Robert Kohls, a renowned author of intercultural literature, defines culture as "an integrated system of learned behavior patterns that are characteristic of the members of any given society ... the total way of life of particular groups of people. It includes everything that a group of people thinks, says, does, and makes, its customs, language, material artifacts and shared systems of attitudes and feelings. Culture is learned and transmitted from generation to generation." It is important to recognize your own "cultural baggage" when you go abroad.
In the ninth inning of an Olympic baseball playoff game, the batter on the Japanese team cracked a towering fly ball deep into left field. It dropped just short of the low fence but then bounced over. When the runner pulled up at second base, half the crowd rose to its feet, screaming for him to keep going around the bases.
He stopped because he knew that the ground rules limited him to a double. Think how foolish he would have appeared if he had kept running or argued with the umpire. In the same way, it’s the job of every traveler to learn local ground rules.
"Study abroad is not a process of gathering credit in another country but of being part of another academic and social culture while continuing the work of being a student," writes Margaret (Peggy) Pusch, of the Intercultural Communication Institute and SIETAR USA. "Through the experience abroad, students [learn] to steer their way through a place significantly unlike 'home.'"
AV's resource section will guide you toward books and websites that can help you learn about your host culture and culture shock before you leave home.
