Tag: intercultural competence

The Deepest Value

Posted Craig StortiLeave a commentPosted in Competence Comments with Craig Storti

People sometimes ask me how to identify the deepest value in another culture. I suppose there are many ways, but one approach I have found quite helpful is to try to identify what behaviors upset people the most in a particular culture. What is it, when someone does that thing, that really annoys people? If you probe beneath the behavior that produces such a strong reaction, you will find a value that has just been violated. If we use the U. S. as an example, I think there is no quicker or more foolproof way to upset an American than […]

Kindness Rocks

Posted Caprice Lantz-DeatonLeave a commentPosted in Art and Enhancements, Resource

I recently published a book on intercultural competence with my friend and colleague, Professor Irina Golubeva. We had a lot of trouble coming up with an idea for the front cover and did not want to use a stock image.  One of my hobbies is making kindness rocks. These are rocks that you paint with words of wisdom or other fun and inspirational pictures. You then leave these rocks for others to find on footpaths, park benches, or other places.  The practice of making and hiding kindness rocks, which started several years ago in the United States, is now found […]

The Birth of a New Zone for Our Own Learning

Posted Kris Acheson-ChairLeave a commentPosted in Intercultural Connector Blog

Two years ago, when the Summer Institute for Intercultural Communication (SIIC) didn’t happen for the first time in over four decades, my staff and I searched in vain for summer professional development opportunities for interculturalists that would offer similar depth of learning and networking opportunities. Mourning the potential end of an era and with a strong desire to honor the work of the giants on whose shoulders we stand, the Center I direct–Purdue University’s Center for Intercultural Learning, Mentorship, Assessment and Research (CILMAR)–pulled together a group of a dozen intercultural and diversity, equity and inclusion thought leaders in the fall […]

Maintaining ICGC in Higher Education through Virtual Exchanges

Posted Yovana S. VeerasamyLeave a commentPosted in Intercultural Connector Blog, Special Series: Inclusivity and ICC in Online Spaces, Working Groups

As a member of the ICC Virtual Working Group, I would like to share how Intercultural & Global Competence (ICGC) maintained traction as a learning outcome in higher education during the pandemic. In the past two decades, U.S.-based institutions have placed more importance on international institutional partnerships between U.S. institutions and foreign counterparts, but the 2020 global pandemic unleashed restrictions which hampered physical mobility between nation states. In response to this and other challenges to ICGC in curricula, institutions adopted innovative solutions in the form of Virtual Exchanges and Collaborative Online Intercultural Learning (VE/COIL) to maintain global partnerships and serve […]

Transnational online space(s) for intercultural educators: How to maintain a critical self-reflection practice during a pandemic

Posted Amy McHugh and Aiko MinematsuLeave a commentPosted in Intercultural Connector Blog, Special Series: Inclusivity and ICC in Online Spaces

When the pandemic became a worldwide issue in 2020, online spaces became a necessary tool for continuing personal and professional intercultural competence journeys. Over the course of four weeks (12 hours overall) in January/February 2021, four researchers from around the world came together online to explicate 20+ readings. These conversations engaged us in defining interculturality, reading through and discussing a range of research studies. They also led us to regularly consider our own identities as intercultural researchers studying the field of interculturality and education. Living and working in various parts of the world (New York, Massachusetts, Tokyo, and Sydney) meant that […]