Intercultural communication studies: the policy background Michael Kelly

Third Space approaches to intercultural communication

• Third Space approaches are deeply ambivalent
• Potentially radical or conservative
• Acknowledge power relations
• Unmasking or confirming
• Strategies of resistance to domination
• But also strategies of domination, and resitance to resistance

Third Space approaches to intercultural communication

• Opportunities for creativity in communication
• But also opportunities for further codification and regulation
• Opportunities for criticial reflection
• But may also be alternative to active engagement

Implications for language education

• Disadvantages of Third Space approaches
• Challenge existing approaches
• National cultural perspectives
• Target language pedagogies
• Demand innovation from educators
• Adds to disciplinary variety

Implications for language education

• Advantages of Third Space approaches
• Provide a theoretical framework with cognative power
• Draw together (some) different disciplinary approaches
• Attract researchers and educators from a range of backgrounds

Implications for language education

• Improve academic recognition of ICC
• Pose radical questions without imposing radical solutions
• Potential for innovative solutions
• Attractive to policy makers
• Connect with a range of pedagogical strategies

Implications for language education

• Pedagogy of the Third Space
• Draws on existing work in language education
• Common European Framework of Reference
• Council of Europe
• Concept of Intercultural communicative competence
• Michael Byram and Geneviève Zarate

Implications for language education

• Four dimensions of skill and knowledge:
• Being (savoir-être) - ability to understand and deal with cultural differences without ethnocentricity;
• Learning (savoir-apprendre) - ability to learn how others live, think, feel and communicate;
• Knowing (savoirs) - knowledge of aspects of a culture, beliefs and reference points likely to be familiar to natives;
• Doing (savoir-faire) - ability to integrate the other three dimensions and interact successfully

Implications for language education

• Intercultural being
• Alison Phipps and Mike Gonzalez
• openness to the Other
• self-confidence
• more inclusive concept of personal identity
• willingness to see things in relative perspective

Implications for language education

• Long-term aims
• Situate language learning in broader context
• Improve mutual understanding
• Promote respect for difference
• Develop capacity to enjoy diversity