2022 International Conference on the Development and Assessment of Intercultural Competence
Virtual. All sessions will be accessed through the conference app, which will be accessible to registered attendees in January.
The Potential of Pedagogies of Discomfort in Intercultural Virtual Exchange
Presentation Summary
We argue that language and intercultural communication education in universities should be humanistic and address ‘discomforting themes’ related to human suffering in order to foster empathy, solidarity and a sense of belonging to the global community. We illustrate with a virtual exchange involving collaborative creative work.
Primary Presenter
Irina Golubeva, UMBC
State (if in the U.S.)
MD
Country
United States
Professional Biography
Irina Golubeva is an Associate Professor at UMBC (USA), where she directs the MA program in Intercultural Communication. Golubeva’s main research interests concern the development of multilingual awareness and intercultural competence, internationalisation of higher education, and conceptualization of intercultural citizenship.
Secondary Presenters
Melina Porto, Universidad Nacional de La Plata and Conicet (National Research Council), La Plata, Argentina
State (if in the U.S.)
Country
Argentina
Professional Biography
Melina Porto is a Researcher at the National Research Council and Professor at Universidad Nacional de La Plata in Argentina, and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of East Anglia (UK). Her research interests include the intercultural dimension of English language teaching and intercultural citizenship education in the FL classroom.
Michael Byram, Universities of Durham (England) and Sofia (Bulgaria)
State (if in the U.S.)
Country
UK
Professional Biography
Michael Byram is Professor Emeritus in the School of Education, Durham and Guest Research Professor at the University of Sofia. He works on intercultural education, foreign language education and the supervision and assessment of the doctorate, and has been involved in the language and education work of the Council of Europe for many years.