Title PROXEMICS IN CROSS-CULTURAL CONTEXT Author(s) Uza, Tokuyu Citation 沖縄短大論叢 = OKINAWA TANDAI RONSO, 10(1): 1-15 Issue Date 1996-03-01 URL http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12001/10668 Rights 沖縄大学短期大学部 PROXEMICS IN CROSS-CULTURAL CONTEXT Tokuyu Uza TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION I. DEFINITION OF PERSONAL SPACE II. PERSONAL SPACE VERSUS TERRITORY III. CULTURAL DIFFERENCES REGARDING PERSONAL SPACE IV. CREATION OF PERSONAL SPACE V. INTRUSIONS ON PERSONAL SPACE By People By Shapes By Animals VI. OCCASIONS REQUIRING ADEQUATE PERSONAL SPACE In Strict Privacy Bad Breath Or Body Odor Psychological Condition VII. OCCASIONS REQUIRING FORFEIT OF PERSONAL SPACE Vlll. OCCASIONS REQUIRING FORFEIT OF PERSONAL SPACE CONCLUSION REFERENCES - 1 - INTRODUCTION This paper is written for individuals who are going to foreign countries due to their business, education, family, and any other reasons which make them travel abroad. Every country has its own clutural differences. To understand this difference in culture is a puzzlement and frustration to people when and if they do not know how to manage the situation. To live in a different culture productively is like going through a maze without going back and forth. It may take time to find out which way is closer and easier, but once one finds on easy path, understands the rules, directions, and angles to get though the maze one will develop a thorough understanding of the maze. There are many things one ought to know when living in a foreign country. In this paper, we shall examine the subject of proxemics. Edward T. Hall who is the specialist in Personal Space has given the special name of proxemics to the study of space. (Tubbs, Stewart L, and Moss, Sylvia, 1980 p. 169). Proxemics are broad, therefore, it will be narrowed down to personal space. Every single person has their own personal space, but most do not realize that they have personal space even though they feel uncomfortable if someone invades their personal space. In this research we shall analyze the following: I . Definition of personal space, II. Personal space versus territory, III. Cultural differences regarding personal space, IV. Creation of personal space, V. Intrusions on personal space, by people, by shapes, and by animals,VI. Occasions requiring adequate personal space, in strict privacy, bad breath or body odor, and psychological condition,VII. Occasions !equiring forfeit of personal space, and VIII. Cultural adjustments to personal space. - 2 - I . DEFINITION OF PERSONAL SPACE. Edward T. Hall's perspective of communication is that; communication is a multichannel affair. Hall believes that just as language varies from culture to culture, so do the other interacting media. Specifically, proxemics refers to the use of space in communication. "Proxemics is the term I have coined for the interrelated observations and theories of man's use of space as a specialized elaboration of culture" (Hall, 1966. p.l). According to Hall (1963), another definition is that the proxemics is the study of how man unconsciously structures microspace and the distance between men in conduct of daily transactions, the organizations of space in his house and buildings, and ultimately the layout of his towns. Although this definition of proxemics is broad, most of the work in the area has been limited to the use of interpersonal space. Edward T. Hall and Mildred R. Hall (1985) said, every individual has around himself an invisible bubble of space that contracts and expands depending on several factors: his emotional state, psychological state, the activity he's performing at the time and his cultural background. This bubble is a kind of mobile territory that a person will defend against intrusion. Robert Sommer's (1969) concern is with personal space, "an area with invisible boundaries surrounding a person's body into which intruders may not come" (p.26). In effect, he says that the concept of personal space can be thought of as a person's portable territory, which each person carries along wherever he or she may go. Therefore, the personal space is the space that the individual has and that space is occupied by themselves. It is impossible to measure the presonal space because it is an "invisible, flexible bubble that surrounds us" (Hickson Ill, Mark L, and Stacks, p.40). - 3- II. PERSONAL SPACE VERSUS TERRITORY The main difference between the two is that the territory is uncarryable but visible, whereas, the personal space is carryable but invisible. Usually the term "territory" is used in geographical sense. The most important difference is that personal space is carried around while territory is relatively stationary. The animal of man will usually mark the boundaries of his territory so that they are visible to others, but the boundaries of his personal space are invisible. Personal space has the body at its center, while territory does not. (Sommer, 1969, p. 248) This is the most accurate definition and distinction between the personal space and the territory. In addition to Sommer's interpretation, anthropologist, Presley added "territory is a concept of a geographical location" (1990). III. CULTURAL DIFFERENCES REGARDING PERSONAL SPACE Psychologically, a person's space helps them to feel secure, private and comfortable by defining their distance from other people. This distance is different in each culture, for example: Two Venezuelan students had just been in trodused to an American woman in the cafeteria. As they talked to their new acquaintance, they stood very close to her. The woman kept moving away a few inches. They came closer, and she moved away again. When their conversation was finished, one of the students commented, 'She didn't seem very insterested in what we were saying, did she?' 'Maybe she was a littel afraid of us,' his friend said.( World Speak: "International Sleuth". 7) - 4- For these two Venezuelan students the personal space was not as large as that for the North American. Therefore, the two Venezuelan students were trying to approach to the point which is their personal space, but in order for them to gain or attain their personal space they had to break into the American's personal space. The North American desires to keep her personal space and if someone who does not have a close relationship with her approaches, she will move away to keep her personal space. The problem is that they have enculturated defferent concepts and values of personal space. These two variables are not tought in school, but are something that individuals acquire through their own clutures. On the other hand, target cultre can be acculturated. According to Fraida and Elite: Culture learning is a natural process in which human beings internalize the knowledge needed to function in a societal group. It may occur in the native context as enculturation or in a non-native or secondary context as acculturation. Fundamentally, learning a first culture is a process of indoctrination. Enculturaion builds a sense of cultural or social indentity, a network of values and beliefs, patterned ways of living, and, for the most part, ethnocentrism, or belief in the power and the rightness of native ways. Acculturation, on the other hand, involves the process of pulling out the world view or ethos of first culture, learning new ways of meeting old problems and shedding ethnocentric evaluations. (1990, p. 55) This means that an individual's behavior reflects one's way of living. In addition, Fraida and Elite, Ryan and Cooper (1984) defines how culture influences individual's behavior in everyday life: By culture we mean the system of norms and standards that a society - 5- develops over the course of many generations and that profoundly influences the everyday behavior of people in the society. More simply, culture is as people do. (p.l51) This phrase states that people will behave differently in different countries: If there was an international meeting with people who do not know about personal space, there will be a misunderstanding and pressure by their need for personal space. "That most people do not know what they are doing with their bodies when they are talking" (P. Ekman and W. V. Friesen, 183). According to Littlejohn (1989), "American culture utilizes four discernible distances: intimate (0 to 18 inches), personal (11/2 to 4 feet), social (4 to 12 feet), public (over 12 feet)" (p.64). The use of personal space is the most noticeable behavior in cross·cultural meeting. IV. CREATION OF PERSONAL SPACE The following represents one example of the techniques of how individuals create personal space not only in the library but also in the office, restaurant, and airport. A person can sprawl out, resting his legs on the chair next to him. If he gets up from the table, he may "reserve" his place by spreading out his books and papers or leaving a jacket draped over the chair he was sitting in. How far you go in defending your personal space will depend, of course, on both your personality and your communication style. If you sit too close to me in the library, I may get up and move. But reverse our roles and it's possible you might glare at me and even spread out your notebooks and papers so that they take up a good part of the table" (Tubbs, Stewart L, and Moss, Sylvia, 1980 p. 173). - 6- This manner of creating personal space is easier for most people because they can make preparation before someone tries to invade his/her territory. Yet, after they have encountered someone's innovation to the territory, it is too late to spread out their notebooks and papers. However, if they had the same concept of personal space, they would not have to worry at all, but if they did not have the same cultural concept of personal space they may suffer trying to keep their own intact.