The Case for Transculturalism: redefining the conceptual base of cultural education in a globalised society

Author(s):

Niranjan Casinader(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

20. Research in Innovative Intercultural Learning Environments

Format:

Paper

Session Information

20 SES 02, What Is a Globalized Society, What Concepts Are Being Used and How Does That Effect the Interplay between Emotion, Identity, Intercultural Competences and Education?

Paper/Poster Session

Time:

2017-08-22

15:15-16:45

Room:

W3.16

Chair:

Gyöngyvér Pataki

Contribution

This paper argues that the current philosophical basis for cultural education, that of interculturalism, is no longer suitable to meet the needs of 21^st century societies, whether at the local, national, regional or global level. In its stead, it is suggested that of the concept of transculturalism is a more appropriate and long term foundation for cultural education after the social, economic and political changes generated by approximately fifty years of modern globalisation.

In the current age, notions of cultural education have been increasingly linked to the demographic transformations created by the modern phase of globalisation, characterised by a rapid increase in the transnational movement of people across national borders, whether by voluntary or forced migrations. Population shifts have become increasingly dynamic, resulting in an increasing cultural diversity of student populations within national school systems. For example, in 2015, nearly half of Australia's population has a parent who was born overseas, and the Australian school student population now reflects the wide diversity of cultural backgrounds that recent migration patterns have reinforced (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2016).

The response of educational authorities to these rapid changes has, in some ways, been quite emphatic. The geographical and intellectual reach and support of such values and attributes has been actualized in United Nations education polices such as the UNESCO frameworks on Intercultural Education (UNESCO, 2006) _ and Intercultural Competence (UNESCO, 2013). Countries such as Australia (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2016) have included the concepts of global citizenship and intercultural education (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2013) in their national curriculum frameworks. However, despite these rapid shifts in the character of global society, the conceptual base of cultural education has remained constant, with relatively little adaptation to the increasing fluidity of an ever-globalising society.

Notions of multicultural and intercultural education have tended to dominate national and international constructions of cultural education, despite the fact that both were developed well before the modern phase of globalisation began in the 1990s. The notion of multiculturalism first emerged across the Euro-American sphere in societies such as the USA, Canada and Australia in the 1970s (Portera 2008), essentially an ethnic pluralist approach (Leeman and Ledoux 2005), in which knowledge about different cultures is gained at the expense of generalized stereotypes. In the 1980s, there was a shift towards intercultural understanding as a foundation (Casinader 2016b), or the capacity to know and understand, how and why people of a particular culture live their lives in a specific way; it is also the ability to look for, and understand, the importance of developing individual agency in order to address any imbalances in existence and power (Gundera & Portera, 32008). Since then, however, there has been relatively little consideration as to the relevance of interculturalism to a reconfigured global society that is now firmly framed around the background of global population mobility and transience.

Method

The concept of transculturalism has been derived from several threads of conceptual development that have emerged during the 21st century. The long-term pattern of global demographic changes resulting from enhanced migration – both forced and voluntary - has had an impact on considerations of both the concept of culture and the nature of individual cultures. As outlined in the work of researchers such as Vertovec (2009) and Rizvi (2011a &b), as well as my own (Casinader 2014, 2016a & b, 2017), these constructs have morphed and developed in response to the increasing interaction between differing approaches to life. One of the products of this process, it can be argued, has been the development of a globalised culture or ‘global imaginary’ (Rizvi 2011a &b) that reflects the emergence of other phenomena such as transcultural ways of thinking (Casinader 2014). As a result, cultural education needs to shift from its current focus on interculturalism to one more based on transcultural concepts. Within transcultural frames of cultural education, acknowledgment of cultural variation is accepted and perceived as the normative state (Casinader and Walsh, 2015; Casinader 2016a & b, 2017); there is not the inherent identification of the ‘Other’ as an issue that is embedded in the notions of multiculturalism and interculturalism. It is also more reflective of the embedded transnational demographic nature of 21st century society, in which transnational behaviour is more accurately characterised as ‘trans-spatial’ movement (Casinader, 2017).

Expected Outcomes

The concept of transculturalism in the educational context is now being applied in several research projects in the areas of teacher education and the capacities of practising teachers. In line with past studies that have shown the impact of transnational school placements in developing the cultural capacity of pre-service teachers, a study of how international placements has impacted on pre-service teachers at Monash University was undertaken; as of December 2016, an international journal article on the initial results of that project is under review (Niranjan Casinader & Allie Clemans: Building the transcultural capacities of Australian preservice teachers to support employability in a globalised world: a pilot study). Another international journal article on the results of a project that studied the transcultural dispositions of practising teachers is also under review (Niranjan Casinader: Transnational learning experiences and teacher transcultural capacity: the impact on professional practice – a comparative study of three Australian schools). Future research projects include assessments of the transcultural capacities of intending and/or practising teachers in Canada and Australia (to be conducted as part of an International Baccalaureate-commissioned project in 2017) and Finland (in planning).

References

Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2016). Migration, Australia, 2014-15 Cat. No. 3412.0. Retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/3412.0Main+Features12014-15?OpenDocument Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority. (2013). Intercultural Understanding. Sydney: Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, Retrieved from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/GeneralCapabilities/Pdf/Intercultural-understanding. Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA]. (2016). The Australian Curriculum V8.2. Sydney: Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. Casinader, N. (2017). Transnationalism, Education and Empowerment: the latent legacies of empire. Routledge: Milton Park, Abingdon (in Press, Feb 2nd) Casinader, N. (2016a). Transnationalism in the Australian Curriculum: new horizons or destinations of the past? Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 37(3), 327-340. doi:10.1080/01596306.2015.1023701 Casinader, N. (2016b). A Lost Conduit for Intercultural Education: School Geography and the Potential for Transformation in the Australian Curriculum. Intercultural Education, 27(3). doi:10.1080/14675986.2016.1150650 Casinader, N. (2014). Culture, Transnational Education and Thinking: case studies in global schooling. Milton Park, Abingdon: Routledge. Casinader, N., & Walsh, L. (2015). Teacher Transculturalism and cultural difference: Addressing racism in Australian schools. International Education Journal: Comparative Perspectives, Special Edition: ANZCIES Conference Proceedings, 14(2), 51-62. Gundara, J. S., & Portera, A. (2008). Theoretical reflections on intercultural education. Intercultural Education, 19(6), 463-468. doi:10.1080/14675980802568244 Leeman, Y., & Ledoux, G. (2005). Teachers on intercultural education. Teachers and Teaching, 11(6), 575-589. doi:10.1080/13450600500293258 Portera, A. (2008). Intercultural education in Europe: epistemological and semantic aspects. Intercultural Education, 19(6), 481-491. doi:10.1080/14675980802568277 Rizvi, F. (2011). Beyond the Social Imaginary of ‘Clash of Civilizations’? Educational Philosophy and Theory, 43(3), 225-235. doi:10.1111/j.1469-5812.2009.00593.x Rizvi, F. (2011). Experiences of Cultural Diversity in the Context of an Emergent Transnationalism. European Educational Research Journal, 10(2), 180-188. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.lib.monash.edu.au/10.2304/eerj.2011.10.2.180 United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation [UNESCO]. (2006). UNESCO Guidelines on Intercultural Education. Paris: UNESCO. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation [UNESCO]. (2013). Intercultural Competences: Conceptual and Operational Framework. Paris: UNESCO.

Author Information

Niranjan Casinader (presenting / submitting)

Monash University, Australia

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