Assignment: Apples to Apples: Major Elements of Cultural Patterns

People are surrounded by multiple cultures in family units, organizations, communities, and nations. Although complex in nature, cultures share similar characteristics that can be identified and evaluated. You may have heard the saying apples to apples when referring to a process of comparing similar items. The categories of orientation explained in your text give you an “apples to apples” framework that can be used to compare similar characteristics of different cultures.

Photo credit: Microsoft Corporation. (Producer). MP900439292 [Photo of green apple among red apples]. Retrieved October 2, 2013, from http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=apples&ex=1#ai:MP900439292

To prepare for this Assignment:

• Review your Discussion posts from Week 1 about how your beliefs, values, and norms are derived from your culture.
• Review the major elements of cultural patterns in Chapter 4 of your course text:
  • Activity orientation
  • Social relations orientation
  • Self-orientation
  • World orientation
  • Time orientation
• Use the Cultural Patterns Continuum document to analyze your orientations and those of your national culture for each of the five orientation categories.
• Review the optional Walden Writing Center resource on effective PowerPoint presentations.

By Day 7

Submit a 10- to 12-slide PowerPoint presentation in which you:

• Compare your preferences in each dimension to those of your culture.
• For the places where you marked yourself differently from your culture, explain what you believe accounts for these differences.
• Explain why cultural patterns are effective for thinking about people from other cultures and understanding cultural differences.
• Predict how knowledge of cultural patterns can be applied to interaction with people from a culture you select

to 12-slide PowerPoint presentation in which you:

• Compare your preferences in each dimension to those of your culture.
• For the places where you marked yourself differently from your culture, explain what you believe accounts for these differences.
• Explain why cultural patterns are effective for thinking about people from other cultures and understanding cultural differences.
• Predict how knowledge of cultural patterns can be applied to interaction with people from a culture you select.

Learning Resources

Required Readings

Lustig, M. W., & Koester, J. (2013).
Intercultural competence: Interpersonal communication across cultures (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.

• Chapter 4, “Cultural Patterns and Communication: Foundations” (pp. 77–99)
• Chapter 5, “Cultural Patterns and Communication: Taxonomies” (pp. 100–128)

Culture Active Introduction. (n.d.). Introducing The Lewis Model and Culture Active: A web-based learning resource. Retrieved from
http://www.cultureactive.com/help/demo.html

Note: This resource is for information purposes. You do not have to take the suggested quiz at the end.

globalEDGE: Your source for global business knowledge. (2013). Retrieved August 20, 2013, from
http://globaledge.msu.edu/

The Culturosity Group. (2013). Retrieved from
http://www.culturosity.com/

Document: Cultural Patterns Continuum (Word document)

Note: In addition, review your colleagues’ annotated bibliographies in the Doc Sharing area.

Optional Resources

Walden Writing Center. (n.d.). CARP design principles for creating an effective PowerPoint presentation. In The non-designer’s design & type books: Design and typographic principles for the visual novice. Berkeley, CA: Peach Pit Press. Retrieved from
http://writingcenter.waldenu.edu/Documents/Scholar…

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