My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable i... more My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable idea stated by my erstwhile colleague Ed Stewart. In the original publication of American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural Perspective, Stewart (1971) generated a useful etic category for comparing cultural groups based on “patterns of perception and thinking.” When I joined as co-author for the Revised Edition (Stewart & M. Bennett, 1991), I added work from linguistics and ordinary language philosophy to the basic idea of perceptual patterns. In my subsequent work on the “representation of perceptual experience” that is summarized in this article, I have articulated the etic model more fully and updated the underlying neuroscience. In Stewart’s opinion, which I share, perception is the core concept in intercultural communication and therefore should be a central concern of intercultural training.
Journal of Intercultural Communication & Interactions Research, 2021
: Current assessments of intercultural communication competence are mostly positivist measurement... more : Current assessments of intercultural communication competence are mostly positivist measurements at an individual level of analysis. This article describes the development of a group-level assessment that uses constructivist methodology and “quantum measurement” to indicate Intercultural Viability—the probability that a group can adapt to unknown future changes in social environments, changes that will include new forms of diversity and otherness. The IVI incorporates scales based on the DMIS to generate interaction between subjects’ perception of themselves and their perception of group behavior in terms of intercultural sensitivity, yielding a measurement of adaptive potential relative to a baseline of organizations. In initial testing, Intercultural Viability does not show any association with gender, but it does increase with age, indicating that life experience may be an important factor in how individuals relate with groups vis-à-vis intercultural issues. The score is also significantly influenced by living abroad and intercultural training. Based on preliminary findings, the Intercultural Viability Indicator is shown to be a discriminating measure of how groups coordinate individual competence to create future adaptive potential.
Salute e migrazione : ieri, oggi e il futuro immaginabile : La SIMM e trent’anni di storia 1990-2020 : Contributi culturali e scientifici per gli anni 2019-2020, 2020
In the long-awaited second edition of "Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication," ... more In the long-awaited second edition of "Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication," Milton J. Bennett provides a comprehensive overview of the field from a constructivist perspective. In addition to his insightful analysis, Bennett offers a full complement of classic readings.
Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training, fourth edition, 2020
My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable i... more My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable idea stated by my erstwhile colleague Ed Stewart. In the original publication of American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural Perspective, Stewart (1971) generated a useful etic category for comparing cultural groups based on “patterns of perception and thinking.” When I joined as co-author for the Revised Edition (Stewart & M. Bennett, 1991), I added work from linguistics and ordinary language philosophy to the basic idea of perceptual patterns. In my subsequent work on the “representation of perceptual experience” that is summarized in this article, I have articulated the etic model more fully and updated the underlying neuroscience. In Stewart’s opinion, which I share, perception is the core concept in intercultural communication and therefore should be a central concern of intercultural training.
The study of intercultural communication has tried to answer the question, “How do people underst... more The study of intercultural communication has tried to answer the question, “How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?” Just a few decades ago, this question was one faced mainly by diplomats, expatriates, and the occasional international traveler. Today, living in multicultural societies within a global village, we all face the question every day. We now realize that issues of intercultural understanding are embedded in other complex questions: What kind of communication is needed by a pluralistic society to be both culturally diverse and unified in common goals? How does communication contribute to creating a climate of respect, not just tolerance, for diversity? The new vision and innovative competencies we bring to this changing world will determine the answer to another question about the global village posed by Dean Barnlund: “Will its residents be neighbors capable of respecting and utilizing their differences or clusters of stra...
What I'd like to do with you today is to extend a conversation begun with a couple of blogs I hav... more What I'd like to do with you today is to extend a conversation begun with a couple of blogs I have published recently, adding a specific application to the topic of assessing intercultural competence. One of blogs that I wrote in June held that was time to retire the iceberg as a metaphor for culture. There were dozens of responses to that blog, from far more people than I thought would be reading the blog. This led to a very interesting conversation that I think is related to intercultural competence. The other blog is one I wrote comparing intercultural competence to the idea of intelligence, particularly its measurement as IQ. The issue around both blogs is that of "reification" (I'll give you the definition in a moment) and it is also the issue I believe we are dealing with in trying to talk about the assessment of intercultural competence. Basically, we need to "dereify" the ideas of culture and intercultural competence back to some original root definition that would allow us to reestablish a more coherent approach to assessment. To put this talk in cultural terms, I'll be taking a more European than American approach. Americans tend to start out very optimistic about everything and in the end they do a little criticism. Europeans tend to do the reverse; they start with being very critical and sometimes end up with constructive suggestions. Although I'm probably basically more American than European in my thinking, I'll try here to practice something approaching the European approach. The idea of reification in this context is attributing objective reality to a process, frequently through measurement. So for instance all of us human beings are participating in a process of defining ourselves vis-àvis other people around us. This is the underlying idea of "identity." But the moment we say "what's your identity?" or "do you have an identity?" the process of generating our relationship with others becomes a thing that you either have or don't have. That in a nutshell is reification: we objectify an ongoing process and thus turn it into a static thing. Another example of reification in intercultural work is the concept of "culture shock." Cross-cultural situations certainly generate some kind of disorientation. If they're paying attention, people who to some extent are experiencing the world in a way that is unfamiliar are also experiencing some disorientation. However, to ask if you have culture shock is a reification of that experience, like asking if you have a certain kind of identity. Further, to assume that disorientation occurs on a U curve or a W curve in which something happens about this far into the process and then something else happens here and so on is an additional reification of the process associated with measurement. As Kay Barado and Bruce La Brack have pointed out, there is no systematic measurement support at all for these curves and we shouldn't use them as generalizations about people's culture shock experience. When measurements of groups are applied to individuals, they always generate reifications. Sometimes, of course, such reifications serve us as useful diagnostic categoriesa way to classify individual experiences. Such classifications need to be 1) supported by research and 2) useful for the purpose of the observation. Measurements are driven by the questions we ask. So, for instance, the original concept of culture shock generates attempts to measure a discrete kind of experience distributed among people over time; in other words, the U or W curves. Since these measurements appear to be unsuccessful, we may have asked the wrong question. Rather than asking "did you have culture shock, and when?," we might ask "how are you dealing with the disorientation that is associated with being in another culture?" This is a different kind of question and it leads to a different kind of measurement. If we think that culture shock is a thing, then we figure out how to define that thing in such a way as to measure whether it is there or not. However if we think that people are engaged in some sort of process that involves being disoriented, then we need to inquire into the nature that disorientation and to see how it is educational or not in terms of the outcomes of the program. In other words, by staying closer to the process (i.e. reducing reification), we may enable more useful observations. I would say that this is certainly the case for "culture shock." Another example of reification in intercultural work is the way we talk about "diversity." Diversity is one pole of a dialectic, the other pole being "unity." Diversity and unity need to be defined in terms of one another, like "left" and "right." If we pull on one side or the other of a dialectic, it generates a reification. So if we talk about either "left" or "right" without reference to the other, it implies that there is some kind of independent thing that
Liberal arts education has traditionally taken the responsibility of preparing students to be int... more Liberal arts education has traditionally taken the responsibility of preparing students to be intellectually competent and ethical citizens of society. But now society has evolved into “global villages” where people of different national and ethnic heritage increasingly live side by side in real and virtual environments. Does this kind of post-modern society demand new intellectual and ethical competencies? If so, what is the responsibility and capability of liberal arts education to teach those competencies? This paper explores how the field of intercultural relations can help address issues of intercultural competence and social justice in intellectually coherent and organizationally practical ways. The paper also address applications of intercultural principles to a wide range of curriculum issues, such as the use of intercultural communication frameworks in the classroom, strategies for encouraging intercultural learning through campus, community, and study abroad activities, an...
SUMMARY This topic addresses the central topic of the internationalization of higher education in... more SUMMARY This topic addresses the central topic of the internationalization of higher education in the current international economic context facing neoliberal globalization. As institutions of higher education continue to internationalize, the number of exchanged students and professors climbs ever higher. Over a quarter of a million US higher education students were studying abroad in 2010/11, a 4% increase from 2009/10. The Erasmus program in Europe sponsors a similarly growing number of participants ‐ 180,000 in 2009. Wherever they are able to do so, it appears that students are seeking international experience as part of their higher education program. The implicit and often explicit expectation by both students and sponsoring institutions is that study abroad generates educational value. But is this true? There never has been any compelling evidence that study abroad is superior to study at home in terms of the acquisition and comprehension of knowledge or concepts. Rather, edu...
How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?"Th... more How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?"This is the first fundamental question posed in editor Milton J. Bennett's Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication. The ideas contained in this collection have been assembled from time-tested classics and more contemporary viewpoints. Bennett has selected and ordered the articles in developmental sequence to generate a coherent conceptual picture of how to successfully communicate with other cultures. The names of some of these articles speak for themselves:- Communication in a Global Village, Dean Barnlund- The Power of Hidden Differences, Edward T. Hall- Black and White Cultural Styles in Pluralistic Perspective, Thomas Kochman- Cultural Assumptions and Values, Edward C. Stewart, Jack Danielian and Robert J. Foster- Stumbling Blocks in Intercultural Communication, LaRay M. Barna- Transition Shock: Putting Culture Shock in Perspective, Janet M. Bennett- Beyond Cultural Identity:...
1 This reading is an edited compilation of two articles by Milton J. Bennett: “Developing Intercu... more 1 This reading is an edited compilation of two articles by Milton J. Bennett: “Developing Intercultural Competence for Global Managers” in Reineke, RolfDieter (Editor) (June, 2001) Interkulturelles Managment. Wiesbaden: Gabler Verlag, ISBN: 3-409-11794-6 and “An Intercultural Mindset and Skillset for Global Leadership” from Conference Proceedings of Leadership Without Borders: Developing Global Leaders. Adelphi, MD: National leadership Institute and the Center for Creative Leadership, University of Maryland University College, 2001. Revised 2016, www.idrinstitute.org.
My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable i... more My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable idea stated by my erstwhile colleague Ed Stewart. In the original publication of American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural Perspective, Stewart (1971) generated a useful etic category for comparing cultural groups based on “patterns of perception and thinking.” When I joined as co-author for the Revised Edition (Stewart & M. Bennett, 1991), I added work from linguistics and ordinary language philosophy to the basic idea of perceptual patterns. In my subsequent work on the “representation of perceptual experience” that is summarized in this article, I have articulated the etic model more fully and updated the underlying neuroscience. In Stewart’s opinion, which I share, perception is the core concept in intercultural communication and therefore should be a central concern of intercultural training.
Journal of Intercultural Communication & Interactions Research, 2021
: Current assessments of intercultural communication competence are mostly positivist measurement... more : Current assessments of intercultural communication competence are mostly positivist measurements at an individual level of analysis. This article describes the development of a group-level assessment that uses constructivist methodology and “quantum measurement” to indicate Intercultural Viability—the probability that a group can adapt to unknown future changes in social environments, changes that will include new forms of diversity and otherness. The IVI incorporates scales based on the DMIS to generate interaction between subjects’ perception of themselves and their perception of group behavior in terms of intercultural sensitivity, yielding a measurement of adaptive potential relative to a baseline of organizations. In initial testing, Intercultural Viability does not show any association with gender, but it does increase with age, indicating that life experience may be an important factor in how individuals relate with groups vis-à-vis intercultural issues. The score is also significantly influenced by living abroad and intercultural training. Based on preliminary findings, the Intercultural Viability Indicator is shown to be a discriminating measure of how groups coordinate individual competence to create future adaptive potential.
Salute e migrazione : ieri, oggi e il futuro immaginabile : La SIMM e trent’anni di storia 1990-2020 : Contributi culturali e scientifici per gli anni 2019-2020, 2020
In the long-awaited second edition of "Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication," ... more In the long-awaited second edition of "Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication," Milton J. Bennett provides a comprehensive overview of the field from a constructivist perspective. In addition to his insightful analysis, Bennett offers a full complement of classic readings.
Cambridge Handbook of Intercultural Training, fourth edition, 2020
My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable i... more My main motivation with this article is to preserve what I think is an interesting and valuable idea stated by my erstwhile colleague Ed Stewart. In the original publication of American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural Perspective, Stewart (1971) generated a useful etic category for comparing cultural groups based on “patterns of perception and thinking.” When I joined as co-author for the Revised Edition (Stewart & M. Bennett, 1991), I added work from linguistics and ordinary language philosophy to the basic idea of perceptual patterns. In my subsequent work on the “representation of perceptual experience” that is summarized in this article, I have articulated the etic model more fully and updated the underlying neuroscience. In Stewart’s opinion, which I share, perception is the core concept in intercultural communication and therefore should be a central concern of intercultural training.
The study of intercultural communication has tried to answer the question, “How do people underst... more The study of intercultural communication has tried to answer the question, “How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?” Just a few decades ago, this question was one faced mainly by diplomats, expatriates, and the occasional international traveler. Today, living in multicultural societies within a global village, we all face the question every day. We now realize that issues of intercultural understanding are embedded in other complex questions: What kind of communication is needed by a pluralistic society to be both culturally diverse and unified in common goals? How does communication contribute to creating a climate of respect, not just tolerance, for diversity? The new vision and innovative competencies we bring to this changing world will determine the answer to another question about the global village posed by Dean Barnlund: “Will its residents be neighbors capable of respecting and utilizing their differences or clusters of stra...
What I'd like to do with you today is to extend a conversation begun with a couple of blogs I hav... more What I'd like to do with you today is to extend a conversation begun with a couple of blogs I have published recently, adding a specific application to the topic of assessing intercultural competence. One of blogs that I wrote in June held that was time to retire the iceberg as a metaphor for culture. There were dozens of responses to that blog, from far more people than I thought would be reading the blog. This led to a very interesting conversation that I think is related to intercultural competence. The other blog is one I wrote comparing intercultural competence to the idea of intelligence, particularly its measurement as IQ. The issue around both blogs is that of "reification" (I'll give you the definition in a moment) and it is also the issue I believe we are dealing with in trying to talk about the assessment of intercultural competence. Basically, we need to "dereify" the ideas of culture and intercultural competence back to some original root definition that would allow us to reestablish a more coherent approach to assessment. To put this talk in cultural terms, I'll be taking a more European than American approach. Americans tend to start out very optimistic about everything and in the end they do a little criticism. Europeans tend to do the reverse; they start with being very critical and sometimes end up with constructive suggestions. Although I'm probably basically more American than European in my thinking, I'll try here to practice something approaching the European approach. The idea of reification in this context is attributing objective reality to a process, frequently through measurement. So for instance all of us human beings are participating in a process of defining ourselves vis-àvis other people around us. This is the underlying idea of "identity." But the moment we say "what's your identity?" or "do you have an identity?" the process of generating our relationship with others becomes a thing that you either have or don't have. That in a nutshell is reification: we objectify an ongoing process and thus turn it into a static thing. Another example of reification in intercultural work is the concept of "culture shock." Cross-cultural situations certainly generate some kind of disorientation. If they're paying attention, people who to some extent are experiencing the world in a way that is unfamiliar are also experiencing some disorientation. However, to ask if you have culture shock is a reification of that experience, like asking if you have a certain kind of identity. Further, to assume that disorientation occurs on a U curve or a W curve in which something happens about this far into the process and then something else happens here and so on is an additional reification of the process associated with measurement. As Kay Barado and Bruce La Brack have pointed out, there is no systematic measurement support at all for these curves and we shouldn't use them as generalizations about people's culture shock experience. When measurements of groups are applied to individuals, they always generate reifications. Sometimes, of course, such reifications serve us as useful diagnostic categoriesa way to classify individual experiences. Such classifications need to be 1) supported by research and 2) useful for the purpose of the observation. Measurements are driven by the questions we ask. So, for instance, the original concept of culture shock generates attempts to measure a discrete kind of experience distributed among people over time; in other words, the U or W curves. Since these measurements appear to be unsuccessful, we may have asked the wrong question. Rather than asking "did you have culture shock, and when?," we might ask "how are you dealing with the disorientation that is associated with being in another culture?" This is a different kind of question and it leads to a different kind of measurement. If we think that culture shock is a thing, then we figure out how to define that thing in such a way as to measure whether it is there or not. However if we think that people are engaged in some sort of process that involves being disoriented, then we need to inquire into the nature that disorientation and to see how it is educational or not in terms of the outcomes of the program. In other words, by staying closer to the process (i.e. reducing reification), we may enable more useful observations. I would say that this is certainly the case for "culture shock." Another example of reification in intercultural work is the way we talk about "diversity." Diversity is one pole of a dialectic, the other pole being "unity." Diversity and unity need to be defined in terms of one another, like "left" and "right." If we pull on one side or the other of a dialectic, it generates a reification. So if we talk about either "left" or "right" without reference to the other, it implies that there is some kind of independent thing that
Liberal arts education has traditionally taken the responsibility of preparing students to be int... more Liberal arts education has traditionally taken the responsibility of preparing students to be intellectually competent and ethical citizens of society. But now society has evolved into “global villages” where people of different national and ethnic heritage increasingly live side by side in real and virtual environments. Does this kind of post-modern society demand new intellectual and ethical competencies? If so, what is the responsibility and capability of liberal arts education to teach those competencies? This paper explores how the field of intercultural relations can help address issues of intercultural competence and social justice in intellectually coherent and organizationally practical ways. The paper also address applications of intercultural principles to a wide range of curriculum issues, such as the use of intercultural communication frameworks in the classroom, strategies for encouraging intercultural learning through campus, community, and study abroad activities, an...
SUMMARY This topic addresses the central topic of the internationalization of higher education in... more SUMMARY This topic addresses the central topic of the internationalization of higher education in the current international economic context facing neoliberal globalization. As institutions of higher education continue to internationalize, the number of exchanged students and professors climbs ever higher. Over a quarter of a million US higher education students were studying abroad in 2010/11, a 4% increase from 2009/10. The Erasmus program in Europe sponsors a similarly growing number of participants ‐ 180,000 in 2009. Wherever they are able to do so, it appears that students are seeking international experience as part of their higher education program. The implicit and often explicit expectation by both students and sponsoring institutions is that study abroad generates educational value. But is this true? There never has been any compelling evidence that study abroad is superior to study at home in terms of the acquisition and comprehension of knowledge or concepts. Rather, edu...
How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?"Th... more How do people understand one another when they do not share a common cultural experience?"This is the first fundamental question posed in editor Milton J. Bennett's Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication. The ideas contained in this collection have been assembled from time-tested classics and more contemporary viewpoints. Bennett has selected and ordered the articles in developmental sequence to generate a coherent conceptual picture of how to successfully communicate with other cultures. The names of some of these articles speak for themselves:- Communication in a Global Village, Dean Barnlund- The Power of Hidden Differences, Edward T. Hall- Black and White Cultural Styles in Pluralistic Perspective, Thomas Kochman- Cultural Assumptions and Values, Edward C. Stewart, Jack Danielian and Robert J. Foster- Stumbling Blocks in Intercultural Communication, LaRay M. Barna- Transition Shock: Putting Culture Shock in Perspective, Janet M. Bennett- Beyond Cultural Identity:...
1 This reading is an edited compilation of two articles by Milton J. Bennett: “Developing Intercu... more 1 This reading is an edited compilation of two articles by Milton J. Bennett: “Developing Intercultural Competence for Global Managers” in Reineke, RolfDieter (Editor) (June, 2001) Interkulturelles Managment. Wiesbaden: Gabler Verlag, ISBN: 3-409-11794-6 and “An Intercultural Mindset and Skillset for Global Leadership” from Conference Proceedings of Leadership Without Borders: Developing Global Leaders. Adelphi, MD: National leadership Institute and the Center for Creative Leadership, University of Maryland University College, 2001. Revised 2016, www.idrinstitute.org.
Uploads
Papers by Milton Bennett