197. How Your Culture Shapes Your Relationships. Multicultural Communication & Belonging Series. Part 3

In Part 3 of the Multicultural Communication and Belonging series, Alejandra Siroka opens with a definition that shaped her entire career: language is not just a tool for communication, it is a way of looking at reality and relating to what we see.

She makes the case that every one of us is a multicultural being and a multicultural speaker, shaped by far more than nationality or the languages we speak.

Family background, religion, socioeconomic class, profession, geography, and whether we grew up inside or outside the dominant social group all add layers of culture that influence how we communicate, how we assign responsibility, and how we relate to the people around us.

Through the lens of Robert Kaplan's research on linguistic thought patterns, Alejandra explains how some languages move in a straight line, others zigzag through context before arriving at the point, and others spiral inward gradually.

Under stress or fatigue, the brain reaches for the pattern it learned first, which can lead to real misunderstandings between people who are each simply thinking in the shape of their first language.

She also explores how asking questions is itself a culturally shaped behavior, welcomed and expected in some cultures, and experienced as a challenge to authority in others, and what that means for relationships, medical care, and the workplace.

As always, Alejandra shares real-life examples and tells you how each of the points she teaches impact your relationships.

At the center of it all is an invitation to map your own cultural layers and explore them with the people who matter most to you. When you uncover the cultural frameworks behind a miscommunication, what looked like avoidance, rudeness, or indifference often turns out to be something else entirely.

Quotes

• "Language is a way to look at reality and to relate to that reality based on what we see." (06:27 | Alejandra Siroka)
• “The language we use is very powerful. And you need to know about this tool you have available to you every single day. Language makes and breaks relationships. Language creates peace and leads to wars. Language shapes and destroys whole lives." (07:52 | Alejandra Siroka)
• "What looked like evasion was simply a different way of relating to reality through language." (09:10 | Alejandra Siroka)
• "No matter how fluent or proficient we become in a second, third, fifth language, under pressure, our minds go home. And home is always the language we learned first." (09:44 | Alejandra Siroka)
• "When you can meet someone's communication style with curiosity instead of judgment, you are creating the conditions for real belonging for both of you." (28:12 | Alejandra Siroka)

Links

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Podcast Music composed by Gary Lapow: open.spotify.com/artist/1HlMhcNfKIELxYil5mVqD

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm