Cover not available
Article published In:
Language and Intercultural Communication Pedagogies in Australian Higher Education
Edited by Paul J. Moore and Adriana Díaz
[Australian Review of Applied Linguistics 42:2] 2019
► pp. 125–145

Developing intercultural learning capabilities

A case study in higher education

| University of South Australia
| University of South Australia
| University of South Australia
This paper reports on a semester-long study that explored the experience of a group of local and international students from multiple disciplines, and their teachers, in a core Intercultural Communication undergraduate course of 550 students in which there is an orientation to learning, teaching and assessment that seeks to develop students’ intercultural learning capabilities. To capture the experience of learning, teaching and assessment in a highly diverse Australian university, data were collected over the life cycle of the course. The research design was ethnographic and collaborative, involving the research team, members of the teaching staff, and members of the university’s learning and teaching unit. The data include interviews with students and teachers, students’ written assessments, and observations of weekly teaching staff meetings. The overarching finding of the study is that, to enable students to develop their intercultural learning capabilities, there is a need to rethink notions of experience and engagement, specifically to attend to the central role of language/s and culture/s in all students’ experience of learning, teaching, and assessment. Analysed examples from the data are used to illustrate four specific guiding principles underpinning this (re)orientation to learning. The study was one of two case studies funded by the University of South Australia as part of a larger project: Developing English Language and Intercultural Learning Capabilities.
Keywords: intercultural capabilities, diversity, learning, teaching and assessment
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Intercultural learning
  • 3.The study
  • 4.The course
  • 5.Data and discussion
    • 5.1Theme 1: Understanding oneself in diversity
    • 5.2Theme 2: The role of reflection
    • 5.3Theme 3: The role of reciprocity
    • 5.4Theme 4: The role of reflexivity
  • 6.An intercultural orientation: Four principles
    • Learning is situated and personalized
    • Learning is interactive and experiential
    • Learning is reflective and reflexive
    • Learning is inter-interpretive
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 15 July 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/aral.00021.one
References (33)
References
Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at large: Cultural dimensions of globalization. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Australian Government. Department of Education and Training. (2017). Research snapshot. Onshore higher education international students as a proportion of all onshore students, by university, 2016. Retrieved from [URL]
Barker, S., & Crichton, J. (2008). Assessing and evaluating intercultural teaching and learning: An information management case study. Journal of International Education in Business, 1(1), 29–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blommaert, J. (2013). Citizenship, language, and superdiversity: Towards complexity. Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 12(3), 193–196. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Byram, M. (1997). Teaching and assessing intercultural communicative competence. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters Ltd.Google Scholar
Clyne, M. (2005). Australia’s language potential. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press.Google Scholar
Creswell, J. W. (2007). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.Google Scholar
Crichton, J. (2019). Transdisciplinary applied linguistics: Themes of perspectivity and transcendence. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 31(1), 143–148.Google Scholar
Crichton, J., & Scarino, A. (2007). How are we to understand the ‘intercultural dimension’? An examination of the intercultural dimension of internationalisation in the context of higher education in Australia. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics, 30(1), 4.1–4.21. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2009). Developing the intercultural dimensions of internationalisation. In H. Chen & K. Cruikshank (Eds.), Making a difference: Challenges for applied linguistics (pp. 65–82). Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.Google Scholar
Crichton, J., Scarino, A., Papademetre, L., Barker, S., Lushington, K., & Woods, M. (2006). Assessing and evaluating intercultural teaching and learning: A focus on sites of intercultural interaction. Report to Teaching and Learning Committee. Adelaide: Research Centre for Languages and Cultures, University of South Australia.Google Scholar
Gadamer, H. G. (1989). Truth and method. (J. Weinsheimer & D. Marshall, Trans., 2nd, ed.). London: Sheed and Ward.Google Scholar
Goodson, I. F. (2008). Investigating the teachers’ life and work. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Halliday, M. A. K. (1993). Towards a language-based theory of learning. Linguistics and Education, 5(2), 93–116. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heugh, K. (2013). Mobility, migration and sustainability: Refiguring languages in diversity. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 2221, 5–32.Google Scholar
Knight, J. (2004). Internationalization remodelled: Definitions, approaches and rationales. Journal of Studies in International Education, 8(1), 5–31. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kramsch, C. (2011). The symbolic dimensions of the intercultural. Language Teaching, 44(3), 354–367. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kraus, P. A. (2012). The politics of complex diversity: A European perspective. Ethnicities, 121, 3–25. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Liddicoat, A. J., & Crichton, J. (2008). The monolingual framing of international education in Australia. Sociolinguistic Studies, 2(3), 367–384. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Liddicoat, A. J., & Scarino, A. (2013). Intercultural language teaching and learning. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
May, S. (Ed). (2014). The multilingual turn: Implications for LSA, TESOL and bilingual education. New York, NY: Routledge.Google Scholar
Miles, M. B., & Huberman, A. M. (1994). Qualitative data analysis 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.Google Scholar
Pauwels, A. (2000). Globalisation and the impact of teaching languages in Australia. In A. J. Liddicoat & C. Crozet (Eds.), Teaching languages, teaching cultures (pp. 19–26). Melbourne: Language Australia.Google Scholar
Ryan, J., & Viete, R. (2009). Respectful interactions: learning with international students in the English-speaking academy, Teaching in Higher Education, 14 (3), 303–314. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Scarino, A. (2014). Learning as reciprocal, interpretive meaning-making. A view from collaborative research into the professional learning of teachers of languages. The Modern Language Journal, (Special Issue) 98(1): 386–401. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Scarino, A., Crichton, J., & Papademetre, L. (2005). A framework for quality assurance in the development and delivery of offshore programs in languages other than English – Report to the Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee. Adelaide: University of South Australia.Google Scholar
Scarino, A., Liddicoat, A. J., & O’Neill, F. (2015). The experience of intercultural interaction among Muslim and non-Muslim students: A case study. Commissioned report for the Centre of Muslim & non-Muslim Understanding with Catholic Education. Adelaide: Research Centre for Languages and Cultures, University of South Australia.Google Scholar
Scarino, A., & Liddicoat, A. J. (2016). Reconceptualising learning in transdisciplinary languages education. L2 Journal, 8(4), 20–35. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sfard, A. (1998). On two metaphors for learning and the dangers of choosing just one. Educational Researcher, 27(2), 4–13. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Snell, J., Shaw, S., & Copland, F. (2015). Linguistic ethnography: Interdisciplinary explorations. Houndsmills, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stern, T., Townsend, A., Rauch, F., & Schuster, A. (2014). Action research, innovation and change: International perspectives across disciplines. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
University of South Australia (2018). Our profile: Australia’s university of enterprise. Retrieved 25 May 2018 from [URL]
Zarate, G., Lévy, D., & Kramsch, C. (Eds.). (2011). Handbook of multilingualism and multiculturalism. Paris: Édition des Archives Contemporaines.Google Scholar
Cited by (4)

Cited by four other publications

O’Neill, Fiona & Timothy James McGrath
2023. Rethinking self, presence, and participation in online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics DOI logo
Chen, Chen
2021. Using Scaffolding Materials to Facilitate Autonomous Online Chinese as a Foreign Language Learning: A Study During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Sage Open 11:3 DOI logo
O’Neill, Fiona & Jeanne-Marie Viljoen
2021. Expanding ‘conceptual horizons’: a reflexive approach to intercultural pedagogies in higher education. Language and Intercultural Communication 21:5 ► pp. 572 ff. DOI logo
[no author supplied]
2022. Transformative Global Learning in Virtual Environment. In Preparing Globally Competent Professionals and Leaders for Innovation and Sustainability [Advances in Higher Education and Professional Development, ], ► pp. 145 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 3 november 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.