Intercultural Communication Education

The expansion of BIPA (Indonesian Language for Foreign Speakers) programs in Thailand necessitates the development of teaching materials that are not only linguistically sound but also culturally responsive and contextually relevant. This study examines the intercultural dynamics in the development of culture-based BIPA teaching materials by six practicum teachers in Thai secondary schools, focus…

Globalization and increasing diversity have rendered intercultural sensitivity (IS) an essential skill for effective communication and development of positive international relations. However, there is a notable lack of studies on the perceptions and development of IS among teachers and students in international schools. This phenomenological study explored conceptions of IS and development strat…

Mexico presents a unique linguistic context with extensive linguistic and cultural diversity. This study presents the results of a quantitative descriptive-correlational and inferential analysis based on the perceptions of 202 elementary school teachers regarding oral language teaching in Mexican intercultural educational contexts. It addresses the difficulties and strategies they use in the clas…

Against the backdrop of religious hostilities worldwide, there is a pressing need to increase intercultural communicative competence (ICC) in the domain of religion. While there is a growing body of scholar ship concerning interreligious dialogue, particularly in the field of peacebuilding, less is known about the contribution that universities can make towards facilitating religious understandin…

This paper examines Mother Tongue-based Bilingual Education (MTbBE) in South Africa as a site for epistemic transformation rather than mere linguistic reform. While policy efforts have widened access by including African languages, classroom and institutional practices often remain anchored in Eurocentric epistemologies. Drawing on decolonial theory and existing empirical studies, the paper argue…

Integrating intercultural activities in English language textbooks that foster intercultural communicative competence (ICC) is crucial for promoting global awareness and tolerance in young learners. However, previous studies have identified persistent gaps in ICC representation, especially in textbooks designed for international use. In the context of Indonesia’s Kurikulum Merdeka, which highligh…

Intercultural competence (IC) is a vital capability in higher education, yet limited opportunities for authentic intercultural interaction in many Asian EFL contexts constrain its development. This study examined the effectiveness of a Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)-integrated Problem-Based Learning (PBL) curriculum in enhancing IC among Taiwanese university students. The intervention combi…

This qualitative study examines how Chinese EFL teachers position their identities when teaching Intercultural Communication (IC), an interdisciplinary subject. With data collected through interviews, observations, and document analysis of three experienced EFL teachers at Chinese universities, thematic analysis revealed: (1) Teachers adopt strategic roles as “organizers,” “guides,” “transmitters…

With the intensification of globalisation and international exchange, intercultural communicative ability has become a focal point in English as a foreign language education in Chinese secondary schools. However, recent studies have indicated that the developmental construct of intercultural awareness is sometimes conflated with intercultural communicative competence. This leads to ambiguity in d…

In the context of globalisation, classrooms have become meeting places for learners from an increasing variety of backgrounds. Intercultural education, anchored in many national curricula, is considered a key approach to doing justice to this growing plurality among students. In relation to fostering learners’ intercultural (communicative) competence, language education plays a particularly impor…

This article addresses key theoretical and practical concerns related to the intercultural encounter with multimodal literature. Previous efforts to incorporate an intercultural dimension into conceptualisations of literary literacy have primarily focused on competences associated with the reading of traditional, script-based texts. However, as the term “literature” is today associated with a wid…

In this article we discuss how the design of a higher education language course can challenge the power of sentimentality in the classroom. In particular, the paper analyses the role of literature in intercultural language education through the lens of affect theory, while focusing on minimizing sentimentality in the classroom, especially when the literary texts used confront students with trauma…

Intercultural competence is a crucial element of foreign language education. It is argued that the multi-faceted nature of intercultural competence implies that assessment of its construct is a complex process; as a consequence, its progress is difficult to measure. Although several tools for evaluating intercultural competence currently exist, research on their use in secondary school settings i…

This article discusses intercultural communicative competence (ICC) as a present-day theoretical and practical concern. Byram’s (1997) model of ICC serves as a point of departure for the discussion since this is a theoretical construct which has had considerable impact on curriculum development and teaching materials in a number of countries over the past two decades. However, several theoretical…

With the increasing recognition of the importance of developing intercultural competence in foreign language education, there is now much discussion amongst scholars and teachers as to how to move beyond fact-based approaches to teaching culture by promoting more interpretive and reflective learning within a critical frame. Whilst study abroad is often seen as the ideal context for promoting such…

The popularity of the idea of interculturality, in different parts of the world, means that there are many differing meanings and ways in which the notion is understood, represented, and expressed. In contrast to the polysemy of the intercultural, democracy often appears on the surface to be understood through universalist and/or absolutist conceptualisations. Combining the intercultural and demo…

Teachers’ backgrounds, knowledge, experiences and beliefs play a decisive role in what and how they teach, and research on teacher cognition indicates that teachers’ knowledge plays an important part in guiding their classroom teaching (Basturkmen, 2012). At the same time, the inclusion of pragmatics in teacher development and training courses and the integration of language and culture in the fo…

Just over ten years ago, Block (2007, p. 2) called the increasing attention that second language researchers-and social scientists at large-were giving to the construct of “identity” an “obsession.” Since then, the identities of those who use, learn or study a language have been investigated in greater detail (e.g., Benson, Barkhuizen, Bodycott & Brown, 2013; Clarke, 2008; Dörnyei & Ushio…

This essay is an attempt to introduce into the discourse of Foreign Language Education the concept and phenomenon of internationalism. It begins with an analysis of the ways in which education systems promote nationalism and “national citizenship,” and suggests that an internationalist perspective would enrich this tradition in education. It continues with a discussion of the concept and the hist…