Intercultural Communication for Inclusion and Social Justice

The objectives of this course are to highlight the importance and challenges of intercultural communication in personal life, work, and education, while fostering a deeper understanding of the variations in personal, social, and cultural identity. Participants will cultivate greater awareness and sensitivity to their own and others' cultural identities through exposure to cross-cultural complexity and reflection on complex cases, comments, and replies. This process will encourage mindful observation, analysis, and understanding, aimed at developing intercultural competence. Additionally, participants will explore and apply leading values frameworks and analytical levels that shape cultural assumptions and behaviors, while engaging with story narratives, metaphors, and meanings related to interculturality.

Contents:

1) Intercultural Communication Introduction

• What is culture?

• What is communication?

• Verbal and not verbal communication

• Language and communication

• Perspective on intercultural communication competence (ICC)

• How to develop intercultural competence?

2) Intercultural Communication: A Global Context

We will broaden our understanding of intercultural communication in various communicative contexts from a global perspective by exploring topics such as:

• Immigration and acculturation, Assimilation, Identity Development

• Assumptions and miscommunication: stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination related to intergroup contact.

• Analysis of situated cases to identify sources of intercultural misunderstanding

• Culture shock and coping dynamics, adaptation processes, and growth outcomes in cross-cultural transitions

• Diversity & Inclusion, Tolerance

• Variations and perceptions of typical communication behaviors or practices and taxonomies for understanding context, space, time and other contextual factors (Hi-low Context, Proxemics, Monochronic-Polychronic, Silence).

3) Communication, Culture, and New Media Technologies

We will think about and apply communication theory and research to the socio-cultural implications of various communication technologies. We will examine the impact of communication technologies on our daily lives, going beyond technical and how-to issues to examine how new media affects our communication practices with others. We will reflect on the social consequences of media technology in contemporary society. To promote critical and interdisciplinary thinking on socio-cultural aspects of new media, this unit will discuss implications of digital content and applications for identity, community, politics and authority relations worldwide.

• Intercultural identity in an interpersonal and intercultural context

• Media and globalization in a mass media context

• Misinformation and hate speech

4) Conflict and Intercultural Dialogue

With our society becoming more culturally diverse, we often find ourselves divided along political, ethnic, and religious fault lines. Although the challenges are many, a dialogue is one of the keys to bridging these differences and working collectively toward a shared future. In this unit, we will explore the complex relationship between conflict, culture, and dialogue. Our focus will be on questions such as the following:

• What is the role of dialogue in building bridges of understanding across cultural divides?

• What are the challenges to engaging in intercultural dialogue?

• What are the approaches to facilitating intercultural dialogue?

• What are the potential contributions and limitations of intercultural dialogue?

Arasaratnam, L. A. (2013). Intercultural communication competence. In A. Kurylo (Ed.), Intercultural communication: Representation and construction of culture (Chap 3, pp. 47-68). Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications.

Chen, G. M., & Starosta, W. J. (1998). Foundations of intercultural communication: Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Lustig, M. W., & Koester, J. (2007). Intercultural competence: interpersonal communication across cultures (5th ed.). Shanghai, China: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

Bennett, Milton. Revised Edition, Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication: Paradigms, Principles, & Practices. Boston: Intercultural Press, 2013

Brislin, Richard. Working with Cultural Differences: Dealing Effectively with Diversity in the Workplace (Contributions in Psychology Number 51). Westport, Conn: Praeger, 2009.

Ting-Toomey, Stella & Chung, Leeva. Understanding Intercultural Communication, Second Edition. London:Oxford University Press, 2011

UN 2005 Convention on Diversity of Cultural Expressions

UNESCO 2024 We need to talk - Report on intercultural communication