Cultural Diversity Reflective Journal Entry: System 003, Semester 2

This reflective journal entry delves into the student's personal understanding and experiences related to cultural diversity. The author begins by defining culture and reflecting on their personal encounters with cultural differences, particularly during a trip to the USA and the challenges of adapting to a new communication style. The journal then explores the importance of intercultural learning and competence, emphasizing the need to understand cultural differences. The student utilizes Hofstede's cultural dimensions model to analyze cultural differences, highlighting dimensions like power distance, individualism/collectivism, masculinity/femininity, uncertainty avoidance, time orientation, and indulgence. They connect these dimensions to their own experiences and observations, particularly within the context of Australian and Asian cultures. The journal concludes by emphasizing the importance of cultural awareness and competence in both social and professional contexts, reflecting on the student's growth and willingness to learn about other cultures.

RUNNING HEAD: CULTURAL DIVERSITY
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Cultural Diversity
Essay
System 003
[Pick the date]

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Reflective Journal
The aim of writing this journal is store my view, reflections and notes of this subject or
related topic and to analyze the experiences that I faced in my personal and professional life so
that all this can be relate to this subject and topic in practical situation. The information provided
in this journal is connected with the topic; however I decided to classify all the information using
headings.
Culture
I would like to center this reflection on my personal view about culture. Culture is the
sameness in the behavior of group or it encompasses of same characteristics that are language,
belief and religion. Different countries have different culture that is their own way of living,
attitude, values, norms and social group. I found this definition connected (Spencer-Oatey,
2008), defined culture as the set of assumptions to life, values, policies and belief that a group
shared and these characteristics of a group influence behavior of each individual. I remembered
the situation when I went to the USA for a tour it was very difficult for me to adapt the culture as
communication style of US people is different and Australian prefer to say direct and blunt to an
individual as I am used to speak abbreviated words in everything but in the US this is not at all
acceptable as they have their own culture and norms.
Considering that situation I realized that understanding and learning intercultural
competence is essential that helps in knowing their culture and human behavior. I would like to
explain about intercultural learning and competence that is how important is to learn the skills,
knowledge and cultural differences of a group or country. Intercultural learning is gaining the
knowledge about others cultures and values or to intentionally explore the cultural differences

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across the countries in order to increase the knowledge (Bennett, 2010). I experienced that if I
was aware about the cultural differences that Australia and the USA have then I would have
enjoyed more as there was the time I felt like I should know about their culture and values that
would help me in respecting their culture.
Hofstede Model
I would to elaborate the dimension of culture through Hofstede’s Framework. I found that
cultures of countries are more interconnected because of globalization. This model highlights the
six dimensions of the culture that are discussed below:
Figure 1: Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions
Source: (Minkov & Hofstede, 2011)

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I understand with this model that power distance is the dimension that promotes
inequality as each country have own belief about the power distribution in business hierarchy.
Top level executives has more power as compare to lower level that make the difference in their
culture. Further the individualism and collectivism dimension is related to interest of group or
individual as people behave according to their culture that reflects in their behavior. This is
reflected in people’s image in term whether they used “We” or “I”. Other dimension is
Masculinity and Femininity that is all about the values that is considered as important in the
society that helps in differentiating and understanding the culture. The masculine relates to the
characteristics such as heroism, materialistic rewards and assertiveness. On other hand,
femininity stands for the cooperation, caring and modesty in society. Uncertainty avoidance is a
dimension that focuses on the behavior of society about uncertain events. High index showed
fixed codes and belie for uncertainty whereas low index indicate relaxation mode of members.
Time orientation is a dimension that includes maintaining traditional culture with current societal
change. This includes whether the focus is on continuing the old or traditional norms or
accepting the modern methods or approaches. The indulgence is added on dimension in the
model that defined the people control over their desires. It indicates the level of fun and
enjoyment in the culture or differentiates it as fun loving environment or strict environment.
Cultural awareness and competence
On the basis of above understanding, I get to know that cultural awareness is an
important aspect in order to interact with people of other culture. When I came to university I
interacted with lots of people who are from different culture and I interacted with a girl who was
from Asia, I was frank on first conversation and she was uncomfortable at that time. Now I
realized that cultural awareness is important aspect if I would aware about her culture that might

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be respectful and can lead to effective communication or better communication between two
people. After that I am a culturally aware person who take care of cultural differences of
individuals and respect that differences in a positive manner and curious about learning the
culture of countries. The Australian culture in accordance with above dimension of uncertainty
avoidance is considered as relaxed as people over here don’t think more about future aspects and
enjoy their life to the fullest. Whereas Asian culture is bit different and people over their focus
on long term planning and are future oriented. Now I adjusted easily to the multi-cultural
environment and that is really helpful in this global scenario as I interacted on daily basis with
the people across the world of different culture that make me understand the values, belief and
norms individual follow.
After this assessment I get to know where I was lacking and the importance of culture in
social life and professional life. I found that I am a person who respects individual culture and
always ready for cultural learning that will help me in changing my behavior or attitude towards
people of other culture.

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References
Bennett, M. (2010). A short conceptual history of interultural learning in study abroad: . Interdisciplinary
Journal of study abroad, 419-499.
Minkov, M., & Hofstede, G. (2011). The evolution of Hofstede culture dimensions. Cross Cultural
Management, 10-20.
Spencer-Oatey, H. (2008). Culturally speaking: communication and politness theory. London: Continuum.