“Cultural Adaptation of Websites - Associated Content” plus 1 more

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Cultural Adaptation of Websites - Associated Content Posted: 07 Feb 2011 07:12 PM PST If your company is planning on offering its web site in different languages, you should consider the following scenarios. Imagine reading English sentences from top-to-bottom, right-to-left, as English letters would be  laid out following the pattern of Chinese text. Or, in a less complex world imagine reading English right to left as you would in Arabic text. Finally, imagine accessing product information in Spanish only, so that you could obtain a better price on an item. Would you be tempted to stay at web sites such as these for a long time as an English speaker? Probably not. This question places most Americans in the shoes of members of ethnic groups or of foreign nationals who must access web sites designed and "translated" into target languages without adaptation. Speaking your customer's language in web site design terms means laying out the text in a way that it would be read in the targeted culture. You must remember as well that any trip to an art museum reveals how different cultures prefer different arrangements of space, which should carry over into the layout of web sites. Colors carry different meanings in many cultures as well. Some cultures prefer animated navigation while others prefer static images. Even the way addresses are displayed is different and needs to be adapted. Why Do Web Sites Need Cultural Adaptation? Arguments such as these have failed to persuade many transnational corporations to adopt culturally adapted web sites. Instead, they use standardized web sites that translate and utilize the text, images, and layout of their headquarters site. Marieke de Mooij (1998) argues against this idea in Global Marketing and Advertising: Understanding Cultural Paradoxes, in which she emphasizes that culture continues to affect the cognitive styles of individuals such that it affects the way they interact with brands (the network of associations) of products or services. Web sites are another cultural artifact that individuals will approach with their particular cognitive style derived from their culture. How to Judge the Success of a Culturally Adapted Web Site This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php Five Filters featured article: Collateral Damage - WikiLeaks In The Crosshairs.

Pattern Recognition and Cultural Aspects of Music - Associated Content Posted: 07 Feb 2011 06:43 PM PST Human brains in particular seem to have a highly developed and flexible pattern recognition capability. This aspect of our intelligence has allowed us to adapt in many different climates and conditions, make the best  use of available shelter and resources, and to build language and culture to communicate to each other and succeeding generations. It also allows us to appreciate and to create pattern for its own sake in the form of visual and aural Arts. The simplest form of pattern is just repetition. If we see something familiar, then it triggers memories and related thoughts, sometimes consciously and sometimes unconsciously. The repetition needn't be exact, but "similar" enough to trigger that familiarity. A pattern is something that we hear and recognize as a similar sound or group of sounds twice then it clicks in our brain. The pattern is often fairly simple consisting of a single note or a few notes in sequence. We will struggle to remember if the sequence is long and it becomes too boring if we hear the music playing many times and cause unconscious experience that can affect us largely due to pattern recognition. The cultural aspects of music are built upon basic foundations, the tempo, pitch and pattern, which evolved overtime into complex conventions that are passed on from many generations. The relative isolation of different communities during musical development evolved in different directions. Then later cross-fertilization between different cultures led to the introduction of new elements, which are initially molded to fit the adopting culture and then evolved further. We now have some familiarity with the increase of communication across the globe and perhaps we recognize the region of origin, though there is no denying that many old forms of world music are being "westernized." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php Five Filters featured article: Collateral Damage - WikiLeaks In The Crosshairs.

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