Intercultural relationships

What kinds of problems could arise from cultural differences when dating or marrying someone from different culture?

As we have studied in this English course, each culture is different from the others, and even when they have some similarities, could be difficult when people want to date or get married. Some of the problems that could arise are 

* Communication: Some words or nonverbal communication can be considered as rude, so this thing has to be clear. 

* Religion: In some cases the religion does not allow the couple to get married and one of them have to turn to the other one. 

*Proxemics and Chronemics: They could be extremely different between cultures.

You can find examples of these problems in the movie "My Big Fat Greek Weeding" 

Palenque

In the first place I would like to say how much I like both forms of art. It's very interesting to know these kinds of music and dance that represent the history and tradition of towns. Alegres Ambulancias and the Alvin Ailey Dance company show us ,using dance the Afro influence in the dance; they have similarities like the drums and some body movements because of their common ancestors. However, palenqueros dance was created by Africans living in Colombia, that's why it has elements of cumbia and cantadoras. In the other hand, the Alvin Ailey Company's dance was created for Africans living in North America, this is the principal reason of the differences between them.

Task 4

This is the video that me and my group made, it is a guide of costeño's vocabulary. I hope you like it :)

Hollydays in other countries

English was used in the blogs to talk about each culture. They did it in this language because is the most recognized worldwide so if they want t transmit their culture, English allows them to get to more people than their mother tongues. 

In the post they talk about rituals related to their religion, is very interesting to see how different could they be and how funny they are. I learned that even when the religions are different and people believe in different gods, join with your family and friends to celebrate is a common trait between them. 

PLUS, I did not know about the Holi festival in India, but it was my favorite, I really want to have those beautiful colors.

Personal culture

How have either a sport, hobby, or music shaped your own personal culture?

I think that music have shaped my own personal culture. I really enjoy listening to rock, it´s like energy for me and , even if some people think this is a genre made of violence and bad feelings, is not like that, at least not all the time; as any other genre, there´s lyrics for every kind of person. 

Rock has influenced my personal culture because, even when I respect other genres as "reguetón" and "vallenato", I don´t feel very comfortable listening to them so that made me enjoy being at home and not to go to discos or that kind of places. The way I dress and speak has traits of the groups I listen and the people who share my likes.

Economic empowerment for women

Read 3 profiles of Costenas through Kiva, a microfinancing organization that lends money to people around the world. Blog about which one you would lend money to.

I would like to lend money to all of them because I admire women with courage and initiative to be independent. Now, If I have to choose one that would be Erika, because she's the youngest and her business seems to be the one that needs more help. Another reason is that the other women have at least one person to support them (husband or sons) and she doesn't.

Afrocolombians

I was very shocked after seeing this video, because I thought that racism was not a problem in Colombia, however, I'm in total disagreement with this kind of discrimination. Every person has the same rights and must be treated with justice and respect.

As Colombians, we are "mestizos" which means that we came from the combination of indigenous,  Europeans and Africans . It´s just unacceptable to  mistreat  Afro communities because that means to discriminate ourselves and our important and beautiful African heritage.

Kenyan Matatu Drivers

1. How are matatu drivers treated in his experience with the BBC? 

This documental shows another face of matatu drivers, the good one. They present these people as hardworking men who don´t have any other option to get some money for their families, is interesting because usually we don´t care about the life of people who make the "simplest" jobs, even if ,without them, our daily routine will be upside down. This is the case of these drivers, they have to break traffic rules and pay bribes in order to get the cash they need. However not all of them want to do this, as Kariuki, many of these men want to make the difference and chase their dreams, this is the side of matatu drivers that BBC wanted to show in the program. 

2. Do Barranquilleros have the same negative opinion of mototaxistas as the Kenyans have of matatu drivers?

I think that some Barranquilleros actually have the same negative opinion of mototaxistas. This probably happens because some of them violate the speed limit and don´t stay in the places of the road specially designed for them. Another reason is for the killings and gangs in the country, the hitmen usually go on a motorcycle, so people may think that all mototaxistas are criminals.

Favorite Carnival moments

Carnivals are the best time of the year!! Everyone loves carnival!! That’s what people use to say, I would like to believe it but I just can’t, is not that I hate it, I just didn’t born with those “genes”. However, there were three things that I truly enjoyed these carnivals: 

1) To see how happy people was, is very nice to see how different people ,who don’t even know each other, are so cheerful, they sing, dance and make new friends. When I saw this, I thought about other cultures, was funny to think what would an Asian do if somebody suddenly dance to him/her one of those weird “reguetón” songs jajajaja, probably he/she would be as stunned as I was(True story).

2)Traditional music is great!, even when my favorite genre is Rock, I found traditional music very beautiful and creative. I think is amazing the way how these songs can transmit feelings and histories without lyrics.

3) The last and most important thing, the thing that I love the most about this carnival was TO SLEEP!! There’s no better feeling than go to bed without alarms or homework. Geez, I don’t care if there have to be one thousand carnivals in the year, or if I don´t know how to dance, or if I hate “reguetón”, who cares? If I can sleep all day long, for me is totally perfect. Certainly, the hours I sleep, were my favorite carnival moments :).

This is one of the very very very few pictures of me in carnival events; my mom took it 12 years ago, I guess you can figure out from my face that “gene” stuff…

Tinariwen

1. What do we learn about Tuareg culture from this video?

In this video we can see a man practicing a tea ceremony, in my opinion, rituals are one of the most distinctive and beautiful parts of every culture. Each place has his own way to see the world and this kind of events allows people to represent, any kind of feeling. We could see that the objects the man used are crafted and the tea is heated with brushwood. This seems to be an ancient tradition, based in their nomad predecessors, in which people meet to drink tea and talk about their lives.

2. Keeping in mind what you learned from this interview, how does seeing the visuals within the video and knowing the meaning of the lyrics give us a deeper understanding of Tuareg culture?

The visuals are very helpful, because they allow us to see the entire ritual and, with the lyrics we can figure out the reasons why this tea ceremony is done . We can see the way the singers are dressed and the instruments and objects they use, also the expressions of people in the video give us an idea about the kind of songs and the message they want to transmit.

Barranquilla- 2013 Cultural Capital

1. Why was Barranquilla chosen?

The city was chosen for the hard work of Barranquilla’s mayoralty; they postulate Barranquilla for cultural capital and started the process with the International Bureau of Cultural Capitals. When the president of that entity was in Atlántico’s capital he was impressed of the positivism, the cultural cohesion, and the international projection of the city.

2. Will Barranquilla receive any of the economic benefits Liverpool hoped to from being named a cultural capital?

The benefits are the same for both, as Liverpool, Barranquilla will have lots of international promotion and this can be very convenient for the tourism. The economic benefits that the city can receive depend on the way the city takes advantage of this opportunity. 

An american in Uganda

1. What different points of view do we see in this story?

We can see two different points of view. On one hand is the white man, he probably came from a good family, has a stable job and a relatively easy life. His Idea of sacrifice is to work in an office and endure all the annoying this that his neighbor does, his future seems to be organized and quite promising.

On the other hand is the black guy, his life has never been easy; he is a hardworking guy because this kind of life is all he knows. This man has no education and lives within the day. His future is very clear, but not as promising as the white guy’s. He seems to be destined to poverty and service for the rest of his life.

2. Explain the reasons behind the miscommunication that occurred between these two men.

I think that the reason behind the miscommunication between these men is that their cultures are too much different, and their culture codes don’t allow them to speak clearly and solve the conflict.

The black man has learned to work hard and to be always subordinated to white men. He feels inferior, that´s why hardly he would be capable to ask the American why he feels so annoyed for his work. In contrast the white man was educated to feel superior than any other and to think just about himself, probably he will leave without understanding that the other was just trying to help him, and earn some money, he doesn’t have to know about the things that make the white guy angry.

In my opinion the solution to this problem is the dialogue, and the tolerance to other’s differences.

Hello

If you are lost in the internet and suddenly found this blog I'm sure that you're going to get bored because this is   a task for my English class. But if you're my professor...Hi professor Kendra! This is my blog, I hope you like it :D.

I'm 17 years old and I´m studying Industrial Engineering in Uninorte (fourth semester yeyy!) .Something interesting about me is that I like to learn random stuffs like to write with my left hand, to learn numbers in another language or some other senseless and useless thing that come to my mind.

Good bye :)