Intercultural Competence

Examples of Intercultural Competence in the following topics:

• Cultural Transmission

  • Intercultural competence is the ability to communicate successfully with people of other cultures.
  • In interactions with people from foreign cultures, a person who is interculturally competent understands culture-specific concepts in perception, thinking, feeling, and acting.
  • The interculturally competent person considers earlier experiences free from prejudices, and has an interest in, and motivation towards, continued learning.
  • The development of intercultural competence is mostly based on the individual's experiences while communicating with different cultures.

• Intergenerational Conflict

  • Intergenerational conflict refers to the conflict between older and younger generations as they compete for jobs and resources.
  • This social theory suggests that conflict between older and younger generations occurs as they compete for resources and jobs .
  • Conflict theory has three main premises: first, that society is comprised of different groups that compete for resources; second, that despite social attempts to portray a sense of cooperation, a continual power struggle exists between social groups as they pursue their own divergent and competing interests; third, social groups will use resources to their own advantage in pursuit of their own goals, even if it means taking advantage of another group of people.
  • According to the conflict perspective of aging, generations are competing over jobs.
  • As jobs became increasingly scarce, younger and older generations both felt pressure to compete over available resources, enabling competition between the generational divide.

• Homeschooling

  • For example, in Virginia it is "home instruction," in South Dakota it is "alternative instruction," and in Iowa it is "competent private instruction. "
  • Some state athletic associations ban homeschoolers from interscholastic competition, both by prohibiting homeschoolers to compete for a state federation member school as well as by prohibiting member schools to compete against independent teams made up of homeschoolers.
  • In such states, homeschoolers may only compete amongst other homeschoolers or against schools that are not members of the state's interscholastic athletic federation.
  • Other states allow homeschoolers to compete for the public schools that they would otherwise attend by virtue of their residence.
  • Still other state interscholastic athletic associations allow homeschoolers to organize teams that compete against other established schools, but do not allow homeschoolers to compete on established school teams.

• The U.S. Political System

  • The United States is a representative federal democracy driven by elections in which citizens' and lobbyists' diverse interests compete.
  • The United States is also a diverse society, and citizens' competing interests are reflected in politics.

• Competition

  • People can compete over tangible resources like land, food, and mates, but also over intangible resources, such as social capital.
  • Many philosophers and psychologists have identified a trait in most living organisms that can drive the particular organism to compete.
  • Competitiveness, or the inclination to compete, has become synonymous with aggressiveness and ambition in the English language.
  • Just as advanced civilizations integrate aggressiveness and competitiveness into their interactions, as a way to distribute resources and adapt, most plants compete for higher spots on trees to receive more sunlight.

• The Changing Face of the Workplace

  • Secondly, workers are being forced to compete in a global job market.
  • They are able to compete successfully in the world market and command higher wages.
  • Conversely, production workers and service workers in industrialized nations are unable to compete with workers in developing countries.

• Conflict Theory

  • Society is made up of individuals competing for limited resources (e.g., money, leisure, sexual partners, etc.).
  • Change occurs as a result of conflict between competing interests rather than through adaptation.
  • Thus, the educational system often screens out poorer individuals not because they are unable to compete academically but because they cannot afford to pay for their education.

• Conflict

  • Discuss how various groups in society compete for resources, status and power within society, known as conflict theory

• The Ecclesia

  • Ecclesias are different from churches because they typically must compete with other religious voices in a community.

• Social Class

  • Social class in the United States is a controversial issue, having many competing definitions, models, and even disagreements over its very existence.
  • While social scientists offer competing models of class structure, most agree that society is stratified by occupation, income, and educational attainment.