Adaptasi Budaya Mahasiswa Internasional di Semarang

Abstract

Cultural adaption becomes crucial for international students who come to Indoneisa since they face difficulties during the adaptation process. In the previous research by Kirana (2012:11) was found that four workers from Japan who worked in Indonesia were stressful due to facing the different habit, especially in the working place. It made those Japanese workers want to go back to their hometown and did not want to live in Indonesia anymore. Semarang as the reseache place has uniqueness due to the various people and cultures, such as: Javanese, Chinese, Arab, and Malay. It proves that cultural adaptation process is significant for sojourners. The aim of this research is to investigate how is the cultural adaptation process of four international students who come from Palestine, Ghana, India, and Russia; and the difficulties they face in the host culture. This research is qualitative research that uses phenomenology method which explains individual experiences of the four international students by using Cultural Adaptation Theory and U Curve Theory. The result of this research shows that the cultural adaptation is different in four international students. The international students from Palestine, Ghana, and India show same patterns of the cultural adaptation, while the Indian has the longest culture shock phase. The Russian student is the only informan who doesn’t face the culture shock, although Russia is the country with high individualistic index among those three informans. Inside or outside motivation of each individual are important elements for the cultural adaptation process of those four international students. In addition, this research shows useful facts that may help university to help the international students to deal with cultural adaptation in the host culture