Body Language Communication In The Cross-cultural Context From The Perspective Of Cultural Universals And Relativity

Generally speaking, human communication is performed in two ways: vocal language communication and nonverbal communication. Although the former is a more important form, we cannot neglect the latter, which is an important complement to the former. For instance, human vocal communication is always accompanied by kinesics, paralanguage, object language, environmental language and so on. Being used in a wide range, body language is a keynote of nonverbal communication and shaped by culture. On certain occasions they have no way but resort to body language, especially when they feel hard to communicate by language. The value of body movement shouldn't be ignored. American anthropologist Ray Birdwhistell claims that 65% information is conveyed through nonverbal communication.Body language communication varies from culture to culture. But with the development of the society, we have more chances to communicate with people from other countries. Cross-cultural communication is no longer strange to us. Since different nonverbal languages have different meanings in different cultures, conflicts are unavoidable. Nonverbal communication is attracting more and more scholars' attention.Based on the importance of body language in cross-cultural communication, the...