Intercultural Summer School in Finland

Introducing and Exploring Intercultural Relations in Everyday Life 

August 9-19, 2016 in Turku, Finland

We keep hearing that we are living in an intercultural world and that we need to prepare for it. What does this really mean? How do we meet ‘other’ people?
What are intercultural relations made of? This introductory course will tell you everything about the knotty idea of the ‘intercultural’ and help you to deal with it.

Short description:
This course introduces and explores intercultural relations in daily life and proposes to move beyond certain assumptions towards a richer and more realistic understanding of the word ‘intercultural’. The course will be of interest to anyone who wrestles with this knotty but central notion of our times. Many concepts such as culture, identity, intercultural competence and intercultural communication are discussed and revised. Myths about interculturality are also unpacked and dispelled. The course proposes a very useful framework to address theoretical and methodological issues related to intercultural relations. Fieldwork in Finland will help the students to apply their knowledge to the reality of everyday life.
Target audience: Students with at least two years of completed Bachelor’s studies in any field.
Selection:
– minimum 2 years of completed Bachelor’s studies in any field of study.
– a motivation letter of max 300 words written in English explaining clearly and honestly why the student is interested in the course, what s/he expects to get out of it and how s/he plans to use what s/he has learnt in her/his future life.
Outcomes:
The student will be able to reassess and discuss the definition and importance of intercultural relations today; develop a useful framework to address conceptual and methodological issues in relation to intercultural relations; analyse, explain and approach intercultural relations from a critical and reflexive perspective; criticise simplistic ideas about intercultural relations
Contents:
definitions of intercultural relations, culture, identity, diversity, community
the meanings of globalization
myths around interculturality
othering, stereotyping, representations
human rights and interculturality
dynamic intercultural competence
an introduction to the basis of discourse analysis
Implementation: 
4 days of 5 hours contact learning in classroom per week + 1 day of fieldwork per week.
Lectures 32 h, workshop 8h, fieldwork 12 h, group work 22 h, individual work 23 h = 97 h
Learning materials:
Articles, presentations, audiovisual material, webpages