Conclusion
Face negotiation theory addresses intercultural communication on cultural, individual, and inter-relational levels. Individualistic and collectivistic cultures will have different methods of maintaining face and resolving conflict. What comes naturally to people from one culture may not seem an appropriate communication style to individuals from another culture.
An example of this was in 2003 when the United States went to war with Iraq. The Iraqi information minister was adamant that US troops were not in the country, despite the obvious fact that they were. Why use such a tactic? Ting-Toomey’s face negotiation theory would recognize Arabic culture as collectivistic. Thus, one might say it was a method of face management to maintain credibility with the ingroup (i.e., the Iraqi people) rather than dealing with the problem more directly.
As Greenberg, Simon, Pyszczynski, Soloman, and Chatel point out, one’s cultural worldview is taken as an absolute, and the fact that there are other people who share that view reinforces it. So, face negotiation theory can be an effective and necessary tool in developing intercultural communication competence.
Read more about this topic: Face Negotiation Theory
Famous quotes containing the word conclusion:
“The source of our actions resides in an unconscious propensity to regard ourselves as the center, the cause, and the conclusion of time. Our reflexes and our pride transform into a planet the parcel of flesh and consciousness we are.”
—E.M. Cioran (b. 1911)
“It is a great many years since at the outset of my career I had to think seriously what life had to offer that was worth having. I came to the conclusion that the chief good for me was freedom to learn, think, and say what I pleased, when I pleased. I have acted on that conviction... and though strongly, and perhaps wisely, warned that I should probably come to grief, I am entirely satisfied with the results of the line of action I have adopted.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“A certain kind of rich man afflicted with the symptoms of moral dandyism sooner or later comes to the conclusion that it isn’t enough merely to make money. He feels obliged to hold views, to espouse causes and elect Presidents, to explain to a trembling world how and why the world went wrong. The spectacle is nearly always comic.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)