Country Culture Brief - The World is Your Oyster

This assignment will give you an opportunity to delve more deeply into a country you currently know little about but are interested in for either career or personal reasons. You are asked to apply your growing knowledge of culture and communication concepts, strategies, and tools to examine the country and its dominant culture(s) for each layer of the culture pyramid or iceberg.

The objective is to use a number of different primary and secondary research resources in undertaking this analysis including sourcesfrom each of the following categories:

1. A fictionalized story (may be based on a true story but not told in a documentary form) set in that country/culture in film format (i.e. a movie). Some possible examples are: Best Marigold Hotel,Outsourced,Biutiful,The Godfather,Disgrace, The Gods Must Be Crazy, The Namesake; Departures (Japan, 2008); Shun Li and the Poet;Mr. Baseball (1992); Eat, Pray, Love; Everything is Illuminated, Gran Torino,The Colour of Paradise,Cherry Blossoms,Mississippi Masala, etc. (Please use the highlighted film)

2. Research materials including print and online publications such as the materials referenced in our text, (Anderson, Bennet, Friesen, Hofstede, etc.) and sources you discover in your own research.

3. A live interview of someone who is either from that country/culture or is well acquainted with it from personal experience. (Must be from Mexican Culture)

In your report you are asked to:

A. Summarize your key findings about the country/culture you are studying and provide support or the basis for these observations from your research sources;(Mexican Culture)

B. Use the results from items #2 and #3 above to assess how well the culture was portrayed or reflected in the film; and

C. Comment on which aspects of that country's culture you are likely to find most challenging should you one day choose to live/work there and why this would be so.(Mexican Culture)

Report Format
Please report your findings in a brief of no less than 4 and no more than 5 pages, using 1.5 spacing in a reasonable font and in proper essay format, using APA style citations - you may use headings to organize your report. Please provide an additional page for your selected references in APA style. You may attach your interview questions and responses separately as well, if you wish, as an appendix.