Intercultural Communication: Video Analysis of Indians, Outlaws, and Angie Debo
This study case analyses the video “Indians, Outlaws and Angie Debo” with respect to question number one: “What insights about intercultural communication is revealed when one considers the histories, power and identities documented in the intercultural interactions portrayed in the video?”. The following analysis shows the implications of power on people´s conditions of living in the present as well as on people´s perception of history in the past. Moreover it shows how history influences our understanding of who we really are and therefore shapes our personal identity. All those points are the cause of disparity between two culturally different groups. According to the similarity-attraction approach, people tend to avoid others who are unlike them (Colquitt, Lepine, Wesson, 2013), so that a huge barrier between the two diverse groups arises. But does this justify a discriminatory and even hostile behavior toward the inferior group?
The documentary “Indians, Outlaws and Angie Debo” shows Angie Debo as a 98-year old lady, reflecting on her experiences in life. In the documentary she talks about Oklahoma´s history of depriving its five Native American tribes of their land and resources in the 1930s from the perspective of the displaced. Native Americans during this time were seen more than ever as a bounded group by the European Anglo-Americans [in the following analysis, the dominant European Anglo-American group is referred to as whites to simplify the reading]. In comparison to whites who felt superior and avowed to themselves the power to dominate the inferior race, the Native Americans were ascribed a strongly subordinated position in society and were treated in a discriminatory way by the whites.
History is always about perceptions. Therefore there are generally two sides of history: the “winner´s” and the “loser´s” side. As history is normally written down by the winners, which is called grand narrative, only few people know which experiences the losers, or
The documentary “Indians, Outlaws and Angie Debo” shows Angie Debo as a 98-year old lady, reflecting on her experiences in life. In the documentary she talks about Oklahoma´s history of depriving its five Native American tribes of their land and resources in the 1930s from the perspective of the displaced. Native Americans during this time were seen more than ever as a bounded group by the European Anglo-Americans [in the following analysis, the dominant European Anglo-American group is referred to as whites to simplify the reading]. In comparison to whites who felt superior and avowed to themselves the power to dominate the inferior race, the Native Americans were ascribed a strongly subordinated position in society and were treated in a discriminatory way by the whites.
History is always about perceptions. Therefore there are generally two sides of history: the “winner´s” and the “loser´s” side. As history is normally written down by the winners, which is called grand narrative, only few people know which experiences the losers, or