• Achieving communication competence in a culturally diverse society is necessary for personal and professional success. One way to enhance our understanding of communication as a relationship-building activity is to talk with people from different cultures. This assignment will give you the opportunity to learn about communication and culture by interviewing people who belong to different cultural groups.

• The purpose of this assignment is to explore and understand the ways in which culture influences the way we communicate and form relationships with others in 1,200-1,400 words (in a mature font, following the MLA format, with the title page and the works cited page). The assignment is also designed to help you improve your ability to communicate competently in cross-cultural interactions.

• This project can be completed individually or in pairs.

• The first step in completing this assignment is to interview two people who belong to cultural groups that are VERY different from your own (the best choice would be to seek out individuals born outside the U.S. mainland). Your task in the interviews is to talk with your interview partners about communication in their cultures, and how it is similar and/or different from your own. You will then use the results of the interviews to analyze how your own cultural communication practices compare with those of your interview partners.

• Some of the interpersonal communication topics that you might ask about in your interviews include the following:

  The creation of the self

  Language and verbal communication

  Nonverbal communication

  Gender roles and gendered communities

  Family communication

  The expression of emotions

  Conflict management

  Friendship communication

  Romantic relationships, including dating, non-marital commitments, and marriage

• You will not be able to include all these topics in your paper. You should include one main topic (a topic is equivalent to a chapter in our textbook), with two or three subtopics. Since the content for these main points will come from your interviews, it is important that you (1) construct your interview questions carefully, (2) ask your partners to elaborate on various points and (3) use paraphrasing and effective listening to ensure clarification and understanding. Keep in mind that the quality of your paper will directly depend on the quality of your interviews, so plan and prepare them carefully. 

• Do not use "you" in the narrative, unless quoting from the interviews.

• The topic must be approved by the date posted in the syllabus (and in assignments) to earn credit for the Semester Project.

• The mandatory rough draft is due by the date posted in the syllabus (and in assignments). You must submit a rough draft (one person per group) through the D2L assignments dropbox to earn a grade on the final draft of the Semester Project.

• This is not a 5¶ essay.

• You should organize your paper into the following three parts. 

  1. Introduction (one or two paragraphs): Provide a brief description of the interviews, your interview partners (with photographs) and the cultural groups that you focused on for this paper; include a brief preview of the body of the paper.
  2. Body (several paragraphs): Discuss in detail the main points corresponding to the various communication topics from your interviews. The body is by far the longest part of the paper and should explicitly address the cultural differences and similarities in relational communication you uncovered in the interviews with your partners. It is important that you give direct quotes from your interview partners as well as direct quotes (and source citations).
  3. Conclusion (one or two paragraphs): Provide a brief summary of the body of the paper. Next discuss your impressions and observations of the interviews, how well you performed in conducting them and what you learned about culture and communication from this assignment.

• You can use headings for each of the three sections described above.

• Papers will be evaluated based on three criteria. First, papers must demonstrate an understanding of communication concepts and principles (for example, the “generalized other”). Second, papers must analyze how these communication topics apply across the three cultures (yours and your two interview partners). Third, papers must demonstrate effective writing mechanics and style. Each type (not each occurrence) of major grammatical errors (e.g., run-on, pronoun-antecedent agreement, fragment, misplaced modifier, parallelism, verb form, subject-verb agreement, 3 x spelling errors) will equal a deduction of 20 points.

• Submit your final draft in the Assignments Dropbox in D2L under Semester Project by the due date.

• Detailed feedback about the submitted paper will be provided in D2L.

• As always, if you have any questions, please email me at cperkowski@gordonstate.edu.

• The MANDATORY proposal must be submitted through the Assignments Dropbox in D2L under Semester Project Proposal by the date posted in the syllabus (and in assignments) to earn credit on the Semester Project. Please include the following in the proposal:

            a) names of two individuals you will interview

            b) why you chose these two individuals

            c) why these two individuals represent cultures VERY different from your own

            d) proposed dates for interviews

            e) direction (topics) of the project and possible thesis