Bridging Education Abroad and Domestic Multicultural Relations with Intercultural Learning

Abstract

This white paper is a conceptual summary of a think tank discussion sponsored by The Forum on Education Abroad. Following the traditional use of “white paper” as a call to action in specific contexts, this paper defines the contexts of programming for education abroad and for domestic diversity education and argues for an incorporation of their differing perspectives into the general category of intercultural learning. The result of the application would be that intercultural learning in education abroad would continue to expand its current emphasis on the developmental experience of contemporary global cultures to include more transformational experience of historical and political context, while domestic diversity education would expand its current focus on transformational experience of historically situated power inequities to include more developmental experience of contemporary domestic multicultural relations. Several illustrations of practical application of the ideas follow the call to action.