This week entry will be on culture differences of international communication.
What is culture? To me, culture is a form of classification for certain groups of people based on their common beliefs, thoughts, influences and behaviors in different races, regions, town, cities and countries.
Look at the picture below. What is the message being conveying here?
A Hand Sign
Yes! The message conveys here is, usually thought by us, Singaporeans, as an O-K sign. It means it’s alright and approval. However, let’s take a look at the illustration below.
Illustration of the hand sign
extracted from http://www.1000ventures.com/
According to this illustration, this sign can be meant as money in Japan, zero in Russia and even an insult in Brazil! This shows that different cultures/ countries have different views on the same object. One man’s meat can be another man’s poison. Imagine showing an O.K sign to a Brazilian businessman after a meeting, guess what will happen? The image of the other party will be tainted and the deal may fall off. Hence, it is vital for people to know these differences when communicating with other people of different nationalities and races.
We can also observe around us that there are forms of Americanization in countries globally. There are several forms of Americanization found in several countries, examples are American brands, like Microsoft, Coca-Cola and Fast Food Restaurants like McDonald’s, KFC, so on and on.
Let’s focus on the American Fast Food Restaurants that have influenced many countries.
Take a look at the pictures below.
McDonald's Global Locations
KFC Global Locations
The above four pictures are extracted from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KFC, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald%27s
These two lists show how many countries have McDonald’s and KFC (Fast Food Restaurants originated from America). They also show how successful and influential these two fast food corporations are, globally. Fast food culture is a part of America culture, which has slowly turning into a global culture with more and more countries being influenced by it.
However, there are steps taken by these restaurants to allow people globally to be more willing to accept their products. They have tried to use the cultural aspects that the country has on food, and incorporate them into their products.
For examples, the different menus of McDonald’s in other countries.
Ebi Filet-O in Japan
Green Tea Mcflurry in Japan
McDonald’s in Japan has Ebi-Filet-O, a shrimp burger with special sauce and lettuce to suit the Japaneses’ likings for seafood. They also have Green Tea McFlurry for Japaneses’ great liking of green tea.
And in India:
Mcdonald's in India
- Maharaja Mac in India
In India, there are McAloo Tikki, vegetarian burger for Hindus and also, spicy food like McCurry Pan to suit the locals’ likings for spicy food in McDonald’s. There is also no Big Mac there as Hindus can not eat beef, so instead, McDonald’s have the Maharaja Mac, a burger look like Big Mac that is made up of chicken meat.
To conclude, there are different McDonald’s/Fast food menus for various countries. The form of Americanization differs in countries as fast food restaurants take in various cultural aspects of food in countries. They amend their America fast food culture to fit in to other countries’ food culture and thus, creating new fast food cultures and menus in countries globally.
Yes, I totally agree with you.
It is interesting to know how something can differ in each culture. I’m sure there are many other things/issues other than the ‘OK’ sign language, that shows the cultural differences. Probably, such as the way people greet one another. At the same time, it’s being americanized too. In the past (let’s say a century ago), the known-to-be more conservative asians usually greet one another with a simple hand gesture. Whereas, the Americans would usually give their friends a hug, or even a peck on the face, once they meet. Yet, if one realises, huggings which used to be quite “alien” in the asian culture is more commonly seen nowadays. “Public Display Affection” has somewhat also become a kind of trend in today’s not-so–anymore-conservative asian culture, and this is also another sign of americanisation.
Hi.
You are right about how culture differ in many countries. Even though there are still many cultural differences between countries, I guess that Americanization had helped us attain a common platform. As you mentioned, fast food like MacDonald’s and KFC had already spread worldwide. However, it just made learning about other cultures more fun. We are both similar and different at the same time.
Even global icons like McDonald’s have to be sensitive to culture. Not only do they have special offerings locally, they have to adapt their standard offerings to the region; they serve Big Macs without cheese in Israel to adhere to Jewish Kosher laws, and India is the only country in the world where they don’t offer any beef items on the menu.
http://talkitportfolio.blogspot.com
A global icon like McDonald’s has to adapt their menu locally; the Big Mac in Israel doesn’t have cheese to adhere to Jewish Kosher food laws. Even then, individuals don’t seem to understand that and expect the whole world to be the same as them, or adapt to suit them. This is especially if they visit somewhere they view as ‘not as good’ as wherever they come from.
I totally agree with you that we have to know the culture differences so we do not do things that is not their culture. one very simple example will be how the Malays eat. They use only their right hand to eat. So if you eat with them using their left hand, they will think that you are not respecting them because to them, left hand is used for cleaning purposes.
OH, INTERESTING ENTRY! (: I would be careful to use that “okay” sign in other countries from now, thanks Sabinah haha.
And regarding food culture as discussed in your article here. I think it’s quite enlightening on how you analysed how food companies integrated their menus to cater to the needs of countries with different religions and preferences.
And it’s interesting how culture influx eg. Americanization through McDonald-isation is same same, yet different different. It has different menus across the world, yet we all still recognise it as Americanization dont we. (: Good job Sabinah!
Yeah do be careful about handsigns when in other countries. There are many cultural taboos unknown to outsiders which can really be landmines for the outsiders. With regards to Mcdonald’s, i do feel that it is extremely important for the local menu to be adapted to suit the local flavour. It is an essential strategy to gain customers. Mcdonald’s really an icon of Americanization huh. Your entry has really shown how culture is multi-faceted.:)