are you one of us?

stereotypes, defined as the generalized beliefs by which we make sense of the world around us, regardless of context or accuracy, is part of an attitudinal barrier to intercultural communication. as humans, we all have the tendency to stereotype others despite the accuracy or context. for instance, in this following video, a few examples of stereotypes have been portrayed.

the first character, which is named 'R-Dizzle' is a depiction of a stereotypical gangster. just like any other groups of people, they are assumed of certain characteristics such as being a somewhat mean and rebellious person, who likes to speak in a certain way that make them sound as if they are rapping. as you can see in the video, they way he introduced himself with words that rhyme with his name and also his hand gestures; kinesics which is used as a form of regulator to his verbal communication is also another characteristic of a gangster. furthermore, in his flashback, he was shown to be rebellion in a comedic way where he touched the big, green ball on display which has a note stuck on it, specifically telling people not to touch it. besides, when he found what others say to be funny and agreeable, he used "that's tight", which is like a jargon where only a group of gangsters would understand, to express his liking towards it.

moving on, the second character which is a girl named 'Regina' is portrayed to be a naive and not so intelligent girl who likes puppies and dislikes disgusting and dirty things. here, a girl has been stereotyped to be someone who likes cute, fluffy animals, hates filthy, revolting things and not to mention, likes wearing clothing that's sexy in order to show off their body. and she was shown to be a girl who's not very smart. case in point, in her flashback, she was holding up a lamp, saying that it is an umbrella. what's more, the way she moves her hands, when she talks is also another typical assumption of how a girl’s hand gestures and body movements would be like when she speaks; which is somewhat limp-wristed or feminine.

lastly, there's also the Japanese character, 'Hanate'. in this short video, he represented a typical Japanese to be someone whose English is not fluent. his pronunciation of English words was also enunciated with Japanese accent. for example, when he introduced himself to the rest of the group, he opened up a book to read from it, showing that he doesn't know his English that well. moreover, he pronounced his name as 'Boob' instead of 'Bob', and this resulted in an attitudinal barrier to intercultural communication with the rest of the group, who are not Japanese as they were unable to understand what he was saying. other than that, his given name was also one that a typically assumed Japanese name, which contains words like suzuki, teriyaki, sushi, honda civic and etc. although the way he pronounced his own name sounds like a real Japanese name, more often than not, Japanese names do not consist of such words. they are just assumptions people arrived, from the derivation of the names of Japanese products. finally, he is also portrayed to be a ninja. this again, is a stereotyped characteristic of a Japanese, because ninjas are often associated with Japanese.

so, after watching the video, and understanding more about it, do you think that the stereotypical aspects implied in the video is accurate? what is your idea of a gangster or ninja or even a girl? is it similar to the ones in the video? though, having said that, this is only a video for entertainment purposes where stereotypes are used as a form of comic effect.

just another publicity stunt?

agenda setting using the media's ability, functions to raise the importance of an issue in the public's mind simply through repeated news coverage. the act of priming in which the media attend to some issues over others, also alter the standards by which people evaluate the issue.

very recently, while I was watching random videos on youtube, I had by chance, encountered a video regarding Miley Cyrus and her twitter account. out of curiosity, I clicked on the video to watch it, and it struck me right then and there that the media is really much more influential that I had bother to give credit to. surely, a non-significant action like shutting down your twitter account will never be buzz-worthy. but it was different for Miley Cyrus. because the moment she shuts down her twitter account, it became Entertainment News; E! worthy in mere minutes. it was like a worldwide phenomenon, with more than hundreds of different videos reporting on this seemingly insignificant news. yet, after all that videos, and reports, the idea of the news being an important one has been planted into the public's mind. soon, everyone was talking about it, discussing it, giving their opinions, even raising an issue.

even the recent natural disasters which struck several different countries haven’t gotten as much feedback from the public, due to its lack of 'priming' by the media. although, i'd have to say that media influences do depend largely on the direct experiences the public has been exposed to, with the issue addressed. for many, disasters occurring in other countries do not even worry the minority because most people living in the countries not affected by the earthquakes or floods, will be exposed to only obtrusive issues; which has only limited effect.

as for Miley Cyrus's case, being a renowned pop star has made news and gossips regarding her life, an unobtrusive issue to the public. and in knowing the effect of a juicy celebrity gossip, the media has taken the initiative to report more on them, creating a louder volume of news coverage on the issue. additionally, the tone in which the media has used to address this issue elicited a lot of discussions and received a lot of feedbacks. likewise, the tones used, suggesting surprise, shock and disbelief has triggered a lot of responses from the public, each with a different stand. some are angry and irritated with the amount of coverage it was receiving, some are sad Miley Cyrus decided to leave twitter, and others are just plain sarcastic about the whole idea of people making a big fuss out of something so small. yet, despite where you stand, what you say, you are still contributing to more discussions in others; just like what i'm doing now. here's an example of how people are expressing their views on this issue....

finally, there's also the salience. the nature of this news being a celebrity gossip has elevated the interest of the public. moreover, the fact that it was one concerning a pop star, named 'America's favourite' has earned this coverage more publicity worth than it deserved. and the biggest catch was the reason behind her deletion of her twitter account, whether it was true or just another made-up reason, it was regarding her intimate interpersonal relationship and how it had affected her decision. with all that aspects tackled by the media, it's no wonder the public was unable to resist the temptations of making comments on all these.

indisputably through all these, the media has proven to have a substantial amount of influence in our lives. perhaps in the near future, you will see hundreds video featured on youtube urging everyone to comment on this blog of mine. when that happens, you know you will not be able to refrain from it. so before I put my freshly acquired 'agenda setting' knowledge to use, you should comment on your own free wills.

Suruhanjaya Pilihan Raya aka EB!

a group is “a collection of individuals who, as a result of interacting with one another over time, become interdependent, developing shared patterns of behaviour and a collective identity”

Trenholm (2004)

if based on what Trenholm describes a group to be, i would say that i have been blessed to be able to think back now, and smugly tell everyone that i’ve been involved in a successful group communication; in my opinion. but what will the application of my coms knowledge say about it? before that, let me introduce…

The EBs of 2008/2009

we are most commonly known as EB, short for ELECTION BOARD. we are a neutral, task-oriented group, formed by the school in order to ensure that the election of the STUDENT COUNCIL is fair. basically, we are a group of students who help organise events and provide help to all the new, prospective candidates of the new student council each year. the main task that we have been set out to do was, to promote student council to the campus, while ensuring an impartial and unprejudiced election of the student council.

there were 18 of us in the group, each in charge of different parts, throughout the entire 3 month period of our service.

our group consisted of...

- 1 Chairperson
- 3 Vice-chairpersons
- 1 Secretary
- 1 Vice-secretary
- 1 Treasurer
- 2 Promotion leaders
- 2 Nomination leaders
- 2 Leadership Camp leaders
- 2 Fixed & Free Campaign leaders
- 2 Election Day leaders
- 1 Year-one Election Board coordinator

to start off, our chairperson is the leader of the group, often overseeing everything. if i were to assess her, i would probably say that she's the opinion seeker-encourager. habitually, during meetings, she will be the one who initiates the discussion by seeking opinions on the ways we could go about our tasks. and if we ever encounter problems along the way, she will be the one to encourage us not to give up with our task at hand.

then there are the 3 vice-chairpersons. i would say that having 3 vice-chairpersons is the weirdest part about our group. however, certainly it was formed that way for a reason. which was to maximise our group synergy and simultaneously, minimise our workload. to me, our vice-chairpersons consisted of the combinations, evaluator-harmoniser, energiser-standard setter, initiator-expediter.

the first vice is always evaluating the nature of our discussions and views, making sure we understood them well before settling for any, so as to not make any wrong decisions which could bring about an irreversible mistake. besides that, she is also the harmoniser in the group. whenever there are any expression of dissimilarities in opinions which could result in arguments, she will be the one who resolves it peacefully, preventing conflicts between us.

the second vice, will surely be the energiser of the group, always giving us the strength to continue when we need it most. he is also the standard-setter of our group, constantly ensuring that no matter how little time we had for our tasks, we should always abide by a certain standard.

as for the third vice, she has been the initiator every time. being an 'action' person, she's constantly the first to carry out all the decided plans, initiating the 'working mode' in us. not forgetting her expediter character in controlling the direction of all our discussions, making certain that it does not deviate, thus speeding up our discussion time, making us more efficient in completing our tasks.

as for the secretaries and treasurer alike, are recorders-compromisers. they are always there, to record everything. the secretaries, writing minutes of the meetings so that we do not forget the details of every idea. while the treasurer accounts all the expenses of our group, making sure that we do not overspend unnecessarily. they are also the compromisers in the group because they are always the few that listens to opinions and are ready to accept diverse approaches to the tasks, by contributing towards the completion process no matter what.

now, Promotion leader as mentioned before, promotes the Student council (SC) in order to encourage the new students to take the initiative to nominate themselves. they are to create posters, banners, film advertisements or any other way possible, to attract the attention of the new students to nominate themselves. below is an example of advertisements that i meant... but it's not from our year.

later, after the 2 weeks promotion period, Nomination leaders take over, by organising an interview session for all the nominees. after the interview, EB would proceed to eliminate nominees which have failed to meet all the stated requirements.

as soon as the list of nominees have been narrowed down, the Leadership camp leaders take over by continuing with the 3 days 2 nights camp where all the potential candidates are taught a thing or two about becoming a leader. during the camp, the current SC and also EB will silently appraise all the potential candidates, to shift out more outstanding ones, that show leadership qualities. at the end of the camp, more nominees will be eliminated based on their performance during the camp. from there, the freshly shortlisted students will be known as, candidates. following, is a picture from the camp...

upon returning from the camp, it will be the Fixed & Free campaign leaders' turn to organise a series of events to create opportunities for the candidates to present themselves to all the students, to earn votes.

once the period of 2 weeks of campaigning is up, Election leaders step in to organise the election day, overlooking every minor detail from the ballot papers to the arrangements of voting halls to the vote-counting, to see to it that the voting fair. then at the end of it, the 10 students chosen, will be elected formally as the new SC, in a Swearing-In ceremony.

throughout the entire period of the EB service, each leader will step into place, taking up the role of a chairperson to the rest of the group, consecutively. therefore, in the overall evaluation, these leaders will portray different roles in dissimilar tasks, giving every member a chance to contribute.

lastly, the Year-one EB coordinator, who is in charge of leading the year-ones who aspire to be the next EB following our retirement. of course, they would first need to contribute to the requirements of manpower in our organisation of events, and at the same time gather experiences so that they would be able to familiarise themselves with the job of an EB. which makes our year-one EB coordinator, a people person. unquestionably, this was the main reason he was chosen to take up this particular position in the first place, since he was required to manage a great deal of people, and make certain that they listened to him.

so you see, this must be a very strong combination right? and we dont even have symptoms of groupthink, i hope...

groupthink is “a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action”

Irving Jarvis

well, that was my personal experience of a group communication. so, what's yours?

relationships are just pure hard work

Interpersonal relationship can be termed as an association between two or more people. Emotions like love and liking are usually the basis to such association. Different interpersonal relationships occur under dissimilar contexts. However, what I intend to focus on today, is regarding intimate or romantic interpersonal relationships. Relational formation and development usually begins with a general perception of physical appearance, and then it depends on reasons varied according to diverse needs of different people. Of course, these needs are usually positive ones. For example, where Scarlett Johansson dishes about her relationship with husband, Ryan Reynolds to Glamour magazine, “I never really thought about getting married -- it just kind of happened ... You hope that a relationship makes you better, that you learn things about yourself ... I feel more confident to explore things within myself that I hadn't thought about in the past.” Here, it shows an example of the numerous reasons of a relational formation. To Scarlett Johansson, being in a relationship with Ryan Reynolds helps her learn things about herself and also makes her a better person.Click HERE to read more.

Moving on, typically, as soon as a relationship begins, it is only normal that what comes afterwards is the managing of it. The formation of a relationship is only the beginning to a continuous task which requires a lot of hard work and effort in order for it to maintain. Therefore, the maintenance of a relationship is normally the hardest part of a relationship. However, if all is well, the end results will be very satisfying. If despite all the effort and sweat, the relationship still doesn’t go well, that’s when you know that it has entered into a whole new stage, where dissolution is necessary to ease the pain of both parties involved in the relationship. When this happens, Duck’s Model of Relational Dissolution comes into play. In this model, there is a series of five processes in no prescribed order, intrapsychic, dyadic, social, grave-dressing and resurrection processes. More often than not, you will know that a relational dissolution is commencing when one side of the party starts to question all the flaws and the consequences of them in the relationship. From there, they will continue a process within Duck’s model, in no particular sequences, until the final decision is made. That is when both parties agree to separate peacefully and move on.

Another example, Us Weekly reported that Avril Lavigne and her husband of three years, Deryck Whibley will be separating. Also, Avril Lavigne took to her blog to address the split. “I am grateful for our time together, and I am grateful and blessed for our remaining friendship. I admire Deryck and have a great amount of respect for him. He is the most amazing person I know, and I love him with all my heart. Deryck and I are separating and moving forward on a positive note.” In this article, quoted from Avril Lavigne’s blog, her relationship with her husband was coming to an end. But instead of abiding by Cody’s relationship disengagement strategies, they are ending their relationship on a positive note and rather than behavioral de-escalation, they still remain friends despite breaking up. Again, click HERE for more.

Lastly, there is also the Knapp's Model of Relational Development. This being one of the most influential models of relationship by Mark Knapp, what is a relationship evaluation without the acknowledgment of it, right? So, according to Knapp’s model, a relationship progresses and develops in a series of ten stages in two phases. These included stages 1 to 5 being the 'coming together' phase and stages 6 to 10 being the 'coming apart' phase. However, these stages do not necessarily take place in sequence, as it may skip several stages or regress even after moving forward. The image to your top right will further explain the model, setting in train with 'initiating' and comes to an end with 'terminating'.

An article by Associated Press reports on Greg Norman, an Australian professional golfer and Chris Evert, a former World No.1 professional tennis player’s divorce. The article also incorporated stories of their past, explaining how they met and eventually got together. During then, they were still settling with their own divorces with their previous partners. After their meeting, everything else was history. But now, here we are, at the end of it once more. Then in no time, we will hear news about their new love life with distinct partners. That’s when you know another relational development has taken place yet again, starting from stage 1 and slowly work its way towards the end once more. To know more, read it for yourself HERE.

reversals of fortune

the first episode of the new season of gossip girl featured an unforgettable scene where after a long summer break, Serena returned from Europe as a popular person, constantly swarmed by reporters. in the beginning, her family, especially her stepfather had been very concern about the reason behind the reporters tailing her everywhere. but she had merely shaken the concern off her stepfather by telling him that she didn’t know why she was suddenly bursting with popularity. she had also managed to put up an innocent, i-dont-know-what-is-going-on act in front of her family so that it would make her excuse legible where she had managed to put all the blames on her past.

however, it soon became clear to everyone that it had not been her past haunting her, but her wild Europe parties which was made public in every magazine around the globe. instantly, her family came to the conclusion that she had somehow returned to her old habits where she would party with friends irrationally. but the real reason for Serena’s odd behaviours was revealed soon. all the effort of partying absurdly and featured in the cover of multiple magazines, was only so that she was able to acquire attention from her father whom had abandoned her for years. this was only because despite her countless effort to seek out her father whom have not been in contact with her for several years, he had made it clear to her that he didn't want anything to do with her anymore. as a result, Serena tried really hard to capture the attention of her father no matter where he went, by doing ridiculous things in front of paparazzi so that she would be featured in every mass media possible in the world.

this episode got me thinking a lot about the way Serena tried to get the attention of her father in spite of not being able to verbally communicate with him. she attempted to send messages across to her father and get him to notice her by communicating non-verbally. though, regardless of her efforts, she was only successful in obtaining all the wrong and unwanted attentions from random people but not the attention that she had thirsted for. attention from her father.

non-verbal communication is receiver-oriented as it depends on the receiver to interpret and attach meaning to the non-verbal cues. this could very much explain why Rufus has misinterpreted the real reason behind Serena's peculiar behaviours. this is because, to Rufus’s perception of the situation, he construed the non-verbal cues displayed by Serena as one of the many terrible and foolish things that she does, which resulted in troubles for everyone around her to resolve.

some other examples of non-verbal communication also include the part where Lily, Serena’s mother had gotten her family, consisting of Dan, Jenny, Eric, Rufus and also Serena invitations to a prestigious private event. as most of them had never really been able to enjoy the beauty of a prominent event held by people from a higher social status, Dan, Jenny and Eric made faces to express their disliking towards the idea of having to attend the event. from their facial expressions, it was apparent that they had articulated their dissatisfaction towards the decision to attend the event without their prior approval.

perhaps non-verbal communications are not always as easy as it seems. although all of us would have engage ourselves in any kind of non-verbal communications at least once in our lives whether or not we even realise it. because when it comes down to it, not being able to speak your mind and express yourself with words can more than once, create misunderstanding and misinterpretation of things that we want to say. just like in this case, Serena wanted to attain attention from his father but instead, she got herself in trouble with her stepfather, Rufus who thinks she is a trouble child. and as a result, endeavours to keep her out of the media.

just my thought

my beloved friends and i back in my hometown, Kota Kinabalu

as an international student here in Singapore, settling down and getting used to the new surroundings, posts a new challenge to my already difficult life.

being away from my hometown, although merely few thousand kilometres away, it has never made me miss home more. i mean, who would ever expect the life of a foreign student to be so hard. and this is especially for an introverted person like me. when i joined a new college for a Cambridge A-level course a year ago, back in Malaysia, the first few days had been lonely. but as soon as i met new friends, things change completely. having friends can really change things. for one, i no longer had to be afraid that if i ever miss any important points given by our lecturers for an assignment. cause my friends are always around to lend a helping hand. compared to what I'm going through now, perhaps those few days which i had thought was the worst times of my life, are actually just appetizers to my three course meal of living it hard.

being here, i was not only unable to make new friends. even the chance to talk was almost entirely zero. what? as if having a lecture in a lecture theatre of more than hundreds of people are not enough. everyone had to look like strangers too. and most of all, they all look very unapproachable, already adapted to their own group of friends and not willing to readjust themselves to anymore changes via external force. maybe i have always been a paranoid person. but knowing that doesn't change the fact that I'm afraid of approaching random strangers and just strike a conversation like i actually belong there with them. and that's just because I'm scared at the mere thought of them shunning me out once they hear me speak to them. so, i have chosen to keep quiet and remain absolutely invisible rather than having to embarrass myself by speaking up, only to find that my way of communication has been barricaded by a language-based barrier.

being an international student, i have only been exposed to cases of exclusionary language whereby local students or foreign students from other countries alienated me by communicating in ways that as a Malaysian, i could never understand. therefore, in order to convince myself that i have made the right decision not to approach random strangers in campus just for the sake of commencing a conversation, i had begun to chant "silence is still a way of communication" as my mantra almost daily. or rather, whenever I'm still in the boundaries of the campus.

plus, i have always been happy staying within my comfort zone, playing everything safe. but the moment i stepped down of the airplane the first night I was here, everything that i have worked so hard all my life to build, had crumbled down in a matter of seconds. i realised that i was no longer in the safe boundary of my comfort zone. and just like last year, i was once again forced to step out of the comfort zone i had only just begun to be grown attached to. and now, everything new is forcing their way into shaping a new zone. a zone i had secretly hoped to be as good as the last. however, only time will tell...

im a chingstah

ask anyone what is a YouTube, and they will tell you the same thing. but have you heard my answer before? if you are curious to know what I'm going to say, please read on...

YouTube is deemed as a video sharing website. who would have thought that a website like that would ever be able to produce some of the most popular upcoming stars. although they only started sharing videos of themselves as a form of blogging, which is called video blogging. when i first saw the word vlogging, i was hesitant about the word's existence. i didn't even know what it meant until one day, my sister told me about it and said that it is actually short for 'video blogging'.

so then, i started searching and watching videos of random vloggers (also another word to describe video bloggers) and instantly, i was hooked. all the comedic stunts earned them several hundred thousands of viewers or subscribers which also indirectly, alleviated them to the path of stardom. and amongst all the huge variety of genres and themes the vloggers opted for, the comedians are usually the most supported ones.

however, amidst all the different vloggers i have stumbled upon, one left me a particularly deep impression. and with some of his most recent videos, he not only showed his music-composing talent,but also acting skills which explained clearly as to why he had infinite subscribers.



personally, i felt that this video was one of his best, and had captured my attention the most. even with the usage of words that might appear to most, as jargon, he managed to portray a character which may be unfamiliar to a lot of us, yet, with this song of his and the music video, although, being linear model of communication, it was able to instantly lift the communication barrier between his ideas and that of his viewers'. his lyrics are about an Asian wannabe gangster which they call 'chingstah' or also known as 'chingster'. meaning, Chinese gangster. overall, i felt that the description of a stereotypical Asian gangster is somewhat true. especially the fact that most of them are merely wannabes.

wannabes usually feel that gangsters are really cool and wants to be just like them. however, being a Chinese myself, i know that these people usually only attempt to act like one, but would never do anything that would actually result in their classification into the group 'gangsters' but instead, be collocated as 'wannabes'. and when this happens, i would only say that they are desperate and pathetic.

i mean, why try to be someone else when you can be yourself? wouldn't it be easier and effortless to just be yourself? if you are saying that people wouldn't like you the way you are, I'm telling you now, that it's not true. everyone has a different perception and view on the same things. cause "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" and one person doesn't represent all. so, don't give yourself an excuse that you are not likable as yourself. cause that reason is no longer valid. besides, if you never give yourself and others a chance, how would you ever know that people would not like you for who you are?

i know that first impressions are important to most people. i mean, who wouldn't want to look good and make an excellent first impression? human tend to judge a book by it's cover. but that is only the case when your exterior is all that they can see and judge. sometimes, it takes more than just good looks for someone to like you. it takes a much deeper understanding to exist, in order for someone to sincerely like you for who you are, despite your flaws. because when it all comes down to it, beauty fades. and when that happens, what's in your heart is the only thing you have left. right?

jeez. i guess vlogging is really a better alternative to get your message across without having to type until your hands are numb.