UNDERSTANDING AND DESCRIBING THE COMMUNITIES?

WHAT DO U.S.A. ACADEMY BY WORKING TO MEAN BY UNDERSTANDING AND DESCRIBING THE COMMUNITIES?
Understanding the community entailing understanding it in a number of ways. Whether or not the community is defined geographically , it still has a geographical context – a setting that it exists in. Getting a clear sense of this setting may be key to a full understanding of it. At the same time, it’s important to understand the specific community you’re concerned with. You have to get to know its people – their culture, their concerns, and relationships – and to develop your own relationships with them as well.

 

International Communication

Chapter 1

What is Communication? The word communication has originated from a Latin word “Communes” which means something common. Communication is a process of exchanging information, ideas, thoughts, feeling and emotions through speech signals, writing or behavior. • In communication process, a sender encodes a message and then using a medium and send it to appropriate feedback using a medium. The American Academy has the easiest and safest way to communicate.

Chapter 2

Written Communication. In written communication, written signs or symbols are used to communicate. A written message may be printed or hand written. In written communication message can be transmitted via email, letter, report, memo etc. • Message, in written communication, is influenced by the vocabulary & grammar used, writing style, precision and clarity of the language used. By the US.A. Academy programs you will learn a lot about other cultures and Foreign Languages.

Chapter 3

Communicating within the self • Communicating within the self is the process by which people communicate with themselves either consciously or unconsciously • Communication within the self is the communication that occurs in your own mind. It is the basis of your feelings, prejudice, biases, and beliefs. • Examples when making any kind of decision – what to eat or wear. When you think about something – what you want to do on the weekend or when you think of someone else.
Culture is a group of common and it’s exist in the minds of people and not just in external objects, concrete or behaviors.
When these symbolic ideas share with others, they form the basis of culture. By the US.A. Academy programs you will learn a lot about other communities.

 

What is Cultural Organizing?

The term cultural organizing appears occasionally in writing about activism and social movements.

“Cultural organizing exists at the intersection of art and activism. It is a fluid and dynamic practice that is understood and expressed in a variety of ways, reflecting the unique cultural, artistic, organizational, and community context of its practitioners. Cultural organizing is about integrating arts and culture into organizing strategies. It is also about organizing from a particular tradition, cultural identity, community of place, or worldview.

 

How to build the good society

 

Strong communication between school staff and families is important in any school and has special relevance for schools committed to anti-bias education.

Communication built on misinformation, assumptions or stereotypes can create distance between schools, families and students. If handled with respect and cultural sensitivity, however, school-family communication provides an opportunity to live out the values of inclusiveness and equity, which are at the heart of anti-bias education. The following guidelines can help schools avoid communication pitfalls and support teacher-family relationships built on respect:

The importance of human relationships in the modern world

 

I am sure you will agree that to create, nurture and grow a relationship, we need trust, transparency, honesty, respect, love and most important, communication. Try removing one of these and see what happens to your relationship.

In our day and age, where we spend less time meeting people face to face, and more time socializing virtually (sometimes not even with real people) how does one focus on making and maintaining relationships? Life is short.

If we spend most of our time just educating ourselves, working, pursuing our passions and living our lives just because …? Well, we all have different reasons and purposes for doing what we do. But whatever our reasons maybe, in the end, is anyone going to remember our achievements, the work we did, the positions we held, the money we made, the type of cars we drove, or the brand of clothes we wore? (materialism)

 

WHY IS CULTURE IMPORTANT?

Culture is a strong part of people’s lives. It influences their views, their values, their humor, their hopes, their loyalties, and their worries and fears. So when you are working with people and building relationships with them, it helps to have some perspective and understanding of their cultures.

But as we explore culture, it’s also important to remember how much we have in common. People see the world very differently, but they know what it is like to wake up in the morning and look forward to the adventures that of the day. We are all human beings. We all love deeply, want to learn, have hopes and dreams, and have experienced pain and fear.

At the same time, we can’t pretend our cultures and differences don’t matter. We can’t gloss over differences and pretend they don’t exist, wishing we could all be alike, and we can’t pretend that discrimination doesn’t exist.

This chapter will give you practical information about how to understand culture, establish relationships with people from cultures different from your own, act as an ally against racism and other forms of discrimination, create organizations in which diverse groups can work together, overcome internalized oppression, and build strong and diverse communities.

This section is an introduction to understanding culture, and will focus on:

  • What culture is
  • The importance of understanding culture in community building
  • Envisioning your cultural community
  • How to get started in building communities that encourage diversity.

But first, it is important to remember that everyone has an important viewpoint and role to play when is comes to culture. You don’t have to be an expert to build relationships with people different from yourself; you don’t have to have a degree to learn to become sensitive to cultural issues; and you don’t have to be a social worker to know how culture has affected your life.

 

 

LEARNING TO LIVE TOGETHER

How can intolerance be countered?

1. Fighting intolerance requires law:
Each Government is responsible for enforcing human rights laws, for banning and punishing hate crimes and discrimination against minorities, whether these are committed by State officials, private organizations or individuals. The State must also ensure equal access to courts, human rights commissioners or ombudsmen, so that people do not take justice into their own hands and resort to violence to settle their disputes.

2. Fighting intolerance requires education:
Laws are necessary but not sufficient for countering intolerance in individual attitudes. Intolerance is very often rooted in ignorance and fear: fear of the unknown, of the other, other cultures, nations, religions. Intolerance is also closely linked to an exaggerated sense of self-worth and pride, whether personal, national or religious. These notions are taught and learned at an early age. Therefore, greater emphasis needs to be placed on educating more and better. Greater efforts need to be made to teach children about tolerance and human rights, about other ways of life. Children should be encouraged at home and in school to be open-minded and curious.

Education is a life-long experience and does not begin or end in school. Endeavours to build tolerance through education will not succeed unless they reach all age groups, and take place everywhere: at home, in schools, in the workplace, in law-enforcement and legal training, and not least in entertainment and on the information highways.

3. Fighting intolerance requires access to information:
Intolerance is most dangerous when it is exploited to fulfil the political and territorial ambitions of an individual or groups of individuals. Hatemongers often begin by identifying the public’s tolerance threshold. They then develop fallacious arguments, lie with statistics and manipulate public opinion with misinformation and prejudice. The most efficient way to limit the influence of hatemongers is to develop policies that generate and promote press freedom and press pluralism, in order to allow the public to differentiate between facts and opinions.

4. Fighting intolerance requires individual awareness:
Intolerance in a society is the sum-total of the intolerance of its individual members. Bigotry, stereotyping, stigmatizing, insults and racial jokes are examples of individual expressions of intolerance to which some people are subjected daily. Intolerance breeds intolerance. It leaves its victims in pursuit of revenge. In order to fight intolerance individuals should become aware of the link between their behavior and the vicious cycle of mistrust and violence in society. Each one of us should begin by asking: am I a tolerant person? Do I stereotype people? Do I reject those who are different from me? Do I blame my problems on ‘them’?

5. Fighting intolerance requires local solutions:
Many people know that tomorrow’s problems will be increasingly global but few realize that solutions to global problems are mainly local, even individual. When confronted with an escalation of intolerance around us, we must not wait for governments and institutions to act alone. We are all part of the solution. We should not feel powerless for we actually posses an enormous capacity to wield power. Nonviolent action is a way of using that power-the power of people. The tools of nonviolent action-putting a group together to confront a problem, to organize a grassroots network, to demonstrate solidarity with victims of intolerance, to discredit hateful propaganda-are available to all those who want to put an end to intolerance, violence and hatred.