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Assimilation

Questions

Question

In this scene Stephanie is learning a skill that will help her assimilate into a different international culture. Other than moving to a different country, when else might a person make a life change that would cause him or her to try to assimilate to new ways?
Although answers may vary, student responses could include the need to assimilate to a campus life or to a new job. Further there could be answers that identify assimilation needed to enter or leave the military, or to move to a different geographical region within the United States, such as moving to the Deep South from the North, or from a rural town to a large urban setting.

Question

Identify an advantage to assimilating easily into a different international culture. What could be a disadvantage?
Student responses could include advantages such as feeling a sense of belonging and fitting in, learning new behaviors, learning to become more broad-minded and accepting, and discovering more about themselves. Student responses to disadvantages may include a feeling of losing core identity, difficulties in readjusting back to their home culture, and a sense of disorientation or confusion about their beliefs and attitudes that had been taken for granted previously.

Question

Stephanie is a new teacher in a completely different culture and is learning to assimilate. Identify three or four changes any person might have to make in order to assimilate into a different culture.
Student responses could include learning a new language or vocabulary, and learning to change clothing, diet, and everyday social manners as simple as greetings and courtesy behaviors. They may mention adjusting to different measures and sources of power, different attitudes regarding gender roles, or different attitudes about religion; how family is defined; the role of the elderly and the ways one measures status or shows respect; what is valuable and what is less valuable.
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