Author Description

Our Voices, Fourth Edition, examines communication in a variety of cultural and personal settings, with each contributor writing from the perspective of his or her cultural experience within diverse theoretical frameworks. Each essay addresses the question, "What is a cultural explanation and interpretation for this communication phenomenon from the ethnic scholar's perspective?"The fourth edition features seven new essays that address such topics of current interest and concern as creating a family across race and gender borders; the struggle for identity of multiethnic and biracial individuals in America; constructing American Jewish male identity; understanding class in the context of race, ethnicity, and gender; racial tensions in a 9/11 memorial; and 9/11 and "the color line." In addition, many of the previous essays have been significantly updated, and two new sections, "Economic Class and Cultural Identity" and "Reflecting on 9/11," have been added.Continuing the successful tradition of previous editions, the fourth edition:* Maintains a consistent focus on communication and culture. Each essay addresses important issues in areas of communication--including rhetoric, mass communication, and interpersonal communication. Together, the authors examine how culture influences the creation of meaning and how various uses of symbols and language constitute what we call cultural reality.* Introduces experience into examinations of cultural communication. The experience-driven approach is presented as a complement to theory-driven approaches to intercultural communication research.* Explores the rich cultural variety of communication practices within broad cultural labels. The premise is that there is not "one" style of any particular group any more than there is "one" style of Anglo-American communication.