Culture Shocks and Living Adjustment Moving from Big City to Small Town

(An analysis of the Character, Lucy Hill in “New in Town” Movie)

Name: Melysa Rachmat

Std. Number: 0606422

Abstract

This study aims to fulfill the last assignment of Intercultural Communication which is supervised
by Prof. Dr. Nenden Sri Lengkanawati, M.Pd. This study also aims to learn several theories
relating to culture shock and living adjustment, so that they can be applied specifically to
appropriate context. The research was conducted by using descriptive method. To collect the
data, direct observation through watching the film was done carefully to find relevant evidence
to answer the proposed research questions. This research was conducted by answering the
research questions: what kind of culture shocks that the character, Lucy Hill encountered? and
how did she adjust to the culture shocks?

1. Introduction
The living adjustment happens anytime and anywhere. Usually, it happens to oneself when
he or she finds some new or the unusual things in the different place or situation. These new or
unusual things can be in form of huge or small things and a lot or few things. And the most
important thing is how he or she would adjust to them.
Introducing Lucy Hill, an ambitious executive that used to live in big city named Miami. She
is willingly moving to New Ulm, a small town in Minnesota to take a look into the company’s
factory. She meets and learns new things including the climate, the people’s attitudes and
behaviors.
Based on these pieces of information, the writer conducts this mini research. This mini
research will analyze the relevant issues in the film to be observed and connected with the related
theories of intercultural communication.
 This mini research focuses on the culture shocks and the living adjustment experienced by
Lucy Hill when moving to the small town called New Ulm. In this mini research, the subject is
Lucy Hill, a big city woman that moved to small town. To lead the research into structured
discussions, it will be directed by answering the questions: What are the cross-cultural shocks
that the character, Lucy Hill encountered? How did she adjust to the culture shocks?
In accordance with the problems stated above, the purposes of this mini research include to
know some of the culture shocks encountered by the character, Lucy Hill and to know how she
adjusts to the culture shocks.

Review of Related Literature

(An editorial by Dr. Lalervo Oberg; Anthropologist; Health, Welfare and Housing Division;
United States Operations Mission to Brazil)
Customs, Cues, Norms

Culture shock is precipitated by the anxiety that results from losing all familiar signs and
symbols of social intercourse. These signs are the thousand and one ways in which we orient
ourselves to the situations of daily life: when to shake hands and what to say when we meet
people, when and how to give tips, how to give orders to servants, how to make purchases, when
to accept and when to refuse invitations, when to take statements seriously and when not.
These cues, which may be words, gestures, facial expressions, customs, or norms are
acquired by all of us in the course of growing up and are as much a part of our culture as the
language we speak or the beliefs we accept. All of us depend for our peace of mind and our
efficiency on hundreds of these cues, most of which are unconsciously learned.
When an individual enters a strange culture, all or most of these familiar cues are
removed. He or she is like a fish out of water. No matter how broad-minded or full of good will
he may be, a series of props have been knocked from under him. This is followed by a feeling of
frustration and anxiety. People react to the frustration in much the same way. First they reject the
environment which causes the discomfort: "the ways of the host country are bad because they
make us feel bad."
For example Americans who are in a strange land get together to grouse about the host
country and its people, you can be sure they are suffering from culture shock.

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 Another phase of culture shock is regression. The home environment suddenly assumes a
tremendous importance, everything becomes irrationally glorified. All difficulties and problems
are forgotten and only the good things back home are remembered. It usually takes a trip home to
bring one back to reality.
Some of the symptoms of culture shock are: excessive concern over cleanliness and the
feeling that what is new and strange is "dirty." This could be in relation to drinking water, food,
dishes, and bedding; fear of physical contact with attendants or servants; a feeling of
helplessness and a desire for dependence on long-term residents of one's own nationality;
irritation over delays and other minor frustrations out of proportion to their causes; delay and
outright refusal to learn the language of the host country; excessive fear of being cheated,
robbed, or injured; great concern over minor pains and irruptions of the skin; and finally, that
terrible longing to be back home, to be in familiar surroundings, to visit one's relatives, and, in
general, to talk to people who really "make sense."
Typical symptoms include the following:
1. Homesickness
2. Inability to work well
3. Too much eating, drinking, or sleeping
4. Anger toward the members of the new culture
5. Glorifying the native culture and emphasizing the negative in the new culture
6. Withdrawal and avoidance of contact with people from the new culture
7. Lack of ability to deal with even small problems.

Individuals differ greatly in the degree in which culture shock affects them. Although not
common, there are individuals who cannot live in foreign countries. Those who have seen people
go through a serious case of culture shock and on to a satisfactory adjustment can discern steps
in the process.
The Honeymoon Stage

During the first few weeks most individuals are fascinated by the new. They stay in hotels and
associate with nationals who speak their language and are polite and gracious to foreigners. This
honeymoon stage may last from a few days or weeks to six months depending on circumstances.

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If one is a very important person he or she will be taken to the show places, pampered and
petted, and in a press interview will speak glowingly about progress, goodwill, and international
amity. If he returns home may well write a book about his pleasant if superficial experience
abroad.
But this "Cook's tour" type of mentality does not normally last if the foreign visitor
remains abroad and has to seriously cope with real conditions of life. It is then that the second
stage begins, characterized by a hostile and aggressive attitude towards the host country. This
hostility evidently grows out of the genuine difficulty which the visitor experiences in the
process of adjustment. There is maid trouble, school trouble, language trouble, house trouble,
transportation trouble, shopping trouble, and the fact that people in the host country are largely
indifferent to all these troubles. They help but they just don't understand your great concern over
these difficulties. Therefore, they must be insensitive and unsympathetic to you and your
worries. The result, "I just don't like them." You become aggressive, you band together with your
fellow countrymen and criticize the host country, its ways and its people.
This criticism is not an objective appraisal but a derogatory one. Instead of trying to
account for conditions as they are through an honest analysis of the actual conditions and the
historical circumstances which have created them, you talk as if the difficulties you experience
are more or less created by the people of the host country for your special discomfort. You take
refuge in the company of your countrymen and this cocktail circuit becomes the fountainhead of
emotionally charged labels knows as stereotypes. This is a peculiar kind of shorthand which
caricatures the host country and its people in a negative manner.

Stereotypes

The "dollar grasping American" and the "indolent Latin American" are samples of mild
forms of stereotypes. The use of stereotypes may salve the ego of someone with a severe case of
culture shock but it certainly does not lead to any genuine understanding of the host country and
its people. This second stage of culture shock is in a sense a crisis in the disease. If you
overcome it you stay, if not, you leave before you reach the stage of a nervous breakdown.
Culture shock is lessened as the visitor succeeds in getting some knowledge of the
language and begins to get around by himself. This is the beginning of his adjustment to the new

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cultural environment. The visitor still has difficulties but he takes a "this is my cross and I have
to bear it" attitude. Usually in this stage the visitor takes a superior attitude toward people of the
host country. His sense of humor begins to exert itself. Instead of criticizing he makes jokes
about the people and even cracks jokes about his or her own difficulties. He or she is now on the
way to recovery. And there is still the poor devil who is worse off than yourself whom you can
help, which in turn gives you confidence in your ability to speak and get around.

Final adjustment

In the final stage of adjustment the visitor accepts the customs of the country as just
another way of living. He can operate within the new milieu without a feeling of anxiety
although there are moments of strain. Only with a complete grasp of all the cues of social
intercourse will this strain disappear.
For a long time the individual will understand what the national is saying, but he is not
always sure what the national means. With a complete adjustment you not only accept the foods,
drinks, habits, and customs but actually begin to enjoy them. When you go back home on leave
you may even take things back with you and if you leave for good you generally miss the
country and the people to whom you have become accustomed.
It might be well to point out that the difficulties which the newcomer experiences are
very real. If individuals come to a tropical area from a temperate one they quite often suffer from
intestinal disturbances. Strange foods sometimes upset people. In Rio, for instance, water and
power shortages are very real. When these physical difficulties are added to those arising from
not knowing how to communicate and the uncertainties presented by customs the consequent
frustrations and anxieties are understandable.
In the course of time, an individual makes this adjustment. You do what is essential about
water, food, and the other minutiae of daily life. You adapt yourself to water and power
shortages and to traffic problems. In short, the environment does not change. What has changed
is your attitude towards it. Somehow it no longer troubles you, you no longer project your
discomforts onto the people of the host country and their ways. You get along under a new set of
living conditions.

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A lack of understanding

An objective treatment of your cultural background and that of your new environment is
important in understanding culture shock. There is a great difference in knowing what is the
cause of your disturbance and not knowing.
Once you realize that your trouble is due to your own lack of understanding of other
people's cultural background and your own lack of the means of communication rather than the
hostility of an alien environment, you also realize that you yourself can gain this understanding
and these means of communication. And the sooner you do this, the sooner culture shock will
disappear.
The question now arises, what can you do to get over culture shock as quickly as
possible? The answer is to get to know the people of that host country. But this you cannot do
with any success without knowing the language, for language is the principal symbol system of
communication.
We all know that learning a new language is difficult, particularly to adults. This task
alone is quite enough to cause frustration and anxiety, no matter how skillful the language
teacher.

But once you begin to be able to carry on a friendly conversation with your maid, your neighbor,
or to go on shopping trips alone, you not only gain confidence and a feeling of power but a
whole new world of cultural meanings open up for you. You begin to find out not only what and
how people do things but also what their interests are.
These interests people usually express by what they habitually talk about and how they
allocate their time and money. Once you know this value or interest pattern it will be quite easy
to get people to talk and to be interested in you. When we say people have no interests we
usually admit the fact that we have not bothered to find out.
At times it is helpful to be a participant observer by joining the activities of the people.
This could be a carnival, a religious rite, or some economic activity. Yet the visitor should never

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forget that he or she is an outsider and will be treated as such. He should view this participation
as role playing.
Understanding the ways of the people is essential but this does not mean that you have to
give up on your own. What happens is that you have developed two patterns of behavior.
Some consideration for someone who will adjust to a new culture:

1. Motivation : Why did the person leave his or her native country? Did the person have a
choice, or was he or she forced to leave for political, religious, or economic reasons?
2. Length of stay : How long will the person be in the new country?
3. Language and cultural background : How similar are the language and culture of the new
country to the person’s native language and culture?
4. Language and cultural knowledge : How well does the newcomer speak the language and
understand the culture of the new country?
5. Personality : How flexible and tolerant is the newcomer?
6. Relationships with others : How much support from either family or friends does
thenewcomer have?
7. Financial situation : What financial resources does the person have?
8. Job : Does the newcomer have a job? Is it a lower status job than the one the person had
in the native country?
9. Age : How old is the person?
10. Degree of ethnocentrism : How ethnocentric is the new comer? Does this person think
that the new culture is inferior to his or her culture of origin? To what degree does the
newcomer consider everything back home to be “normal”and everything in the new
environtment to be “strange”?

The source of pain

Finally a word on what your fellow countrymen can do to help you get over culture
shock. Persons suffering from culture shock feel weak in the face of conditions which appear
insufferable and it is natural for them to try to lean heavily on their compatriots.

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 This may be irritating to the long-term resident, but he should be patient, sympathetic,
and understanding. Although talking does not remove pain, a great deal is gained by having the
source explained.
Some of the steps toward a cure have been indicated. With patience and understanding,
we can be reasonably sure that time, the great healer, will soon set things right.

2. Research Methodology
This mini research used descriptive method. Dealing with this method, Best cited in Ersan
(2000) that:
Descriptive method describes and interprets what conditions, relationship exist, opinions
that are held, processed that are going on, effect that are going on, effect that are evident
or trends that are developing. It is primarily concerned with the present although it often
past events and influences as they relate to current conditions (1977: 116).
Descriptive method was appropriate for this kind of mini research. This method involved
data collection to solve the problems by describing the present conditions of research, subject or
object (individual, institution, society, etc) based on the facts. The data were collected by
gathering information from questioner of an Indonesian student who learns in the United States.

a. Data Collection
This mini research used descriptive method which use the case sudy approach. The data is
taken from direct observation by watching the movie entitled “New in Town” and analyzing the
character named Lucy Hill.

b. Data Analysis
There are three steps in analyzing the data resulted:
1. Determining some culture shocks that the character, Lucy hill encountered.

2. Analyzing the result of the observation.

3. Interpreting the result of the observation.

4. Relating the data with the related theories.

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 5. Making the conclusion of the research.

3. Findings and Discussions

a. Findings
The movie “New in Town” tells how a big city woman based on Miami drastically changed
her lives to survive living in a small town called New Ulm in Minnesota that appeared
contrast to her previous stay. Lucy Hill the hard worker executive woman who took a job to
streamline a food-processing plant company’s factory. The ambitious and hard worker
Lucy, an executive who loves climbing the corporate ladder agreed to take the responsible
for streamline the food-processing plant company’s factory even if it is in a small town
called New Ulm. She went through several culture shocks including the climate, the
people’s attitudes and behaviors. But these all things made her learned and realized what is
good of being in small town.
The writer’s first finding is how the character, Lucy Hill have to undergo the difference
in climate condition. Got used to the tropical Miami, Lucy forgot to check the weather of the
wintry Minnesota. She was lack of knowledge that the snow was coming heavily in New
Ulm, a small town that she was about to live. She brought her many piles of luggage fully
loaded with useless tropical clothes. Even her luxury executive woman suits are useless in
this cold place. People dressed casually and wear warm clothes to office. She must forget all
her Miami-style fabulousness including branded and famous designer executive woman
suits and also her tons of high heels and transformed herself from sophisticated Lucy to dull
Lucy. For days, she survived the freezing New Ulm with these thin clothes helplessly until
her next return to Miami to report her work.
The next finding related to the culture shocks that Lucy encountered was how people is
so friendly and religious. The first woman that Lucy got to know was her secretary, Blanche
that she was out of expectation. Blanche addressed Lucy very casual and talking about stuff
that weird enough for Lucy for her first meeting with her. And she asked Lucy everything
including the private things such as marriage. Lucy’s first impression of Blanche was how
incapable she was. Blanche keep asking things that Lucy thought irrelevant during work.
She also sent Lucy food as gifts, and invited Lucy to her house. Blanche was clearly being

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 friendly with Lucy but it made Blanche being a second in the “termination list” of
company’s downsize. Lucy thought Blanche wasn’t capable enough to work for the
company. It doesn’t require much time to realize for people in New Ulm that Lucy was an
arrogant worker who aims to change everything. The factory was well-known in the town,
and people knew that Lucy not only intend to streamline the factory’s production but also
downsize the number of employees.
People of New Ulm were also known as religious. In her first met with Blanche, she
asked Lucy “have you found Jesus?” as it was a usual thing to ask. Lucy who had no idea
why Blanche asked that took it as a joke. She replied, “Well, I didn’t know he was missing.
Oh it was a joke.” And laughed. But Blanche didn’t laugh. He answered, “Normally we
don’t joke about Jesus around here.” The religiosity also appeared in form of how people
enthusiastic celebrated the ritual. They went down to the street to sing the religious songs
together in the middle of the night.

b. Discussions
According to the findings, there are some culture shocks encountered by Lucy who
moved from a big city to a small town. The first culture shock is the weather. The
difference in climate from the tropical Miami made her forget to check the weather that
snow was coming to New Ulm. She was unprepared. No clothes are matched to be put on
in this freezing town. Her fabulous and sophisticated appearance absolute were a pain to
wear in both home and office. She also learned that it’s not just the employees’
appearance that casual, they also acted casual and friendly in the office. They wore
jumper all the time and boots. Lucy also thought Blanche, the secretary as the incapable
one. She was constantly stepped in Lucy’s office to tell something that got nothing to do
for the job matter. We can see it from this scene:
(in the office)
BLANCHE: (hung up the phone. Saw Lucy coming to the office.) Oh good morning. Sorry
about that. That was Trudy. She’s always trying to get my tapioca recipe out of me.
LUCY: (glaring at Blanche.) Yeah, well. I bet that your tapioca recipe is gonna affect the
plant. So let’s just stick to work if we could.
There also scenes that Lucy at special moment made Blanche meet her in office and
lectured her for being irresponsible for work. Lucy did feel that Blanche’s attitude was
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 being self-respect. While in the other hand, Blanche’s attitude is naturally friendly
because it’s a small town. Everybody knows each other. Who they are and where they
live. But Lucy misunderstands them.
Lucy also thought that the casualty appearance of the foreman, Sue and the informal
language that he used was all lack of self-respect. She fired Sue. It made her hated by the
workers even the society out of the factory. Everybody knows Sue. Sue was known as
friendly and humble man. How Lucy couldn’t get along with Sue made her recognized as
an arrogant and selfish woman.
This situation of course made Lucy suffered. She couldn’t make the workers work well.
How Lucy couldn’t understand the culture of New Ulm affects her work. She denied
blending with people. And it cost to losing her job. So in order to keep her job and get the
worker’s trust, she must do the adjustment. She tried to understand the New Ulm, the
people, and their attitude. She was slowly transformed herself. Firstly, she dressed herself
the appropriate cloth that matched with the weather. And then she tried to understand the
friendliness of New Ulm people by getting to know them more. She also learns how to
understand the religious side of New Ulm. Once at a time, she made herself joined people
in the street singing a religious song. We can say that in the end, Lucy reached the final
adjustment. She was being used with everything in the new Ulm.
In the final stage of adjustment the visitor accepts the customs of the country as just
another way of living. He can operate within the new milieu without a feeling of anxiety
although there are moments of strain. Only with a complete grasp of all the cues of social
intercourse will this strain disappear.

4. Conclusion
It is known as the fish out of water when someone appears to new environment that
seems very different to his or her previous environment. Just like what happened to Lucy.
She was used to being a city-woman who always determines to look fabulous. Wearing
an executive suit and high heels and being the capable one. She has the standard how to
act and do the properly and how to deal with the employees. But transferred to a small
town called New Ulm gives her different perspective. You can dressed casually here and
talk with the workers so casual. She was touched by the friendliness of New Ulm people.
And she only has two options: adjust them or lose her job.
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 5. References
• Levine, R. Deena. (1982). BEYOND LANGUAGE: Cross-Cultural Communication (2nd
ed.). PRENTICE HALL REGENTS
• Worldwide Classroom .An editorial by Dr. Lalervo Oberg; Anthropologist; Health,
Welfare and Housing Division; United States Operations Mission to Brazil
http://cultureshock.com
• New in Town: Movie Script
• New in Town: Movie Review
From: flickfilosopher.com, helium.com, slatemagazine.com,

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