Everyone communicates, whether that meanshaving an in depth conversation with someone or not saying anything at all. As a communicator, it is important to be ethically responsible. This is especially important in college since there are so many people around who are of different ethnicities. Being ethically responsible means being knowledgeable about other cultures so, the communicator will not offend those of other ethnicities. If one is offended, the communicator’s message may not be transmitted. Ethical communication should be practiced since it is very important in conveying one’s message.
First, I should describe what ethics mean to me. Ethics means to me to abide by a certain conduct that is respectable to someone else’s culture so to not offend them when communicating with them. Another definition of ethics can be found in our textbook, Communicating: A Social and Career Focus. According to our textbook, “Ethics is the systematic study of what should be the grounds and principles for acceptable and unacceptable behavior” (Berko 29). There are many rules for acceptable behavior, which changes from culture to culture. Because of this, if one does not know about the rules of the culture it could be very easy to offend someone. For example if one were to give someone thumbs up in Afghanistan, it would offend someone since this is equivalent to someone raising their middle finger in America. This is why it is important to be ethnically responsible when communicating with others.
This is also important on college campuses. When speaking to people of other ethnicities it is best to understand something about the person’s moral standards so that one will not offend the other. For example, if someone tried to communicate while eating with their mouth open and arms on the table it would probably offend someone. This is why a small part of ethical communication requires being respectable and mannerly to others. Another example of being mannerly through communication is not interrupting someone while they are speaking. This is important to people in many cultures. It is also important while when talking to others to not use words that may be offensive to their race, gender, age, etc. For example if someone would say, “Stop acting like a sissy girl,” to a man, this could be offensive to the women who also hear the conversation.
Ethical communication is being respectable to someone of another culture. It is easier to be respectable to someone from your own culture because you may practice similar morals, but when it comes to someone of a different culture, it can be more difficult to know and understand their morals and standards. If one were to make themselves knowledgeable about other cultures before speaking with them, this could show respect for that person and their culture since you care enough about them to learn more about their culture.
Trying to be ethically responsible can be an issue however, when it comes to communicating with large groups. Since people are from all different cultures, it can be hard to please everyone at the same time. While communicating with large groups, it is important that the speaker find what the large group may have in common. For example, when I did my speech in class on online moneymaking, I focused on the fact that we were all college students and why this is a good endeavor for us as college students. This is important for a speaker to do when speaking to a large group since many people have so many differences. By showing what a large group may have in common, it lets the group temporarily forget about their differences. It is still important however to be culturally aware while speaking to others and to act accordingly.
Ethical communication is very important since it shows the importance of different cultures in communication. Everyone should know about other cultures in order to prevent ethnocentrism. Everyone has their own morals and they should be respected and acknowledged. Everyone cannot be pleased however when it comes to large groups everyone cannot be pleased. This is why when it comes to large groups the speaker must find what the groups have in common. All of these things should be taken into account when it comes to communicating with others of different ethnicities. Although people’s morals differ, it is still important to be respectable to everyone.
Works Cited
Berko, Roy M., Andrew D. Wolvin and Darlyn R. Wolvin. Communicating: A Social and Career Focus. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004.
