With all of the emphasis in intercultural communications on recognizing and embracing one’s cultural identity, it’s important to remember that while acknowledging someone’s ethnicity may be natural, it also may have no connection whatsoever to the meaning of the interaction at hand, as with this playful ad by Wieden + Kennedy for Swagger by…
DetailsI love intercultural communications, and I love cookies, so I had to love this ad for oreos that connects two little girls from different cultural backgrounds by their common enjoyment of and manner of eating Oreos. For a strong diversity program to succeed, it’s important that internal programs and policies align with external communications. This seems to be the case for…
DetailsThe problem with stereotyping is that it presumes guilt before innocence, dictating that someone will behave a certain way because of their race or ethnicity. In the extreme, the results can be devastating, as they were for the late Timothy Cole, a young black man who was exonerated last week for a rape he didn’t…
DetailsCall me crazy, but if I owned a company that had as many discrimination lawsuits against it as Denny’s, I don’t know that I would lead with an ad that purposely uses ethnic stereotypes to relay its message. Over the years Denny’s has faced suits from groups of African Americans, Muslim Americans, employees, women…perhaps they…
DetailsI took Dillon and one of his classmates to the Chinese New Year parade in Chicago’s Chinatown yesterday. You have to love culture in an urban environment: there were dragons and lion dancers and colorful floats from various Asian-American Chambers of Commerce, but also the Irish Shamrock Rovers and marching bands and drill teams from…
DetailsI started to write a simple “10 Quick Steps to Preparing for Your International Visitor,” as in preparing to meet your mother-in-law from Argentina for the first time or hosting the new team from Korea for a business conference, but I realized it rang of insincerity. Sure, you can (and should) read works of fiction…
DetailsThe Huffington Post has taken up the cause of 10 year old Damon Weaver, reporter for the Kathryn E. Cunningham Canal Point Elementary school TV station, to get a one-on-one interview with President Obama. As his story continues to grow, he did get credentials to cover the Inauguration. Dwayne Wade also has offered to play…
DetailsTake look at this delightful ad for Heineken created by TBWA\Neboko, Amstelveen. The ad does play on stereotypic “likes” of the sexes-shoes for her and beer for him, but it does it in a light, non-judgmental way that works. What is particularly nice in this day of globalization is that while there is a minimal…
DetailsAccording to psychologytoday.com, a mid-life crisis can hit around age 40, plus or minus 20 years, and can include “questioning decisions made years earlier and the meaning of life.” However, in the words of English novelist George Eliot (aka Mary Anne Evans), “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” As…
DetailsI will say one thing for this recent Ad for Virgin Atlantic Airlines, it does seem to be “on-brand” with the image of its owner, Richard Branson. The ad uses images (a brick sized mobile phone, dated hair-do’s) and music (Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax”) to capture the essence of 1984 in celebration of the…
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