Cultural competence

Draft

Introduction

Cultural literacy or intercultural competence or being able to cope with cultural diversity is becoming increasingly important.

With increasing cultural diversity as a result of globalization, intercultural competence (IC) to interact and co-exist in multicultural environments is recognized as being very important. (Corder and U-Mackey, 2015).

Heyward (2002) cited by Deithl & Prints (2008), defines intercultural literacy as the competencies, understandings, attitudes, language, proficiencies, participation and identities necessary for effective cross-cultural engagement.

Culture itself is difficult to define. Billmann-Mahecha (2003) defines it [translated] in the following way: “Culture can be characterized as a character, knowledge, rule and symbol system that structures on on hand the human action space, and on the other hand is constructed and altered through the implementation of actions and their practice.” In more simple words, it is something that guides our activities, but that is also reshaped by those.

Cultural and cross-cultural psychology

Cultural psychology, after the rise of cognitivism, seems to have become a somewhat forgotten science (Allolio-Näcke, 2005). On the other hand, cultural dimensions are central to ethnology, anthropology, (cognitive) linguistics, literature critique, etc., i.e. disciplines that put emphasis on "sense" and "meaning".

According to Doris Weidemann (2001) , “investigation of intercultural interactions has demonstrated that individual psychological processes show distinct cultural patterns and, more important, that communication across cultural gaps often meets with difficulties.” She also adds, that “Communication across cultural divides is usually described as difficult and often results in misunderstandings and failure to achieve individual or even common goals. This is especially true for persons transferring to a different cultural context, as overseas students, expatriate managers or immigrants do, and adaptation to the new cultural environment can be frustrating and painful.”

In that context, literacies (not just cultural ones) cannot be compared in an abstract way or with respect to one culture, but rather as a predictor for a successful life in a given culture. This principle applies for example when comparing school systems. “Nur in dem Falle, "dass innerhalb eines jeden Landes, die erfassten Kompetenzen zur Vorhersage einer erfolgreichen Lebensführung beitragen", könnte das literacy-Konzept als tertium comparationis fungieren. In vielen Ländern aber spielt es keine bzw. nur eine untergeordnete Rolle, so dass "der Ausgang einer solchen Validitätsprüfung wahrscheinlich zu einer kulturellen Gruppierung der Funktionalität der Grundkompetenzen führen wird";” (Hermann-Günter Hesse, cited by Allolio-Näcke, 2005).

Teaching intercultural literacy

Deborah Corder and Alice U-Mackey (2015) argue that educating intercultural literacy is very challenging. Cognitive aims (e.g. learners being able to pass an exam) can be met, however, meeting affective and behavioral goals might be much more difficult. According to the authors, “research shows that the development of IC is a complex process that involves cognitive, metacognitive, affective and behavioural development, and has to be intentionally developed over time (Ehrenreich 2006; Stier 2006; Crossman 2011; Deardorff 2011). As Perry and Southwell (2011) and Witte (2011) point out, there is increasing evidence that the normal classroom or lecture context with a cognitive orientation alone cannot provide the environment for learners to develop the necessary competencies. Nor will IC automatically develop by just encountering other cultures whether in the classroom, through study abroad, overseas holidays, the workplace or social settings.”

Intercultural diversity is an important component of global citizenship. Vadura (2007: 17) argues that “The knowledge, skills and values that international studies graduates gain need now more than ever to reflect understanding of social responsibility and cultural inclusivity, embodied in the concept of global citizenship.”

Johanna E. Crossman led a qualitative study that {{iscover how undergraduate and culturally diverse students experienced a collaborative, international, online, experiential project to learn about intercultural communication. Student participants in the study endorsed experiential learning in culturally diverse groups about intercultural communication through intercultural communication.}}. The study involved students from Australia, international students from Asia (in Australia) and students from the Netherlands. The task was to “to respond to a case study that concerned a franchisor in Australia considering two expressions of interest from potential franchisees in the Netherlands and Hong Kong.”. More specificially, members of the these three populations were required to act as "communication consultants" to advise the fanchisor of any potential intercultrual communication implications between the Australian organisation and the Dutch and Asian franchise. In other words, each type of student had to play and reflect upon his own cultural inheritage.

In this context, the author found that “learning about intercultural communication through intercultural communication is a powerful activity that responds to the need for learning approaches that internationalise the business curriculum in universities and develop global citizenship. The capacity of the experiential project appeared to engage students in ways that seemed to be perceived as authentic and relevant to their lives and work. The study has also illuminated how participants try to make sense of intercultural communication by juxtaposing personal experience with theoretical literature. Whilst stereotyping did occur, the observation can be used in the design of future activities so that the potential for meta-cognitive approaches can be developed further through asking questions about what stereotyping is and how, why and under what circumstances individuals might engage in it, particularly when tension and conflict exists in intercultural communication and indeed, culturally diverse learning contexts.”

Elicitation and representation of cultural representations

Structure Formation Technique

Weideman's (2001) study focuses on subjective theories hold by German Immigrants in Taiwan and that can be verbally explicated and reconstructed by way of dialogue between researcher and participant. The research method goes through the following steps:

• A semi-standardized interview that will try to elicit the contents of the subjective theories
• A visualization of the theory structure ,using representational rules of the Heidelberg structure formation technique, (Heidelberger Strukturlegetechnik, SCHEELE & GROEBEN, 1988)

Based on this Heidelberg structure formation technique, she developed a set of interview questions and rules for representing the theory.: “a differentiation was made according to the outcome of actions (face gained or face lost) and the person concerned (self or other).” The combination of these two dimensions will define four semantic fields, namely a) to lose face, b) to gain face, c) to hurt the other person's face, d) to give the other person face.

Results then can be represented graphically, for example like this:

Part of a subjective theory structure on "face" (reproduced from Weidemann, 2001)

Arts-Informed Research

Over the last decade, a growing number of social scientists have become interested in visual methodologies. On could distinguish between "researcher created", "respondent generated" and "found" visual data. Visual arts can be found in all three.

Guruge et al. (2015) describe an arts-informed technique “to understand the changes in refugee youth's roles and responsibilities in the family within the (re)settlement context in Canada. The study involved 57 newcomer youths from Afghan, Karen, or Sudanese communities in Toronto, who had come to Canada as refugees. The data collection method embedded a drawing activity within focus group discussions.”

This study also included eight refugee youth peer researchers from the three communities. In line with community-based participatory research principles, {{quotation|Peer researchers received three months of research training and were actively involved in paid capacity in all phases of the study, including research design, data collection, data analysis, and writing. Guruge et al. (2015:[14]) describe the elicitation process as follows:

Each participant was invited to draw two pictures:

1. one depicting pre-migration roles and responsibilities,
2. and the second depicting post-migration roles and responsibilities.

The participants were given flip chart paper and color pens, and 10 to 15 minutes to complete the activity. The drawings were then displayed on the walls around the room. Each participant was asked to briefly present her/his drawing to the group. Once all participants had their individual turns reflecting on and explaining their drawings to the group, the floor was open to all for reflection and clarification of the drawings within the group. This was followed by a semi-structured focus group discussion of roles and responsibilities in which participants were encouraged to refer to their drawings wherever appropriate. In a later part of the focus group discussion, the youths were also asked to list the services they had used and the services they needed on sticky notes, which were added to the flip chart drawings.

A key lesson learnt was that adequate time and opportunities must be given to participants to (1) create the drawings, (2) to interpret and discuss the drawings and (3) to complete or change the drawings as a result of group discussions. Facilitators must attempt to clarify and expand links between drawings and discussions.

According to the authors [paragraph 38], “The multiple data collection methods (i.e., drawings and individual reflections on them, and focus group discussions) we used in this study were complementary: the drawings provided unique insights into certain aspects of their lives. For example, the magnitude of the difference in youth's (built and natural) environments came up in the drawings that were not discussed in the focus groups. The sense of cohesion versus scattered and chaotic patterns in the drawings is also interesting. On the other hand, the focus group discussions provided unique information on other aspects of their lives, such as racism. In addition, the drawings also provided more contextual information that enriched the understanding gained from the focus groups.”

Before and after drawing by Participant 3 in the Afghan female 16-19 years focus group

Data analysis and interpretation involved several levels of analysis and was based on participant's own explanations:

1. a reflective dialogue between each participant and his own drawing
2. a group dialogue concerning all the drawings of the group
3. reflections of the peer (refugee youth) researchers from each group in response to questions about (1) and (2) from the rest of the research team
4. the research teams reflections across the three groups

A list of themes and supporting excerpts was finally established in the form of a table.

Somewhat similar research was conducted by Frey and Cross (2011) on overcoming poor youth stigmatization and invisibility through art. Initially, a more traditional plan was to conduct interviews with various stakeholders, then creating focus groups, and finally a joint work on a common video to trigger dialogue with other actors. The team then found out the dramatization and video could (and did) have a more important role “We discovered that the inclusion of dramatization and video had three main effects: first, they favored the involvement of the young men and women; second, they allowed them to share their experiences, formerly blocked by stigmatization processes; third, they were a potent instrument to make their perspectives visible to other social actors concerned by this problematic (teachers, government officers, parents).” Frey and Cross (2011:69)

Tristan Bruslé's (2010) research examines the place that Nepalese immigrant workers occupy in Qatar. Visual images, mainly photographs, are use as one of the research tools to illustrate the divided nature of society.

“I have tried to put forward the hypothesis that photographs are not just an illustration, but that social realities can indeed be understood through pictures. The building of places, from collective spaces to very private ones, clearly stands out in the pictures. The use of pictures to analyze social and spatial division in Qatar has enabled me to grasp some realities that I had either overlooked or not fully understood. While carrying out fieldwork, and particularly new fieldwork, the researcher is continually bombarded with a flow of information, making it at times difficult to focus on everything of interest. Pictures are therefore a way of focusing on detail, especially in a migrant's room, which might not necessarily have been studied while talking to migrants. Looking at pictures taken in an almost random way is also a way of reactivating one's memory. Distant places, emotions and memories come to life when perusing pictures. Things that were not first noticed when the photograph was actually taken, but were "discovered" thanks to a careful study and comparison of pictures, come across as important and make sense. A juxtaposition of scenes has helped me identify common points between places. Moreover, pictures have helped me show the different levels of spatial segregation, from the town to the migrant's bed. Images of walls and of physical separation may prove to be speaker louder than mere words in making the reader realize what segregation really is. Indeed, pictures can play the role of backing up research and be a valuable tool in that they convey large amounts of information that would sometimes be harder to explain verbally.” (Bruslé's, 2010, [29])

Map making

Olga den Besten (2010) studied social and spatial divisions (urban segregation). Her study “explores children's and young people's experiences in two socially contrasted neighbourhoods in Berlin through subjective maps drawn by the children.”

“Children were asked to produce two maps: first, to draw their way home from school and all the objects that attracted their attention on the way. This task was chosen because all the children went to school, so the way home from school was their everyday, routine trajectory (see also ROSS, 2007). Coming back home from school was chosen because of the supposedly more relaxed, unhurried character of this trajectory and more opportunities for deviations from this way, like, for example, popping in to shops or playing in a park after classes. Second, the children were asked to draw their "neighbourhood" or "territory", i.e. a city area which they knew rather well and where they "felt at home". This drawing activity was done at school during one lesson.” (den Besten: 2010: [13]).

In addition, children were asked to place four types of emoticons on the maps: (1) A heart symbol to mark places they like, (2) a big dot for places where they hang out, (3) a cross inside a circle for places they disliked and (4) a square for places they fear.

Drawing 2b (by a Turkish boy aged 12 in Kreuzberg) shows his "way to school" with the school in the foreground, the building where he lives and a park that he likes, as well as a disco and a nightclub marked with the "emoticon" of dislike. Reproduced from den Besten (2010)

Results showed that the children's socio-spatial worlds were different in the two segregated areas of the city. Generally, drawings from children of the advantaged area are comparatively more elaborated, show a larger space, more places for activities, a denser network of friends, and so forth. This also reflects the situation that advantaged children have more access to extra curricular activities and therefore for personal development.

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  A map of her "subjective territory" by a 13-year-old German-American girl from the school in Zehlendorf. Reproduced from den Besten (2010)

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  Drawing 3a (by a Turkish boy aged 14 in Kreuzberg) features a youth club and a football field. Reproduced from den Besten (2010)

Technologies for cultural literacy

According to Anstadt (2015), an environment like second life has several affordances:

• The ability to role play simulations without compromising the identity of the individual. Yet at the same time there, is a relationship between users virtual lives and their real lives.
• A simulated environment offers the potential for a range of experiences that is not available in "real live", including connecting with people that otherwise cannot be met.

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