Adaptation Of Cultural Life In Black American History At The University Of Chinese Exchange

This study selected8Chinese exchange students of an Historical Black College&University (HBCU) in Mississippi, United States,-Jackson Stated University (JSU), as the research objects, took JSU as the main research setting, made a research on their8months’life and study experience in JSU, discussed the adaptation issues of them. This research aims to show the adaptation process of Chinese exchange students in HBCUs, and then help readers have a real feeling on Chinese people living condition in American Black schools, communities and cities; reduce the prejudice to Blacks on some extend, increase the Chinese academic attention to Black universities and Black education.The study employed grounded theory and other qualitative research methods, made observation, interviews and field notes in the field work; analyzed the collected data based on researcher’s same experience with objects; made coding and analyzing on collected data which includes audio records, students’blogs, and field notes; finally grounded the theory on Chinese exchange students adaptation process in HBCUs; meanwhile exhibited the real reflection on the life and study of Chinese exchange students in one of HBCUs.By analyzing the collected data, the research suggested that the adaptation issues of Chinese exchange students in HBCUs are influenced by social background, individual factors and group factors. In detail, social background contains the conditions and policies of countries, areas, and institutions, and also the background of politics, economy, history and culture; individual factors include gender, age, personality, ability and development direction; group factors include American Black, American White, international students and Chinese groups. The results of this research show that the process of cultural adaptation has the features of time and direction and can be manifested by different dimensions of the culture. According to the degrees of cultural adaptation, the adaptation process of Chinese exchange students in HBCUs can be divided into several periods which from the beginning prejudice, maladjustment, start adaptation, semi adaptation, to getting used to. From the dimensions of cultural adaptation, the adaptation process of Chinese exchange students in HBCUs can be classified into daily life adaptation and study adaptation. Daily life adaptation includes eating habit, language, wearing, traffic, consumption habit and religion aspects; study adaptation includes the adaptation process on aspects of study resources, course enrollment, class learning, examination and teacher-student interaction.