Cultural Diversity and Adaptation

This assignment discusses the author's personal experience adapting to Australian culture as an international student. They contrast the formal, collective culture of their home country with Australia's informal, individualistic culture. The author reflects on initial challenges, such as communication and social norms, and highlights the positive impact of embracing cultural diversity. They emphasize the importance of open-mindedness and understanding different perspectives in a globalized world.

Running head: CULTURAL DIVERSITY
Cultural Diversity
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author note:

1CULTURAL DIVERSITY
I believe there is always a longing amongst the humans to be able to feel belonged, we all
long to belong to a family, a group of friends or a cultural heritage. Neither do we wish to be left
alone, nor do we wish to associate ourselves with too many people, except what rightfully
belongs to us. Each one of us associate with, and subscribe to a set of ideals, norms, beliefs and
attitudes endorsed by the culture we belong to (Tjosvold, 2017). While a feeling of togetherness
and harmony amongst the members of the same cultural group is indeed desirable, our
inclination to relate to a particular worldview only, and to deny the norms, ideals and belief
system of any other cultural group can cause conflict at workplace.
As an international student, I have come to Australia for completing my higher studies,
and since the time of my arrival, I have discovered a variety of things about Australian culture
that I was not primarily aware of. In my own country, we had a very polite and extremely formal
culture, especially in academic institutions and workplaces. However, in Australia, I was both
surprised as well as amazed to find a way too informal culture, where the students were freely
allowed and rather encouraged to exchange their ideas, opinions and suggestions with the
teachers. Since I was coming from a completely different nation, during the initial phase, I used
to get perplexed and often disturbed, when I used to discover that often my actions and
behaviour, that are intrinsic to my existence and cultural orientation, are interpreted in a wrong
way here. I am coming from a nation that enjoys a highly collective culture, and consequently I
would most often refer to my family members while recalling any incident of the past ( Thomas
& Peterson 2017). However, here in Australia, people are more individualistic in their day to day
affairs, and at times, they prefer to remain with friends only that astonished me. I could not relate
to how things were, and started feeling upset. Since I came in a foreign land, and I found
majority of the people behaving in different ways, I stated feeling alienated, and felt that there

2CULTURAL DIVERSITY
must be something wrong with me. However, gradually I started realizing that the Australians
are inherently different from us, simply because it is a different country its cultural orientation
and cultural norms and ideals are different, consequently making its people different. Soon I
started realizing that I should appreciate the diversity of cultures, and identify what is good in it.
I have learnt to be more forthcoming, open-minded, hard-working, after my stay in Australia,
and leading a life with humour, and having no hierarchical relation with anyone at workplace or
in college, are the added advantages (Luo, 2016). This learning experience had been such a
fulfilling experience for me. Even unknown to me, I always held parochial thoughts, whereby I
had previously failed to appreciate the importance of other cultures or identify their goodness
(DiAngelo & Sensoy, 2014). I believe that living in the era of globalization, there is no point in
upholding the values of one’s own cultural background, remaining ignorant of the existence of
other cultural perspectives. This learning experience has turned out to be an invaluable resource
for me, that have taught me that the careful observation of a foreign culture helps in expanding
the horizon of cultural knowledge , enhancing the individual’s ability to accept and embrace
other cultural perspectives. From next time onwards, I would try to be less resistant towards a
different cultural perspective, and would like to apply acquired cultural knowledge of a different
culture, in learning something, or exploring new things about the culture.

3CULTURAL DIVERSITY
Reference List:
DiAngelo, R., & Sensoy, Ö. (2014). Getting slammed: White depictions of race discussions as
arenas of violence. Race Ethnicity and Education, 17(1), 103-128.
Luo, Y. (2016). Toward a reverse adaptation view in cross-cultural management. Cross Cultural
& Strategic Management, 23(1), 29-41.
Thomas, D. C., & Peterson, M. F. (2017). Cross-cultural management: Essential concepts. Sage
Publications.
Tjosvold, D. (2017). Cross-cultural management: foundations and future. Routledge.