Course:LLED222/Intercultural Communication/Saving Face
Saving Face in Canada
Introduction
"Saving Face" refers to maintaining a good self image. People who are involved in a conflict and secretly know that they are wrong will often not admit that they are wrong because they do not want to admit that they make a mistake. They therefore continue the conflict, just to avoid the embarrassment of looking bad. "Saving Face" might be often seen in High-Context culture like most of Asian countries' especially Japanese. On the other hand,cultures in the US and Canada, along with northern European countries, seems to be classified as low-context. For instance,in a international conference,interestingly Japanese prime minister(e.g. Hatoyama) would to tend to use "Saving Face" to communicate smoothly with the United Stated President(e.g. Obama). Learning different communication styles could be so useful for the intercultural communication. Most Japanese people is shyer than Canad, the United States and many European countries' people. Therefore, Japanese people is conservative and they do not express ourselves in order to save face. The action of Japanese people is related to the high-context culture.