True Story 1.08
Male–female complications
at a graduate school in Brazil
The setting for this story
A language institute in São Paulo, Brazil, invited a U.S. university to deliver a training program for Brazilian teachers of English that, if completed, would result in a master’s degree from the American university. Dorothee, one of the American professors, was an intercultural communication specialist who was planning to teach about differences in Brazilian and American interpersonal behavior.
A story of misaligned minds9
Early during the first week of one class, a male Brazilian student approached Dorothee during a break. He immediately brought himself within ten to twelve inches of her, placed his hand on her shoulder, and gazed directly at her while asking a question about one of the course assignments.
Dorothee instantly became uncomfortable with the behavior of the Brazilian and instinctively took various evasive actions: she looked away from his face and angled her body a quarter turn to the side. But she retained her composure and provided an answer.
Dorothee was a bit startled afterward to realize that, as a specialist in Brazilian and American interpersonal behavior, she already was knowledgeable about this tendency of Brazilian males.
Dorothee’s question
Why did I, an authority on Brazilian–American differences in interpersonal behavior, instantly react to this guy’s behavior as being borderline abusive?
Critique of story 1.08
To write Misaligned Minds, I amassed many facts about behavior differences across cultures. I can testify that factual knowledge, by itself, does little or nothing to moderate my spontaneous negative reaction to behavior I deem inappropriate by someone from another society. This is because we all develop our sense of right and wrong as children, which deeply anchors it in our psyche, below the level of consciousness. When we’re confronted by behavior we learned early on to view as wrong, we don’t analyze it. We react instantly and emotionally.
When I worked near the U.N. complex in New York, I once was asked to accompany an African scholar as he toured the U.N. I was startled and flustered when he took my hand and held it throughout the visit. Yes, my storehouse of facts included that nonromantic handholding between males is common in parts of Africa and elsewhere in the world. But that fact did little to calm my emotional jolt.
What we can hope for is that, when caught off guard during a cross-cultural encounter by a behavior that makes us uncomfortable, we can avoid reacting in emergency mode, retain our composure and, afterward, recognize what just happened. Fortunately, that’s what Dorothee did!
For thought
Imagine that Dorothee is a Brazilian professor of intercultural communication who came to the U.S. to teach her specialty, including differences in Brazilian–American interpersonal behavior. All of her students are Americans. During the first week, a male student approaches Dorothee with a question. In contrast with the behavior of the Brazilian male described above, how does the American probably behave while conversing with Dorothee? How does she react? What does she think afterwards?
Related stories
Story 1.17 concerns misaligned nonverbal cues between teacher and student that were far more subtle. More details about Dorothee’s time in Brazil are related near the end of Chapter 11.
Return to Chapter 1 Quick-Links | Go to Chapter 4 Quick-Links | Go to Chapter 7 Quick-Links | Go to Chapter 10 Quick-Links
Endnotes:
9 Crabtree & Sapp, 118–19.
All full citations are available at misalignedminds.info/References.