7.4 Attitudinal Problems--Stereotyping数字时代的商务英语写作.pdf

Intercultural CommunicationBarriers Intercultural CommunicationBarriers 7.4AttitudinalProblems--Stereotyping In this lesson, we’ll proceed with attitudinal problems. Do you still remember Wang Xin’sjudgement of Jerry? Yes. He was very upset with Jerry. The next day, he filled his another friend in on Jerry’s response to hishospitality.He said, “TheyAmerican people arereally cold-blooded.” What doyou think ofWangXin’scommentsonAmericans?You may say it isway too exaggerating andisnot fair to alltheAmericans.Sure.Wang Xin’sclaim overgeneralizesthebeliefaboutwhat agroup ofpeopleareor shouldbe,which isso-calleda stereotype. The word stereotyping was first used by a journalist Walter Lippmann in 1922 to describejudgement made about others on the basis of their ethnic group membership. Stereotyping is a natural process. Anyonecan stereotype and anyone canbe stereotyped. 严明大学英语跨文 （ . 化交际教程[M]. 北京：清华大学出版社, 2009:114. ） Stereotyping meets human beings’psychological need to categorize and classify.As is known to all, the world is so complex that no one can know it in all its details. Although stereotyping brings convenience to some extent, it normally hinders intercultural communication because stereotypes overgeneralize and oversimplify people’s traits so that they ignore individual characteristics. What’s more, stereotypes create, repeat andreinforcebeliefsuntilthey often become taken for “truth”.(Samovar, Larry A., Porter, R. E., Stefani, L.A. Communication Between Cultures. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press: 246) For example, women were stereotyped as “housewives”. Being confined to houses, they had been rejected in the workplace for centuries all the world over. The consequence of stereotyping is that the vast differences that exist among the members of any one group may not be taken into account in theinterpretation ofmessages. Thereareawiderangeofca