304 Spring 2022 Midterm Exam
Read the following “Side Trips” from our coursebook. In your answer to the question/comment at the end of the side trip, develop an essay on the basis of the arguments presented in the relevant chapter, which includes your own interpretation. The the essay should not be less than 500 words.

Good luck.

1. Gender and Our Brains 
Interviewed by TIME (Kluger, 2019), the British cognitive researcher Gina Rippon talks about why male and female brains aren’t so different, explored in her book Gender and our brains. She also mentions that she’s been contacted by transgender males or females who ask,“Can you put me in a scanner and prove my brain is male or female?” Her reply is,“I’m sorry, there isn’t any such thing. I can’t say your brain is all pinks or blues. In fact, I wanted to call my book Fifty Shades of Gray Matter.” 

How does this pertain to the continuum concept? How can such findings affect human interaction? 

2.  What Is a ‘Person of Color’? 
In his article, entitled ‘“People of color” came out of the blue,’ Jonathan Kolatch (2019) poses the question:“What is a ‘person of color’?” He says that to grade people by skin tone is silly, except to politicians, and that recurrent headlines in national newspapers, such as ‘Five essay collections by women of color,’ only perpetuate this distortion. He also argues that the expression ‘people of color’ is a purely American invention and must be stripped from the lexicon, or, at a minimum, needs better classification, suggesting such labels as ‘colorless,’‘colored,’‘bicolored,’‘tricolored,’ and ‘multicolored.’ 

Do you agree with Kotlach’s opinion and suggestion? 

3. ‘There Is Strangeness Hidden in the Familiar’ 
In her book, entitled Full circles, overlapping lives: Culture and generation in transition, Mary Bateson, an American cultural anthropologist, writes: 
We live with strangers. Those we love most, with whom we share a shelter, a table, a bed, remain mysterious. Wherever lives overlap and flow together, there are depths of unknowing. Parents and children, partners, siblings, and friends repeatedly surprise us, revealing the need to learn where we are most at home. We even surprise ourselves in our own becoming, moving through the cycles of our lives.There is strangeness hidden in the familiar. 

Can you think of surprising yourself as a result of intercultural encounters? 

4. Intercultural Travel Blogs 
Elizabeth Slattery and Rick Malleus’s paper ‘Personal travel blogs as texts for studying intercultural interactions: A pilot test case study of an American sojourner’s blogs from Zimbabwe’ presents the results of content analysis of an American woman’s travel blog written on a sojourn to Zimbabwe.The analysis was performed using four intercultural constructs: culture shock, intercultural communication challenges, cross-cultural comparison, and intercultural adaptation.The authors of the paper argue that personal travel blogs can be an important source for studying self-reports of face-to-face intercultural interaction. 

Do you agree with their argument? Can you think of other sources that could be used for studying culture shock and intercultural adaptation in intercultural communication? 

5. Positive Cultural Appropriation? 
The term ‘cultural appropriation’ is usually understood as the act of adopting elements from other cultures without truly understanding or respecting the original context.At the same time, we read that “in the 21st century, cultural appropriation—like globalization—isn’t just inevitable; it’s potentially positive” (Avins, 2015). It is argued that, were it not for cultural appropriation, some cultural products would fade away (Scafidi, 2005).Also, by adopting aesthetics from other cultures, people are “finding beauty in cultural appropriation” (Wang, 2019). In this sense, cultural appropriation is seen as an exchange of ideas, styles, and traditions in today’s multicultural world. Some authors, though, note that cultural exchange suggests you give something in return for having taken something; also, exchange is about teasing out points of conflict, while “appropriation suggests a significant amount of self-satisfaction and a desire to show off ” (Galchen & Holmes, 2017, p. 27). 

Do you think that cultural appropriation is/can be something positive? Is it the same as cultural exchange? When addressing these questions, should we consider such things as power, credit, authenticity, and respectfulness? 

6. Translate Mobile App 
Today, there are many translation devices that make talking to people in other countries easier. For instance, during the FIFA World Cup in Russia, Google reported a 30% rise in the use of its Translate mobile app from the country, with searches for ‘World Cup,’ ‘stadium,’ and ‘beer’ increasing by 200%, 135%, and 65% respectively.While many people believe that translation devices bring cultures together, some think that automated translation leads to a different social interaction from a human attempt, because we cannot really understand one another. 

How do you see the role of such technology for the future of intercultural interactions?