When East Meets West: Cross-Cultural Challenges in a Tourist’s Guide to Love

This study analyses the portrayal of intercultural communication barriers in A Tourist’s Guide to Love (2023), with a particular focus on interactions between American and Vietnamese characters. Drawing on Barna’s six stumbling blocks in intercultural communication, the research applied a qualitative film analysis to examine how cultural challenges were depicted. Key scenes revealed recurring issues such as assumption to similarities, followed by nonverbal misinterpretations and language differences. To find out how these challenges were tackled, DeVito’s Principles for Effective Intercultural Communication was referred to. Education oneself was found to be the most frequent strategy of all. The study highlighted the value of media representations in reflecting real-world cultural encounters and underscores the role of films in promoting cross-cultural understanding. Its insights may benefit professionals working in multicultural settings, particularly in fields like tourism and international business, by shedding light on cross-cultural challenges that one may encounter when they are in contact with people of other cultural backgrounds. Future research could extend this analysis by using different research approaches.

Intercultural communication, cross-cultural challenges

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