The cultural hybridity of Lena: A multi-method case study of a third culture kid

This study used a multi-method case study to explore the central paradox of global nomadism, that cultural hybrids seem at home in any cultural context, but feel at home only among others with a similar cultural history. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) was used to provide a psychometric profile of Lena, an Adult Third Culture Kid. Lena presented an atypical and theoretically impossible IDI profile, simultaneously ethnocentric, with issues in Minimization, yet clearly ethnorelative, with no issue evident on the AA or EM scales. A series of in-depth interviews were conducted to explore these IDI results, their implications for the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS), which is the theoretical basis for the IDI, and whether they helped to explain the paradox of global nomadism. The interviews helped Lena to realise that although she was surrounded by people from different national backgrounds throughout her life, their shared cultural experience was stronger than their surface differences, resulting in a Minimization orientation of ‘beneath our superficial differences, people are basically all the same’.     

Visualizing the knowledge domain of intercultural competence research: A bibliometric analysis

As the volume of research on intercultural competence (ICC) increases greatly in the past twenty years, a systematic review of the diverse literature and its development process becomes essential. This study conducted a bibliometric analysis for the knowledge domain of intercultural competence by using 663 research articles on ICC spanning from 2000 to 2018 in Web of Science (WoS) database. Knowledge maps of ICC research were visualized by CiteSpace. The research findings show that in the field of ICC research, the number of published articles shows an ostensible upward trend in terms of temporal distribution since 2007; the first five highly cited countries are USA, China, Australia, Spain, and UK; International Journal of Intercultural Relations (IJIR) is found to be the most highly cited journal within the past twenty years; the first five highly cited authors are Michael Byram, Darla Deardorff, Claire Kramsch, Mitchell Hammer and Milton Bennett; Conceptualizing intercultural competence (Spitzberg & Changnon, 2009) is the most highly cited article; Blog entries, medical student, academic expatriate, and global management competencies are found to be top four ICC research hotspots. These findings provide considerable insights into research trend, topics, journals, authors and hotspots concerning ICC from the diachronic perspective. Visualization study of the ICC literature by formulating a graphical and explicit approach might be beneficial for researchers and scholars to track the development of ICC research.     

Intercultural Friendships,Social Identities and Psychological Well-Being of Ethnic Minorities in Different Contexts

ABSTRACT

The study focuses on the relationship between intercultural friendships, social identities, and well-being of ethnic Russians in three different contexts of the North and South Caucasus. We revealed the positive relations of intercultural friendships with the host society identity in all contexts and with the well-being of Russict ans in the culturally diverse contexts. Ethnic identity is positively related to the self-esteem of Russians in two more inclusive contexts, and, negatively associated with their life satisfaction in the least inclusive context. The ethnic and host society identities mediated the relationship between intercultural friendships and psychological well-being only in the most inclusive context.     

Perceptions of social strategies in intercultural relations: The case of Ethiopian immigrants in Israel

Social strategies are a central component of intercultural competence, and are vital in understanding, theoretically and practically, the immigration and acculturation process. This study focused on an immigrant group experiencing identity threat, namely young Ethiopians in Israel, and examined their perceptions of social strategies in intergroup relations. Thematic analysis was performed on two types of qualitative data: (1) newspaper articles in which members of the Ethiopian community addressed aspects of their social strategies (31 reports collected from seven newspapers and magazines) and (2) data from two focus groups conducted afterwards with young adult members of the Ethiopian community (five to seven participants in each group). A major pattern emerging from the immigrants’ reports is the adoption of the hosts’ perspective and attitudes regarding the effective norms of social behavior. In their daily coping, on the other hand, the immigrant youth tended to exhibit a complex and at times ambivalent variety of behavioral patterns in their social interactions with members of the host culture. This spectrum of social strategies suggests dynamic processes of trial and error and reflects the unique complexity of intercultural competence. Findings were analyzed in terms of the immigrants’ perception of the threat to their identity and of their ways of coping with those threats.     

大数据时代个人敏感信息的法律保护

随着大数据时代的到来,传统个人信息的保护架构无法全面保护个人敏感信息。从公众对信息敏感度的感知差异性以及企业经济成本的角度而言,对个人敏感信息进行区分保护有其必要性。面对大数据时代对个人敏感信息带来的挑战,应该完善法律体系,从以下几点着手:对个人敏感信息范围的界定应采取静态列举与动态情景相结合的综合考量方式;更新现有的信息保护机制;强化个人敏感信息的保护规则。     

Promoting intercultural competence in diverse US classrooms through ethnographic interviews

To meet the demands of contemporary society, students need to develop the ability to interact effectively with people from different cultures. To advance this goal, a project involving ethnographic interviews was introduced to an intercultural communication course. Participating students’ attitudes toward other cultures were measured on a Likert scale at the beginning and end of the project. The findings show that through the interviews, the students developed greater awareness of their own cultures and of themselves within their culture and deepened their knowledge of other cultures. Yet, the majority of the students did not show greater interest in learning a foreign language at the end of the project. Further, even though the students did learn about other cultures, their responses to becoming more open to other cultures were inconclusive. The article discusses possible reasons for these outcomes and outlines future research directions.     

来华留学生跨文化适应策略与影响因素的相关研究——基于对在杭州日本留学生调查数据的分析

文化适应问题成为各国学者关注的焦点.本研究旨在探索中国文化环境下留学生的文化适应问题.通过选取杭州高校的50名日本留学生进行调查,探索他们采取的文化适应策略以及影响因素与策略的相关性.结果发现,整合策略应用最广,其次是分离和同化,边缘化是最不受欢迎的策略;不同策略在性别上的发展趋势略有不同.研究还发现,策略与个体认知方式与社会支持呈显著相关,而与跨文化接触无显著相关;男女群体中进行比较,相关性也有差异.     

跨文化交际与原版电影听说教学

通过教学途径学习的英语和英美日常生活中使用的英语有一些差别,这些差异会在跨文化交际中引起一些交际困难或失误。利用真实的视听材料如原版电影安排教学活动,可以让英语学习者熟悉和适应这些差异,弥补课堂教学的不足,丰富了学习情境。英语电影欣赏的内容、方法、教材编写等方面还有待于进一步探讨。     

Dimensions of diversity: Challenges to secondary school teachers with implications for intercultural teacher education

The study used the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) questionnaire instrument developed by Hammer and Bennett (2001) to determine the level of intercultural sensitivity of Hong Kong secondary school teachers. Three hundred and eighty-six serving teachers were surveyed. Findings revealed that the majority of the teachers were operating in the beginning stage, denial/defense, of the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS). They saw the world from an ethnocentric perspective and held a negative view on evaluating cultural differences. Predominantly, emphasis tended to be placed on cultural similarities, and the recognition of cultural differences was superficial. The implications for teacher education are discussed.     

韩语常用汉字词与汉语词文化的差异

韩语中有很多汉字,通常把与汉字有关的韩语词汇,包括汉源词、日文汉字词及借用汉字的韩语词等称为汉字词。本文旨在讨论词汇的附加义以及文化色彩的差异,对一些感情色彩等方面有异同的汉字词和汉语词进行了比较,为对外汉语教学及教材编写以及韩国人学习汉语都提供一定的参考。