Chapter 6

Intolerance-acceptance-appreciation
Intercultural Communication for Everyday Life

Framing intolerance (1)

Intolerance: A range of acceptability:
Intolerance Tolerance Appreciation

Intolerance: any thought, behavior, policy, or social

structure that treats people unequally based on group terms

Framing intolerance (2)

Tolerance: The application of the same moral principles and
rules, caring and empathy, and feeling of connection to human
beings of other perceived groups (Hecht & Baldwin, 1998, pp.
66-67).

Appreciation: Not only accepting a groups behaviors, but also

seeing the good in them, even adopting them, and actively
including the individuals of a group

Framing intolerance: Cognition

Attribution

Attribution and attributional bias

Attribution: a process by which we give meanings
to our own behavior and the behavior of others

The fundamental attribution error

The tendency to overestimate dispositional influences and
underestimate situational factors

The self-serving bias

https://
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fg1jQ6TJ4YY&noredirect=
1
2:06

Framing intolerance: Cognition

Attribution and attributional bias

Stereotypes: Oversimplified attitudes we have
towards others because we assume they hold
the characteristics of a certain group
Prejudice: Hostility towards or avoidance of
another, based on the group to which the
person belongs

Framing intolerance: Cognition

Stereotypes
Stereotypes function to help people make sense of the

world, based on categorization (the mental process of

grouping things, attributes, behaviors, and people into like
clusters)
People have stereotypes of other groups and of their own
group
All people have the tendency to rely on stereotypes
We may stereotype a person differently depending on the
group in which we mentally place them
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKvi2eZnphI&feature=youtu.be

Framing intolerance: Behavior

Arms-length prejudice (e.g., racism): Being
socially friendly towards people from a group
but not wanting closer social relationships with
them
Redneck prejudice (e.g., racism): A blatant
intolerance we see when someone speaks
openly and negatively about other groups

Framing intolerance: Policy and

social structure
Social policy: Legal and social policy that
discriminates based on group identity
Redlining: When banks avoid giving mortgages to
people wanting to purchase in certain neighborhoods
or to people of different ethnic or racial groups
Racial profiling: When law enforcement, store
security, or other officials target people of a specific
group for surveillance

Where does racism lie, and who can be racist? Dimensions of

intolerance

While these dimensions mention racism, they could apply to

any intolerance:
Attitude or behavior?
Overt or covert/subtle? (e.g., subtle and symbolic racism)
Defined by intent or result?
One of the biggest debates on issues such as racism and
sexism is whether
they are individual thoughts and
http://mothership.sg/2016/04/foreign-student-in-nusexpressions writes-an-article-on-the-racism-she-faces-in-singapore/
or social structural?

Where does racism lie, and who can

be racist? Dimensions of intolerance
Regardless of ones view, even if we define
racism as social or individual, a person who
experiences racism in a social structure that
systematically opposes their group will likely
experience it differently than someone who
experiences
it
as
an
exception
to
the
rule.
http://limpehft.blogspot.sg/2013/07/just-how-racist-arechinese-singaporeans.html

Solutions for intolerance

A key point: We often use education as the solution for
intolerancebut that works only if the only problem is
ignorance. If there are systemic social, legal/policy, or
media system influences on intolerance, educating the
individual will provide only a limited solution.
The most complete solution will take in the complexities
of intolerance in a given historical, social, and economic
context.

Solutions for intolerance:

Individual level
Use contact hypothesis (or contact theory)
to develop group events between members
of groups
Help people in the dominant group become
aware of their hidden privileges
Avoid simplistic solutions, such as
promoting colorhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYDzhrYwGTM
blindness

Solutions for intolerance:

Communicative level
Be aware of our own communicationthe jokes we
tell, the way we talk about others, even our own
nonverbal communication
Promote dialogue over real issues (not just
political correctness, which might change
language, but not intergroup hostility)
Address media imagery through social media,
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/tan-kin-lian-alleged-racistprotest to media
makers
033053745.html?linkId=12096543

Solutions for intolerance:

Structural
level
Group-based protest or petition appropriate
to what government in ones country allows
Investigate ways to change social structure,
from classroom seating to school-funding
models
Talk to politicians to promote policies that
enhance equality and respect between
groups
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics35852724

Thank you for a great semester!