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This film shows two different cultures. Xu Datong's ideas and methods represent Chinese culture, while American lawyers and others represent American culture. They have conflicts in the process of communication. However, cross-cultural communication is a challenge and a gain. Because cross-cultural communication is full of misunderstanding and failure is a conflict, successful cross-cultural communication is not easy, but it is also an activity that can bring profound changes to people. The experience of cross-cultural communication enables people to have a broader vision, richer experience, more mature personality, more complex thinking, and more tolerant attitude. Through cross-cultural communication, we can more deeply feel that there are different lives in the world, and learn to understand and appreciate this cultural difference. In addition, cross-cultural communication is also a kind of promotion for culture itself. The exchange of different cultures can help culture absorb various essence, face up to the shortcomings of this culture, and let culture develop and progress together.

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The film Guasha shows us a series of conflicts caused by different legal systems and social habits of Chinese in the United States. This kind of conflict can be called a conflict of Chinese style and American style. It can be said that the dramatic conflict of the whole film is caused by the conflict of the characters in the play due to cross-cultural communication. The whole film is like a magnifying glass, presenting the conflict between Chinese and American cultural differences to the audience. The differences in history, religion, social organization and language between the two major civilizations of China and the United States closely affect the intercultural communication process of the whole film characters.

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The second concept in the film The Gua Sha Treatment (2001) is that of culture and identity at the workplace. Culture and identity are anchored on the diversity of the transcultural workplace (Michael & Janne, 2022). In the analysis of transcultural communication at the workplace, the three dimensions of individualism and collectivism, neutrality and emotionality, and directivism and indirectivism are generally referred upon to assess and describe the perception of these differences in a transcultural workplace (Piller, 2017).

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C. Gouttefarde, “Host National Culture Shock: What Management Can Do,” European Business Review 92, 4 (1992): 1.

Groff, A. (2020). Power distance index (PDI). Salem Press Encyclopedia.

Jackson, J. (2014). Introducing language and intercultural communication. London & New York: Routledge.

Kirilova, M. and Jo A. (2018). ‘You Are Now One of Us – Negotiating “Fitting in” in the Workplace’. In The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdiversity, edited by Angela Creese and Adrian Blackledge, 345–360. London: Routledge.

LeVine, R.A. (2017). International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences: Second Edition. ELSEVIER. p. 166.

Michael, E. & Janne M. (2022). Culture and identity at work MERGE 90026 Lecture 5 Semester 2- 2022 [PowerPoint slides]. https://canvas.lms.unimelb.edu.au/courses/159631/pages/week-5-lecture?module_item_id=3762115.

McCornack, Steven; Ortiz, Joseph (2017). Choices & connections: an introduction to communication. Bedford/St. Martin's.

Piller, I. (2017). Intercultural communication: A critical introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

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The film's plot intends to demonstrate identity conflicts between the Chinese culture and the American transcultural scene. The protagonist, Datong, seems to have fully accomplished his American dream. In reality, he still faces great difficulties in entering the workplace because of lacking to understand the local explicit or implicit ideologies (Kirilova & Jo, 2018, p. 347). These ideologies are entrenched on the differences between American and Chinese dimensions of individualism and collectivism, neutrality and emotionality, and directivism and indirectivism. In the film, Traditional oriental Chinese medicine is not recognised in the US, and it cannot be justified by the Western doctor's theory of Gua Sha based on deconstruction. The protagonist Datong Xu asks his most trusted friend and boss, lawyer John Quinlan, for help in his defense, only to be outrightly rejected.

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Described in terms of Piller's three dimensions, China can be regarded as a highly collectivist culture (Piller, 2017, p. 122) ，whereas the United States is individualistic. This is evidenced by the fact that Attorney John Quinlan does not help Datong directly, even though he is his friend and emphasises his opinion. In the end, John Quinlan does not defend Datong in front of the judge. On the contrary, Datong, being from a collectivist Chinese culture, ideologically believes that his good friend John Quinlan can understand him from an emotional point of view and offer him help. To his astonishment, Quinlan does not reciprocate. Therefore, conflict is quite evident in the transcultural scenario of the film. It presents the dimension of the three conflicts that the Chinese people could encounter in America’s transcultural work scenario.

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The first theory related to plots in Gua Shua is power distance. Devised in the 1970s by Dutch business theorist Geert Hofstede, the power distance index measures people’s attitudes toward inequality in a given society (Groff, 2020) . People in nations with a high PDI are considered to be more accepting of significant power imbalances, which prevents subordinates from challenging their superiors or expecting to participate in decision-making. In contrast, people are more inclined to assume equality among persons in nations with low PDIs, regardless of inequalities in socioeconomic rank.

When the Chinese main character, Datong, saw his son, Daniel, arguing with the child of his leader, he ordered Daniel to apologize even without asking the reason. Daniel refused, then Datong slapped him in public. Later in the episode, we learn that he considered this behavior as a sign of respect for his leadership, which is a typical Chinese way of thinking that his leader couldn’t understand. Clearly, the power distance is greater in China than in the United States. In China, when you have a conflict with your boss, you are supposed to bow down as soon as possible because of the different status.

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Power distance exists not only in the workplace, but also in the family. Datong’s father said that a father beating his child is the embodiment of love for his child. In China, it is justified for a father to punish his children. However, when doctors suspected that Daniel might have been abused, they called the children's services. In the United States, the safety of children is a priority, and they cannot be arbitrarily abused. This is the difference between power distance in the family of China and America. In China, children are hardly treated equally, while in America, children are more protected than adults because they are more vulnerable.

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The third concept is ethnocentrism. Ethnocentrism in social science and anthropology—as well as in colloquial English discourse—means to apply one's own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge other cultures, practices, behaviors, beliefs, and people, instead of using the standards of the particular culture involved. Since this judgment is often negative, some people also use the term to refer to the belief that one's culture is superior to, or more correct or normal than, all others—especially regarding the distinctions that define each ethnicity's cultural identity, such as language, behavior, customs, and religion (McCornack & Ortiz, 2017). In common usage, it can also simply mean any culturally biased judgment (LeVine, 2017).

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In the film, the American lawyer believes scraping therapy is child abuse, and that Journey to the West is a violent work. This is an example of ethnocentrism. Taken to an extreme in workplaces, ethnocentrism can lead to prejudice, which in turn can produce mistrust, hostility, and even hate (Gouttefarde, 1992). Those Americans in the film favor their own community's way of life with a subjective attitude and criticize the way of life and cultural achievements of other ethnic groups with a negative attitude. Chinese traditional medicine has a rich history dating back thousands of years, with some therapeutic practices that are specific to the Chinese people. It is not the correct attitude to deny and belittle this type of medical skill simply because it is not mentioned in American culture. Journey to the West is one of ancient China's four great classical books. It has great intellectual and artistic value, and understanding it requires some knowledge of Chinese culture. The lawyer in the film is unfamiliar with Chinese culture and views it as a violent work, which is arbitrary.

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The movie The Gua Shua Treatment (2011) tells a story about cultural conflict goes around a family which immigrates from China to America. Xu Datong and his wife have lived in the United States with their children Daniel for 8 years, whereas still have deep roots within Chinese culture. During a family visit by Datong's father, Daniel receives the traditional Chinese therapy of scraping. However, this traditional treatment that has lasted for thousands of years in China, is considered to be child abuse in the United States. This movie revolves around two different cultural awarenesses at workplace and family education, the predicament of traditional Chinese therapy in the United States, Chinese interpersonal communication and American law to show fierce cultural conflicts between Chinese and Western cultures under the transcultural communication context.

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Culture as relative, and it may be understood only by contrasting and comparing with another culture (Jackson, 2014). Today, it is common to see that people with different genders, ages, races, nations or even beliefs, values and worldviews are working and living together, and the interaction involves cross-cultural communication. The specific behavior can only be interpreted, where no definite rightness is in it. Through the movie, our group use Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory and the theory of culture and identity at the workplace to analyse the relationship between the superior and subordinate, elder and junior in China and the United States to interpret the fierce conflict between Chinese and American cultures within a specific cultural context. Also, we use the theory of ethnocentrism to interpret the ethnocentric mindset shows in the film which ignores critical awareness and cast a negative light on unfamiliarity. When encountering cultural differences and reference is made to another, it is of importance to aviod the ethnocentric mindset because only mutual respect can provide a smooth progress of communication.

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1.What are the negative effects of the ethnocentric mindset and how to deal with it?
2.Have you ever encountered any dilemmas when intergreting into a new culture?