The Essay on Cultural Self-awareness's Significance for Developing Cultural Intelligence.

The Importance of Cultural Self Awareness

Discuss about the Cultural Intelligence and Capability.

Culture has been regarded as the system of shared idea; standards, mores that the members of community hold (Earley & Mosakowski, 2004).  But it has been clearly stated that the cultural intelligence requires being aware of one’s own culture as well as the cultural differences in the manner that others behave and think.

Also, the individuals should be self aware about their culture as after that only they could tell other people or help them. Therefore, a reflective essay have been mentioned below which states that what were the two concepts and how the cultural self-awareness helps individuals to be more culturally intelligent.

Thesis Statement for this essay could be, “whether a cultural self- awareness was significant to develop cultural intelligence or not?”.

Cultural self awareness on one hand has been described as a significant factor which helps in assisting special facets of cultural studies and to carry out various kind of trade acts (Roysircar, 2004).  It has its significance due to some issues that were measured significant as it assists people to discover, appreciate, recognize and assess their educational and communal background of race, sex, etc.

Cultural intelligence (CQ) has been described as an ability to narrate and work efficiently in ethnically varied circumstances. Going ahead of obtainable notions of educational sympathy and consciousness, it was significant to recognize the chronic abilities of people who could productively and deferentially achieve their aims (Cultural Intelligence Center, 2016). Awareness has been regarded as the first step, but was not enough (Forbes, 2015).

An ethnically intelligent person was not only conscious but could also efficiently work, narrate with individuals and projects across dissimilar cultural circumstances.

Although it has been seen that the worldwide corporations which fit into place in cross-cultural trade relationships, lead multicultural players, build up intercultural abilities, endeavor to increase educational consciousness and look for edifying aptitude (Griffer & Perlis, 2007).  

The quote mentioned above was given by an eminent scientist on how self-awareness affects human performance which was a good fundamental disagreement for the assumption of the writer that cultural self-awareness has been a basis for cultural competence, and thus should always come first.

Being more culturally self-aware was not a simple task, as significant base fundamental cultural aspects were insensible to people. Nevertheless, becoming responsive states that certain fundamental cultural suppositions drive the view of a person. It became more conscientious to their opinions which may assist to realize the effect that culture has a effect on the behavior of an individual (Livermore, 2009).

Cultural Intelligence

Also, it has been defined and stated by different researchers like Spencer- Oatey 2012 that ‘Culture has been a downy set of elementary suppositions and standards, orientations to life, attitudes, and behavioural meetings that were used by a group of individuals, and that sway the behavior of each member and his/her understanding of the ‘meaning’ of other individual’s behavior (Spencer-Oatey, 2012) (Earley & Ang, 2003).  

Taipale 2012 on the other hand strains the importance of people extending their awareness of a number of cultural groups in a world where individuals travel from place to place for work.

Quappe and Cantatore (2005) defines Cultural Awareness as the basis of communication and it includes the skill of footing back from one’s ownself and fetching conscious of our educational values, ideas (Quappe & Cantatore, 2016).

Adler also concludes that “the more culturally self-aware people would be, the more able they would be to forecast the impact of their behavior would have on others” (Adler  & Gundersen, 2008).

While people generally agree with the view of David, so, it would emphasize the significance of this self-awareness, as it was contemplated that it was more than an crucial section of cultural intelligence a primary step in mounting a person’s own educational capability.

Also, by taking inference from my personal experience I have found out that for instance

I've developed up in an island in Greece where most of the Syrian refugees pass from my island to go somewhere else in Europe.

Another, example was that in spite winter weather, many of the refugees from Syria were making the dangerous trip from Turkey in flimsy boats every day. From this it could be concluded that there was an anticipation of what could be the situation then also a risky trio was made which states that there was no self awareness about the place and as a result the people would be concluded to be not culturally intelligent. So, they should have anticipated the culture and weather before planning the trip (Maclachlan, 2011).

• Experience: I have my father, mother, my siblings and me in my family where my parents know what we want and desire for. Me and my family spent our precious time by g=having food together in restaurants, clubbing, travelling and trying new activities.
• Knowledge: My family lives in Greece and I live in Australia. And as we live separately in different regions, so from my personal experience I could say that family is the obly precious jewel which every have. They were the people who would be there with you no matter whatever would be the situation and would never judge you as other people do. So we should be with them and I thank god that I have a family because those who don’t have lack everything in life. So as per my opinion people should value them.
• Behavior: Being a middle sibling from my three siblings, I have realized that if one of them is bossy and other one is irritating. I have inculcated a personality to be patient, responsible and obtain a cultivated personality as I have to handle and listen to both.

• Experience: I like reading, travelling, learning new languages, etc.
• Knowledge: Regarding the outdoor activities, I’ve sharpened my planning and survival skills!
• Behavior: Sports build your character! In some sports I’ve learned how to be a team player and simultaneously in other sports I’ve learned to be more individualistic and competitive.

• Experience: Some of my trips were in north Greece and islands, Australia and Turkey.
• Knowledge: It helped me in trying different foods, travelling places and knowing about them.
• Behavior: I understood and respect the places I travelled, such as local people.

• Experience: I’m a Greek native speaker but I also know other languages like English.
• Knowledge: Through the languages I have been taught, I established within my self a habit to know and learn more languages of different cultures.
• Behavior: As a result of knowing different languages I have experienced a positive thing that whenever I go to some other place I don’t have to make attempts to understand their language. Rather I became more confident by way of which I tried and conveyed my ideas to different people.

So, it could be concluded that self awareness of a culture of a person’s own state or country has to be there on which the cultural intelligence could be inculcated. As if a person would be culturally capable and have knowledge of one’s own state than only he could inculcate a zeal of knowing other countries languages and cultures. Therefore, to be a intelligent individual culturally an individual should be self aware about what he has and was there in his country so that he could tell that to other people as they tell about their country.

The Thesis statement could be restated as, yes, a cultural self- awareness was significant to develop cultural intelligence of an individual.

References

Adler, N. J., & Gundersen, A. (2008). International Dimensions of Organizational Behavior: 5th ed. Florence: Thomson South-Western.

Cultural Intelligence Center. (2016). Cultural Intelligence: What It Is and Why You Need It!. Retrieved on 30^th December’ 2016 from: https://culturalq.com/what-is-cq/

Earley, P. C, & Ang, S. (2003). Cultural intelligence: An analysis of individual interactions across cultures. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.

Earley, P.C., & Mosakowski, E. (2004). Cultural Intelligence. Harvard Business Review, 10.

Forbes. (2015). Why You Need Cultural Intelligence (And How To Develop It). Retrieved on 30^th December’ 2016 from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/iese/2015/03/24/why-you-need-cultural-intelligence-and-how-to-develop-it/#1f20d0933670

Griffer, M.R. & Perlis, M.P. (2007). Developing cultural intelligence in pre-service speech-language pathologists and educators. Communication Disorders jhQuarterly, 29(1), 28-35.

Livermore, D. A. (2009). Cultural intelligence: Improving your CQ to engage our multicultural world. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Academic.

Maclachlan, M. (2011). Cultural Intelligence: A Necessity For Working Effectively Across Cultures. Retrieved on 30^th December’ 2016 from: https://www.communicaid.com/cross-cultural-training/blog/cultural-intelligence-a-necessity-for-working-effectively-across-cultures/

Quappe, S., & Cantatore, G. (2016). What is Cultural Awareness, anyway? How do I build it?. Retrieved on 30^th December’ 2016 from: http://www.culturosity.com/pdfs/What%20is%20Cultural%20Awareness.pdf

Roysircar, G (2004). Cultural Self-Awareness Assessment: Practice Examples From Psychology Training. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 35 (6) pp. 666.

Spencer-Oatey, H. (2012). What is culture? A compilation of quotations. GlobalPAD Core Concepts. Retrieved on 30^th December’ 2016 from: http://go.warwick.ac.uk/globalpadintercultural