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Cultural Interview Reflection Paper
Background: As the world continues to become more multicultural and diverse, you as a
professional in human services or another field will find yourself interacting with individuals
who differ from you in many significant ways. This diversity brings with it many great benefits,
but it can also impact communication and relationships in unexpected ways.
Consider if you as a HMSV professional have to provide in-home services to a family that has
recently immigrated to the U.S. from another country. How might this diversity impact
expectations, communications and relationships of all involved? What information related to
their culture might be helpful to have prior to engaging with them?
Purpose: Therefore, this project focuses on exploring and learning about cultural differences in
interpersonal relations and communication. One way to safely experience and identify
differences is through interviewing a person from a culture significantly different from your
own.
Overview: You are required to conduct an interview with an individual that is culturally
different from yourself in several major ways and highlight and reflect upon your learning in
this paper. Your written explanation, description, and reflections will point out the similarities
and differences you found between your culture and your interviewee’s, as well as barriers and
bridges that might impact relationships between people from your culture and individuals from
his or her culture.
Specific Requirements: The person interviewed must differ from you in at least two
significant ways (culture, religion, country of origin, etc.). Think of the paper as consisting of
two sections, the first, is about your interviewee and the information gained. The second part
allows you to explore aspects of the culture that you found interesting and important, and how
you might advocate for, as well as remove barriers and build bridges, to enhance relationships
with individuals similar to those of your interviewee’s culture. Your written explanation,
description, and reflection must point out the similarities and differences you found between
cultures. I chose my friend since childhood Nikta Tadayoni. She was born in Tehran, Iran and moved here as a baby. She is both an american citizen and and Iranian citizen. The two cultural diffferences I focused on were “Taarof”- meaning the manners of insisting on helping the other (research) AND also the customs surrounding physical contact in public with the opposite sex.
Steps:
4) In the Interview component of your paper (4 full pages), begin with an engaging
Introduction and then discuss the important aspects of the culture that were brought out in
the interview that might be likely to impact interpersonal relations. Also, consider how your
own background and experiences might compare and contrast with those of the individual
you interviewed. This section must be comprised of the summarized information obtained
from the interview, including:
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• Name, description, personal background of the person interviewed, and how you
know him or her Nikta, born in Iranian but very American, met in middle school.
• Where this person has lived, and his or her family’s beliefs and values regarding
relationships, parenting, etc. Her single mother believes in a combination of both american and persian values, so does her brother who is older by 3 years.
• Interesting cultural facts in this person’s history (e.g., views regarding time,
power structures, health and healing, ceremonies and traditions, conflict,
spirituality and religion, nonverbal behaviors, etc.)
• Any experiences this person has had in adapting to new cultures
• Any legislation that has or might impact individuals within this cultural group
• A comparison of your own upbringing and personal experiences with the cultural
experiences of the individual interviewed I am very mainstream American and have only lived here.
5) In the Reflections section of your paper, (1 full page), create a plan incorporating strategies
that you could use to build bridges when faced with intercultural barriers with individuals
from your interviewee’s group. In your reflections, discuss the following within your plan:
• Cultural similarities and differences with the individual you interviewed that might
create either bridges or barriers in relating to others from his or her group.
• Strategies to overcome any potential barriers you might encounter with this person
or people from a similar culture that might affect interpersonal relations.
• Methods in which you might advocate and bring about greater acceptance for
individuals similar to your interviewee.
• Remember to end with a compelling Conclusion paragraph that describes what you
learned about yourself and others, both personally and professionally, from doing
this project.
Paper Structure:
• Requires a title page (and reference page if necessary), but no abstract. These must follow
APA style. No fancy colors or super fonts, etc. allowed.
• APA style includes a running head and use of college level grammar.
• If you are uncertain of how to create an APA Running Head search on YouTube for “how
to” videos similar to this:
• The body of the paper needs to be 5 full pages in length – this does NOT include the title
page, (and reference page, if any).
• APA standards include: font size of 12, Times New Roman, double spaced lines, single-sided
printed pages, margins set at 1 inch, and content headers used throughout the paper to
divide sections. Suggested headers are Introduction, Interview, Reflections, and
Conclusion.
• In the Introduction paragraph, introduce your interviewee, the culture, and some basic
details about the person including how you know them. This introductory paragraph
should set the stage for the aspects of the culture that you will be exploring within your
paper.
• The first part (4 FULL pages) (Introduction, Interview) of your paper should be a narrative
summary of the interview, where you paraphrase and summarize the discussion and
highlight the information you have obtained during the interview.
• The second part (1 FULL page) (Reflections, Conclusion) of your paper should be your plan
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for building bridges to overcome barriers in interpersonal relations with individuals from
the interviewee’s cultural group, as well as what you have learned from the assignment.
• A strong Conclusion paragraph is expected to summarize and tie together what you learned
through doing the interview and developing your plan.
• Additional references are not required for this assignment. However, if you use material
from another source, each reference must be cited using appropriate APA style and
included in a separate reference section at the end of the paper. Also, please note that
direct quotes from your interviewee require an APA-style citation for personal
communication, and you must have at least one citation for personal communication in
your paper.
Let me know if you have questions. Quality and thoughtfulness is extremely important in this paper! 🙂
