Intercultural Friendship Issues Among International Students In Australia

What theories explain the difficulties international students face when they attempt to form intercultural friendships? What factors would enable both local and international students to form better intercultural friendships?

Language Barrier

The aim of this essay is to discuss the issues relating the cultural differences affecting the foreign students studying in Australian universities. The international students for many generations are finding difficulties in some aspects of Australian life. most of these students suffer isolation and depression due to their financial difficulties and social or cultural incapability to cope up with the new culture of Australia. There are theories for intercultural communication by Edward Hall and sociolinguistics theory that can help to understand the reasons and factors relating the communication gap among the students which ultimately lead to their psychological sufferings.  This essay will be discussing the aspects of intercultural friendship in their education in the foreign countries and the factors that can help them to improving their situations.

The number of international students visiting Australia for educational purpose has been increasing day to day but most of them are facing problems and difficulties to adjust effectively in the Australian setting. The main problem that these international students are facing is associated with language. First of all, most of the international students visiting Australia are from non- English-speaking background therefore, they struggle with the course work as they had English as their second language (Studiesinaustralia.com 2018). This is the reason why the students are not getting benefitted from the lectures and in one hand and feel engaged in their studies on the other. They also cannot take part in the small talks in the small talks in the class rooms or presentation of their assignment like other native students of Australia. This communication issues regarding language and different usage of it in different places create barrier among these students.

Thesis statement: most of the international students struggle to integrate into the domestic culture of Australia as they have little opportunities to make new friends having different faiths and cultures.

The international students fail to make friends as they feel nervous initially as they do not have proper understanding of the cultural norms and values of that particular place. The abbreviations of the words used by the local students in the country may not be conceivable to the international students and they feel uncomfortable with the usage of language of their local classmates. There are some very important theories that explain why these types of issues arise among the international and domestic students studying together the domestics in the Australian universities. From the perception of the cultural norms, the theory of cultural context proposed by Edward Hall can be discussed. According to this particular theory, the culture of the countries is different from one another so also their understanding of the context of commutations. In Australia, the students visit from countries like Thailand, India, Pakistan, Colombia and other distant lands. As mentioned by Page and Hall (2014), these cultures either fall in the categories of high context culture and low context one. The high context cultural people share covert and implicit messages and uses much non-verbal communication (Page and Hall 2014). They remain reserved in their communication which many of the low culture communicators do not understand. They follow strong in group and out group distinction therefore cannot change their communication style so easily to make friends.

Cultural Context and Communication

In discussing the cultural context that affects the communication of the people of that culture, it can be stated that the Australian culture has low context element. In this context, the people prefer to share explicit and overt messages which are most of the time clear and simple. The domestic students of Australia prefer their communication to be more focused on the verbal communication than using body language (Thesuffolkjournal.com. 2018). The communication style is visible and external with outward reaction. They prefer in the flexible open grouping process which allows the changing members of the group whenever the change is needed. Therefore, it can be stared that the students and educational setting has flexible communication style so that the students from the other countries can effectively adapt the style of communication and cope up fast. However, this does not help the students all the time. This is due to the fact they do not grow friendship easily with the local students.

The friendship with the local students cannot be grown by the international students as there is a strong barrier of language which can be one of the most important barriers to be explained with the sociolinguist theory. This refers to the effect of language in the various aspects of the society and cultural norms of a particular country. This also includes the method of using language in expressing thoughts and beliefs of the society (Www120.secure.griffith.edu.au. 2018). this differs from the sociology of language that rather records the society’s effect on the language. In the case of Australia, English is the mainstream language which is the chief mode of communication every nation in this global era. Despite all these, the international students are facing problems in communicating with the Australia students. According to sociolinguist theory, there are speech community where the district group of people who have unique language accepted mutually among themselves. To become the member of such group one has to have communicative competence so that he or she can express thoughts appropriately in the given condition (Blogs.qut.edu.au. 2018). Therefore, it can be stated that the international students are not being able to enter the groups of the Australian students as they do not prosses the communicative competence not only in language proficiency but also the nonverbal communication in the Australian cultural context.

As discussed in the two theories that there are some very important issues creating barrier in successful communication and adaptation process of the international students in the culture of Australia, there are effective solutions to these problems. Despite the fact theta the faith, understanding, food habits a lifestyle are completely different in Australia from the lands in which these international students belong, there is an attempt from the part of the international students to adopt the mainland culture of Australia (Abc.net.au. 2018). However, the responses from these students reveal that they face problems as they do not get perfect support from their peers as well as professors to adopt with the new culture.

In this regard, the factors involving effective communication process incur responses from the universities of the country, the mentors, domestic students and the international students themselves. To many of the international students studying in the Australian universities have pointed out that they are traded by the professors different due to their different cultural and national background which refers to the existence of double standards built by the university authorities (Neuliep 2017). The main factor in such discrepancy of understanding and miscommunication originates from the cultural differences therefore, the professors can take initiative to bring the international and domestic students together.  In order to solve this kind of problem, the universities must arrange some cultural workshops and social programs where the students from different culture will share their views and beliefs. These will increase knowledge of the students about other cultures which will reduce the conflict or ignorance. The problems regarding the inability of communication and nervousness which the international students feel initially will be eliminated by the direct intervention of the university authorities.

Another factor is the differences in the lifestyle and food habits of the students for which they do not find any types of common link among themselves. In order to solve such issues, the students can themselves find solutions. In order to increase the cultural competency among the students, the professors can form groups consisting different students with different cultural background in a project or assignment so that they can build relationship among themselves and understand how to communicate with one another in spite of having cultural barriers (Oetzel 2017). From the aspect of the international students, they can motivate the international students to enter the flexible open grouping process so that all of the get benefited. This will allow the international  to make new friends develop better intercultural relationship. However, in order to mitigate such issues, the factors involve the international students also. They need to improve their social skills by going out of their comfort zone and joining in communication with the domestic students. Thera re student centers in every universities of Australia which can be visited by the students to get help in joining students club or organizations. By taking active part in the events and volunteering in the campus the international students get to know the new culture and adapt themselves with it.

Therefore, it can be concluded that the international students studying in the Australian universities facing problems and difficulties to adjust effectively in the Australian setting. The international students visiting Australia may have non- English-speaking background hence are not getting benefitted from the lectures. This communication issues regarding language and cultural norms in communication create barrier among these students. They fail to make friends as their culture, values, norms and expectations are completely different from those of the Australian students. In this regard Hall’s cultural context and sociolinguist theory has been discussed. however, an assembled effort from the professors, domestic and international students will make possible to end such issues in future.

References:

Abc.net.au. 2018. Loneliness, racism, poverty: The realities facing overseas students in Australia. [online] ABC News. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-01/challenges-international-students-face-in-melbourne-australia/9702606 [Accessed 1 Nov. 2018].

Blogs.qut.edu.au. 2018. Living in Brisbane | Student Life in Brisbane. [online] Blogs.qut.edu.au. Available at: https://blogs.qut.edu.au/student-life-in-brisbane/category/living-in-brisbane/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2018].

Neuliep, J.W., 2017. Intercultural communication: A contextual approach. Sage Publications.

Oetzel, J.G., 2017. Effective intercultural workgroup communication theory. The International Encyclopedia of Intercultural Communication, pp.1-5.

Page, S.J. and Hall, C.M., 2014. The geography of tourism and recreation: Environment, place and space. Routledge.

Studiesinaustralia.com. 2018. Five challenges international students face and how to overcome them | Study in Australia. [online] Studies in Australia. Available at: https://www.studiesinaustralia.com/Blog/study-tips/five-challenges-international-students-face-and-how-to-overcome-them [Accessed 1 Nov. 2018].

Thesuffolkjournal.com. 2018. International student struggles: The trouble with English. [online] The Suffolk Journal. Available at: https://thesuffolkjournal.com/19492/world-news-at-suffolk/international-student-struggles-the-trouble-with-english/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2018].

Www120.secure.griffith.edu.au. 2018. [online] Www120.secure.griffith.edu.au. Available at: https://www120.secure.griffith.edu.au/rch/file/b67b1eb2-8933-4702-8f70-fc115d4afff9/1/Park_2016_01Thesis.pdf [Accessed 1 Nov. 2018].