Theories of intercultural education, Joseba Arregi, Asier Barandiaran, Dmitrii Enygin, Venera Midova [7 ebook reader .TXT] 📗

intercultural learning?

f Does the model make it possible to take into account other aspects in the interpretation of reality, besides culture (for example, historical injustice or socio-economic factors)?

f Does the model offer a framework to interpret reality without oversimplifying it? f How does this model relate to other models and theories of intercultural learning? f Can this model be used in various contexts, parts of the world or groups?

Three theoretical frameworks used in intercultural learning are presented below. These models were also chosen on the basis of their depth and relevance to the context of youth work. The diversity of approaches was also considered. The first model is designed mainly from an educational approach. The second model, the model of acculturation orientations, shows a perspective of the relations in society, while the third one refers to intercultural sensitivity from an individual point of view.

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A model of intercultural competence

The authors of the “Autobiography of intercultural encounters” (Council of Europe 2009a)15 used the following model of intercultural competence to frame a number of identifiable elements that an individual can develop in order to be “equipped” for intercultural encounters.

Attitudes and feelings

f Acknowledging the identities of others – Noticing how others have different identities and accepting their values and insights. This means accepting the complexity of reality and of people, dealing with ambiguous situations and contradictory opinions.

f Respecting otherness – Showing curiosity about others and being willing to question what is usually taken for granted and viewed as “normal”. It starts with trying to understand others, acknowledging their identities and refraining from putting them into preconceived boxes. It involves willingness to relativise one’s owns values, beliefs and behaviours, not to assume that they are the only correct ones.

f Having empathy – Being able to take someone else’s perspective, to imagine their thoughts, their feelings, their opinions and motives, and to consider them in our own actions.

f Identifying positive and negative emotions and relating them to attitudes and knowledge – Self-awareness and self-knowledge are important parts of emotional intelligence.

f Tolerance for ambiguity – The ability to accept ambiguity and lack of clarity and to be able to deal with this constructively. This means being able to grasp the ideas, feelings and intentions of other people, accepting that there can be multiple perspectives on and interpretations of any given situation, but also showing real interest in what other people feel and how they perceive situations.

Behaviour

f Being flexible – Adapting one’s behaviour to new situations and to what other people expect.

f Being sensitive to ways of communicating – Recognising different ways of communication that exist in other languages or other ways of using the same language. It involves the ability to recognise different verbal and non-verbal conventions, and to negotiate rules appropriate to intercultural communication.

Knowledge and skills

This kind of knowledge does not refer primarily to knowledge about a specific culture, but rather knowledge of how one’s own and others’ social groups and social identities function.

f Having knowledge about other people – Knowing facts about people whom one meets, and knowing how and why they are what they are.

f Having knowledge about social processes – Understanding the interaction processes in a given society, at group and individual level. This involves becoming aware of one’s own assumptions, preconceptions, stereotypes and prejudices.

f Skills of interpreting and relating – The ability to interpret a document or event from another culture, to explain it and relate it to documents or events from one’s own.

f Skills of discovery and interaction – Using certain skills to find out about people one meets, by asking questions, seeking out information and using these skills in real-time encounters.

f Critical cultural awareness – The ability to evaluate critically and on the basis of explicit criteria, perspec- tives, practices and products in one’s own and other cultures and countries. This means becoming aware of one’s own values and making them explicit in interactions with other people. It also means taking a fundamental position on values that acknowledges respect for human dignity and human rights, as the democratic basis for social interaction.

Action

f Action orientation – The willingness to undertake some activity alone or with others as a consequence of reflection, with the aim of making a contribution to the common good.

15. The “Autobiography of intercultural encounters” is a tool developed by the Council of Europe and designed to encourage people to think about and learn from intercultural encounters that have made a strong impression or had a long-lasting effect on them.

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Relevance to the context of youth work

This model gives an overview of specific characteristics that can be developed through intercultural learning. These characteristics are grouped into four categories: attitudes and feelings; behaviour; knowledge and skills; action. The model does not explain how these characteristics are interlinked or how they can be developed in non-formal settings, but it can be a helpful starting point in designing intercultural learning processes and running activities aimed at developing these characteristics.

An activity based on the “Autobiography of intercultural encounters” is described in Chapter 4, “Educational activities”.

Interactive acculturation model

Acculturation is defined as an exchange process between people belonging to different cultural groups, which leads to cultural, linguistic, religious and psychological changes. Acculturation rarely takes place between groups with equal status and power. Most often it is an exchange process between the majority and minorities, or the majority and migrants.

The acculturation orientations defined below are drawn from the initial work of John Berry (1980), and further developed by Richard Bourhis (1997).

Acculturation orientations are defined based on the answers given to the following questions.
1. Is it considered to be of value to maintain one’s identity and characteristics? (Identity axis)
2. Is it considered to be of value to maintain relationships with society as a whole? (Communication axis)

Figure 4: Acculturation orientations

Assimilationism

Integrationism

Marginalisation / Exclusionism

Separatism / Segregationism

Source: Adapted from Bourhis (2007)

The answers to these questions reflect on the one hand how minorities/migrants view themselves in society and, on the other hand, how the majority expects minorities/migrants to behave.

These acculturation orientations are presented below, first from the majority community perspective and then from the minority/migrant perspective.

Acculturation orientation of majority groups

Assimilationism – The desire to have minorities give up their cultural/identity characteristics in order to adopt the cultural/identity characteristics of the majority. This reflects a situation in which the behaviour of a person is considered “normal” only when it reflects completely the characteristics and values of majority culture.

Segregationism – A tolerance of the minority culture/identity as long as they live separately, in specific neigh- bourhoods or regions (ghettos, for example). Segregationists avoid contact with minorities as they believe this would dilute or weaken the integrity and authenticity of their culture/identity.

Exclusionism – No tolerance for the minorities’ culture/identity and a belief that certain groups can never assimilate within the majority community. Certain exclusionists create the conditions to incite minorities to leave the country/neighbourhood.

Identity

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Communication

Integrationism – The valorisation of the maintenance of certain aspects of minority identity and a willingness to modify one’s own institutional practices and certain aspects of the majority culture to facilitate the integration of minority groups. It reflects a situation in which there is freedom of expression and opportunities to affirm cultural identity, as well as spaces for dialogue between different members of society.

Individualism – The tendency to define oneself and others as individuals and not as members of groups. This leads to an ignoring of cultural aspects in social interaction and a focus on individual characteristics.

Acculturation orientation of minority groups

Assimilationism – This reflects the willingness to give up most aspects of one’s own culture for the sake of adopting the cultural practices of the majority.

Separatism – This is characterised by the desire to maintain all the features of one’s own culture, while rejecting the culture of and relations with members of the majority culture or other cultural groups.

Marginalisation – This characterises individuals who feel ambivalent and somewhat alienated from both their own and the majority culture, thereby feeling excluded from both their heritage culture and the culture of the majority.

Integrationism – This reflects a desire to maintain key features of one’s own culture, while also valuing the adoption of key elements of the majority culture.

Individualism – The tendency to define oneself and others as individuals and not as members of groups. This leads to an ignoring of cultural aspects in social interaction and a focus on individual characteristics.

Relevance to the context of youth work

This model offers a framework for understanding intercultural relationships in society. An interesting aspect of the model is the fact that it presents the reality from the perspective of both dominant and non-dominant groups. It can serve as a tool for interpreting the policies of institutions regarding minorities and migrants and for analysing discourses, media articles or general attitudes towards different groups of people. The activity “From exclusion to integration”, described in Chapter 4, is based on this model.

Questions to be asked in youth work in relation to this model could be as follows.

f Who should adapt to whom? Why?

f How much should I give up in order to adapt/integrate? What are my personal limits?

f Is this model applicable in the same way if I move by choice (for studies, to work abroad or travel) or if I am forced to flee my country?

Developmental model of intercultural sensitivity

This model provides a theoretical framework to understand and assess how we subjectively experience dif- ferences. The underlying assumption is that difference must be experienced and then processed in order to increase the potential of intercultural competence and to effect changes in the levels of intercultural sensiti- vity. The model is a continuum of six stages of intercultural sensitivity. Three of these stages are ethnocentric (denial, defence and minimisation) and three are ethno-relative (acceptance, adaptation, integration). In the ethnocentric stages, the tendency is to avoid cultural difference, while in ethno-relative stages it is to seek cultural difference.

Table 2: Developmental model of intercultural sensitivity

Ethnocentric stages Ethno-relative stages

Source: Adapted visualisation from Bennett (1986)

Denial

Defence Reversal

Minimisation

Acceptance

Adaptation

Integration

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Ethnocentrism – One’s own culture is experienced as central to reality and maintains the assumption that one’s world view is superior to others.

The three ethnocentric stages are as follows.

Denial – One’s own culture is experienced as the only real one. Denial can be based on isolation or separa- tion. In situations of physical isolation, there is little chance of being confronted with difference, therefore cultural difference is not experienced. Nowadays, this situation is almost impossible, but partial isolation is still possible. In situations of separation, physical and social barriers are created intentionally, so that people can remain comfortably in denial. “The other” is seen in a general and undifferentiated way, such as “the foreigner”or“the immigrant”and needs to be kept at a distance. Ethnically distinct neighbourhoods, intense nationalism or viewing the others as humans of a lower level are examples of barriers set in the denial stage.

Defence – When people move beyond denial and realise that cultural difference does exist, the first tendency is to fight against it. In the defence stage, cultural difference is perceived as threatening, as something that needs to be fought against. One’s own culture is experienced as the only viable one. Cultural difference is experienced in a stereotypical, racist manner. The world is organised into “us” and “them”; one’s culture is superior to the culture of others. There is an emphasis on the positive attributes of one’s own culture, and no or little attention to that of others, which implicitly is valued lower.

A variation of defence is reversal – One adopts another culture that is viewed as superior, denigrating one’s own cultural background. Even if people in this stage know more about other cultures, they are still at an eth- nocentric stage; the only difference is that they have changed the culture at the centre of their reality. They still act out in a defensive manner towards their original culture and consider there to be a hierarchy of cultures.

Minimisation – In this stage, difference may not be fought against, but there is an attempt to