is one of the well known dialects in Malaysia because of how different it is to the standard Malay language in terms of speaking.

photo credit to google images
To me, you can either be good in English and bad at your own dialect, OR speak good dialect but bad in English. You can't have both; that WAS my theory. Until one day, I entered IIUM (International Islamic University Malaysia), and met this one girl who was unique. She spoke in English the day we met. She 's my classmate and my friend. I later found out she was from Kelantan. I was shocked of course, because well...she kinda broke my theory. BUT that did not stop me from being friends with her. THE END. It's a simple story but what I’ve learned from it has shaped my way of thinking.
I had my stereotype, I had some prejudice, but I certainly DO NOT DISCRIMINATE.

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