From Computer-Mediated Colonization to Culturally Aware ICT Usage and Design

Abstract

A number of examples demonstrate that technologies of computer-mediated communication (CMC) embed and foster specific cultural values and communicative preferences. Differences between the values and preferences embedded in CMC and those of a given cultural group thereby lead to communication failures. Hofstede’s and Hall’s theories partially explain these failures and, by contrast, examples of successful online cross-cultural communication via CMC designed to incorporate important cultural and communicative differences.