Cultural Review of A Thousand Years of Good Prayers

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers
10/03/13
Intercultural Communications Midterm Exam
Introduction
The film A Thousand Years of Good Prayers is a great example of how real life intercultural interactions exist. The main characters do a great job in playing their role. In this essay exam I am going to give a brief synopsis of the film and then describe 15 key terms from our reading and how they apply to the film.

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers
A Thousand Years of Good Prayers is a story about a Chinese father (Mr. Shi) who travels to America to see his daughter (Yilan). His daughter had immigrated to the United States 15 years before and they had not seen each other since. Mr. Shi is a reserved man who is the icon of Chinese culture. Yilan has recently gone through a divorce and Mr. Shi feels that he can help her workout some of her problems. While visiting, Mr. Shi is staying with Yilan in her apartment. It is immediately apparent that there may have been a tense past between the two. As the days go by Mr. Shi becomes more adventurous while Yilan is at work. He has multiple interactions with others outside of the apartment. Yilan appears to be bothered by her father’s visit and starts to avoid him by going out with friends at night after work. Eventually the tension comes a head one night when Mr. Shi witnesses his daughter being dropped off by a man. The man happens to be married and it appears the two are having an affair. Mr. Shi is upset with this and attempts to give advice to Yilan, which ends up in an argument. Yilan is forced to strike back and brings up Mr. Shi’s not so grateful past. This distances both of them. Mr. Shi eventually ends up leaving his daughter to tour the rest of the United States and the two go on their separate ways.

Culture – The totality of a group’s thought, experiences, and patterns of behavior and its concepts, values, and assumptions about life that guide behavior and how those evolve with contact with other cultures. The culture’s identified in the movie A Thousand Years of Good Prayers are Chinese, Chinese-American, American, Russian, and Iranian. This film does a great job of intercultural interaction. The main characters Mr. Shi is native of China and is visiting his daughter Yilan who as been in America for the last 15 years. Mr. Shi has interaction with multiple American’s throughout the film. Mr. Shi also develops a friendship with an Iranian woman, who like Mr. Shi, also has difficulty speaking English.

Cultural Identity – The identification with and perceived acceptance into a group that has a shared system of symbols and meanings as well as norms for conduct.
In the film there are many examples of culture that Mr. Shi demonstrates during his visit to America. His examination of Yilan’s apartment reveals a lack of cultural identity that Mr. Shi is use too. Being a former communist, Mr. Shi imposes his own décor on Yilan’s apartment by hanging a red Chinese symbol on the door. He also ties up the blinds with a red scarf. Mr. Shi cooks multiple meals for Yilan after her workday but has to go out and buy a wok. He states, “I don’t know how to cook without it” referring to the wok.

Co-culture – An interdependent and equal subculture within a society.
Mr Shi was proud of the fact that he was a communist and attempts to explain the goodness in it to the Iranian madam. Being Chinese and being communist co-exist. When Mr. Shi is trying to explain communism to the Iranian madam, she appears to be appalled by it. Mr. Shi explains that Chinese communism is good but it is in the wrong hands referring to the emperor.

High Context Communication – Communication in which less has to be said or written because more of the meaning is in the physical environment or already shared by people.
Throughout the movie there are many examples of high context communication. In the opening scenes, Yilan is picking up her father Mr. Shi from the airport. The initial greeting from not seeing each other for the past 15 years is subtle. Chinese have a predominately high context communication culture. Few words need to be exchanged between the father and daughter because they know what each other’s feelings are.

Low Context Communication – Communication in which little of the meaning is determined by the context because the message is encoded in explicit code.
In the opening scenes of the movie, two American women greet Mr. Shi at the luggage claim. One of the ladies explains to her friend that Mr. Shi was a rocket scientist and begins making small talk with him. Mr. Shi appears puzzled and does not know how to take the ladies. Americans have a knack for small talk and low context communication. Yilan confirms this and warns him not to make false assumptions.
Another scene occurs as Yilan is at work one day. Mr. Shi ventures out to the pool and is attempting to better his English language by interacting with others. Mr. Shi carries a note pad with English words in order to better his language. A young woman is sitting poolside in a bikini and becomes interested in Mr. Shi as he is writing in his note pad “no diving.” The lady begins to talk to Mr. Shi uninvited and explains that she went to school to be a forensic scientist. Mr. Shi identifies with the word scientist and states that he was a rocket scientist. This immediately intrigues the young lady and she begins asking him all kinds of questions about it, which Mr. Shi cannot understand. The woman was not genuinely interested but found something common to make small talk.

High uncertainty avoidance – The extent to which people in a culture feel threatened by uncertain or unknown situations.
At multiple points in the film, the uncertainty avoidance is evident by Mr. Shi’s questioning to Yilan. Most of the interaction between the two is Mr. Shi asking questions to Yilan. He is trying to solve her problems through questioning what went wrong with her previous marriage. Mr. Shi is deeply concerned by Yilan’s unhappy behavior and seems to induce anxiety onto himself.
One night Yilan returns from a late night and Mr. Shi was waiting up for her. He witnesses her being dropped off by a man. When Yilan enters her apartment Mr. Shi immediately begins to question what she was doing. The climatic point in the movie is the argument that ensues between the two and both sides let out their thoughts and emotions. Mr. Shi discovers that Yilan is having an affair with a married man through his questioning of her. This upsets Mr. Shi and in his attempt to solve the problem through advice, Yilan brings up the hurtful past of Mr. Shi. This ultimately leads to Mr. Shi touring America and leaving Yilan

High Power Distance – The way the culture deals with inequalities. Also defined as the extent to which less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally.
Yilan displays multiple signs of the high power distance that exist between her and her father. When picking Mr. Shi up from the airport, Yilan carries both of Mr. Shi’s luggage bags as a sign of respect. Once they arrived at the apartment, Yilan made her father dinner and treated him as a guest.

Cultural Relativism – Refers to the view that an individuals beliefs and behaviors should only be understood in terms of that person’s own culture.
Yilan throughout the movie talks to her father in the Chinese context. She has not been to China for 12 years and it is hard for her to fully speak the language. On the opposite end her father knows only very little English. Yilan attempts to use cultural relativism in not only her spoken language to her father but also with her non-verbal language. Yilan can not fully express herself through the Chinese language and in the argument scene she ends up expressing herself in English even though her father may not understand.

Kinesics – behaviors such as gestures, body movements, facial expressions, and eye contact.
Mr. Shi and Yilan use kinesics accustomed to their culture throughout the film. The common greeting for Chinese people is to bring the hands together and bow in front. Mr. Shi uses this body movement as a respectful gesture of hello. The Chinese culture uses minimal eye contact during conversation. This is a form of respect. Most of the conversations between Yilan and Mr. Shi have no eye contact and from my perspective it appears to be disrespectful however this is a cultural norm. During Mr. Shi’s interaction with the young lady at the poolside, he is talking to her with his back facing her. This is partially because she is in a bikini and also because his no eye contact culture. The woman attempts to step in front of Mr. Shi to gain eye contact during the conversation. She does not know Mr. Shi’s cultural behaviors and it is disrespectful to him. This scene was a great example of kinesics as the actors did a wonderful job of body gesture and portraying the different eye contact between the two cultures.

Proxemics – The study of our personal space.
The poolside scene was also a display of cultural proxemics. When the women initiated conversation she was about 6 feet away from Mr. Shi. After the small talk and when she found out he was a rocket scientist she got up out of her chair and entered what Mr. Shi would consider his personal space. She was about two feet from him and it was obvious that Mr. Shi was uncomfortable as he attempted to back up and turn away. The women didn’t understand the differing proxemics between the two cultures and continued to “pressure” Mr. Shi until he eventually cut the conversation short and left.

Chronemics – The study of our use of time.
Yilan had emigrated from China and became a busy businesswoman in the United States. Throughout the film, Yilan was always on the go and had grown accustomed to the U.S. workaholic lifestyle. Mr. Shi was foreign to this and attempted multiple times to slow down Yilan. When she would go out at night he continued to remind her that it was late and she needed sleep. During most of the dinner scenes were Mr. Shi would have a prepared meal ready, he put extra food on her plate because he knew that she needed the extra nutrition for her busy life. Yilan attempted to downplay it, as this was normal now for her and she just wanted her father to relax during his visit to the U.S.

Haptics – The study of our use of touch to communicate
Throughout the film, Mr. Shi and Yilan had very limited use of using touch to communicate. This stems back to the respectfulness of the Chinese culture and their respect for proxemics. During the scene with Mr. Shi and the Iranian madam on the park bench, the madam used touch multiple times to communicate. This was in part because of both parties had limited use of English and also the difference in cultures. Mr. Shi tolerated the touching as he was enjoying the attempt to communicate English between the two individuals.

Individualism – A dimension of culture: refers to the rights and independent action of the individual.
During a scene in the film, Mr. Shi is out in the park and sitting on the bench. He is awaiting the madam to show up so he can have a broken conversation with her. Instead of the madam showing up, the madam’s friend arrives and brings bad news to Mr. Shi. She informs him that the madam will not be coming back. Her son, who was a wealthy doctor, did not need or want her to be looking after her children anymore. He had her placed into a nursing home. This is iconic of an individualism culture. The son put his mother into a nursing home because he no longer had a need for her.

Collectivism – A dimension of culture; refers to interdependence, groupness, and social cohesion.
After Mr. Shi receives the news that his conversation friend was placed into a nursing home, he appeared to be very devastated. This was uncomfortable to him as he was also old. It was also foreign to him because of the Confucian dominated countries in Asia that believe in collectivism and have strong family ties. Sending away an elder was very unusually to him and in China, elders were held with the highest respect and the younger family would take care of them.

Territoriality – How space can be used to communicate messages. Once arrived at Yilan’s apartment, Mr. Shi settles in on the first day that Yilan is gone to work. Mr. Shi insisted on doing the cooking. Above the stove was a bare spot on the wall. Mr. Shi would put a newspaper page there each day while he cooked to make effective use of the space. This example of territoriality was odd at first but made sense after putting the definition to the Chinese culture and their effective use of space to communicate messages. Mr. Shi also opened the blinds on the windows everyday to brighten up the room and bring a sense of happiness to the apartment.

Conclusion
Overall this film was a great example of intercultural communication. The terms above are defined and described by their application in the film. I am glad I picked this film because it gave me real life examples too many of the terms we have discussed in class.
References
Jandt, F. E. (2013). An Introduction to Intercultural Communication, Identities in a Global Community. California: Sage Publication, Inc.

References: Jandt, F. E. (2013). An Introduction to Intercultural Communication, Identities in a Global Community. California: Sage Publication, Inc.