Blog 5- Post Service

1.  A major theme that has shown throughout my experience with the Burmese family involves Knapp’s Relational Model.    Our interpersonal relationship with the family has progressed through the stages of this model.  We began in the coming together phase.  In this stage, we went from strangers to acquaintances.  At first we were all a bit apprehensive and guarded.  Slowly, however, we grew much more comfortable with the family.  We began bonding as we started seeing each other more and holding conversations.  The children really began to warm up to us and always begged for our attention during our visits. Our relational maintenance was going strong even through our last days with the family.  The children would cry when it was time for us to leave.  It was very touching that they enjoyed our presence so much. We did not grow apart, but we had to come to an abrupt termination as we said our final goodbyes to the family.  The mother’s growing of knowledge was a theme that greatly contributed to our strong interpersonal relationship with the family.    She began understanding and interpreting connotative meanings of English sayings and phrases.  We were able to make jokes and talk about aspects of our cultures.  I am pleased to think that I made an impact on the family and helped them adjust to American Culture. 

2.   Working with a family from Burma influenced my perspective on culture more than any class lecture would possibly be able to.  I’m so glad I had that experience because it really opened my eyes to diversity and intercultural communication.   I am more culturally sensitive now that I have had interpersonal interactions with people of a completely different culture.  This will help me in future interactions in my career and everyday life.  I will have a better understanding of how to communicate with people that speak other languages.  I can be more sympathetic to people that accustom to our culture or norms.  I am so glad that I got the opportunity to learn and help others through this service project experience!

Blog 4- During Service

1.  Our family from Burma has began to feel much more comfortable with us being around. They act more natural as opposed to being formal to impress us. As time has progressed, I have noticed the mother of our Burmese family become more assertive in her parenting style.  She began to raise her voice and make harsh gestures at the children when they disrespected her. The mother has been improving greatly with her reading skills.  She is finally beginning to understand and interpret what she is reading, rather than simply saying unfamiliar words.  We have began making conversation with her more now that she understands us better.  however, there are many times where miscommunication occurs and we must use descriptions, gestures or drawings to communicate.

2.  Our family has become much more comfortable with us as we become more familiar.  They have welcomed us into their home as if we are a part of their family rather than part of an out-group.  It seems that they are experiencing less culture shock as they begin to understand our language better.  The family follows a high power distance lifestyle. Elders are always respected.  When children disrespect their elders there are harsh consequences.  The mother of our family yells at her children and makes hand gestures to them in attempt to save and maintain her authority face. Her hand gestures are a form on nonverbal communication to signal to the children that she is very mad and they need to calm down.  We use nonverbal communication a lot with the family.  Sometimes there is no direct translation for a word we are trying to use.  In this case we will use actions, drawings or the internet to depict the message we are trying to convey. As the mother learns, she is understanding connotative meanings and interpreting words and sentences for herself.  Instead of simply reading, she is reading and comprehending.  We learned that by repeating the same story or book several times, she picks up on the meaning of the story.  We enjoy talking about the stories we read and making conversation. It is important to do this with the family so that they can feel more confident out in the real world when they do things such as shopping or going to the doctor.

3.  In our final visit with the family, we are going to give them tips for living in America.  We want them to feel comfortable here and adapt to our language and culture.  We are going to incorporate the children into the activity or conversation so they will not feel excluded, and so the mother will not have to discipline them. We will continue reading with the mother for comprehension skills.  We want to encourage her to continue reading English books to her children.  The children are still very young, so we would like for them to be integrated into the American culture while still maintaining their cultural roots from Burma.  It will be important for the entire family to understand English as the children grow and enter school.