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Objective

The tourism and hospitality industry is perhaps the most international and intercultural profession in a world, where most every aspects of the profession is exposed to components of intercultural interaction. In addition, the field requires a wide variety of “soft skills” to complete tasks within one’s own culture and in another’s. These skills include, for example, problem solving, successful interpersonal engagement, professional writing, presentation skills, teamwork, communication competency, and many more. Thus the objective of this course is to expose you to a variety of basic concepts of intercultural interaction as well as to use many soft skills as a means to put that knowledge into action, thereby increasing your professional competencies.

The goal of this course is to help you develop knowledge of many concepts that influence interaction within the tourism industry--not just when you are abroad but also within your home culture--and how these apply to your future clients, your professional interaction, and your own attitudes and behaviors.

Additionally, this course will lay the foundation for your learning how to work with dissimilar others that will facilitate not only your academic studies and social interaction on campus and beyond but also your career goals within the tourism and hospitality industries.

Competences
internationalization and multiculturalism, ethics, and learning to learn

Learning objectives
The Intercultural Communication in Tourism course provides content, knowledge, and learning experiences that meet the above competences in the following way:

You become familiar with the impact of your cultural background on many activities and are able to develop operating methods that take into account the multiculturalism of your work community. In the case of this course, the emphasis is as much on the your recognition of yourself and others as cultural beings, but also on the interaction of these various aspects in your perceptions, interactions, and more. (Competences: Internationalization and multiculturalism; learning to learn)

You begin developing capabilities in understanding the interdependence of cultures and cultural behavior and the inherent ethical dilemmas and decisions that arise from contact and interaction among cultures. (Competences: Internationalization and multiculturalism; ethics)

Content

Several of the topics this course presents include
The nature of culture
Dimensions of cultural variability
Cultural values and expression
Culture’s impact on communication
How to apply meta-communication
The non-neutrality of knowledge
Conflict negotiation and management
Culture’s impact on teamwork

Qualifications

There are no pre-requisites for this course.

Assessment criteria, satisfactory (1)

1 (Sufficient) You have achieved the just the basic knowledge and applicability of cultural issues within the industry and soft skills practices. Thus, you may be able to identify aspects of culture and intercultural interaction but possess only a superficial understanding of the complexities that international or intercultural environments bring to interpersonal and professional activities.

2 (Satisfactory) You have demonstrated a general understanding and applicability of cultural concepts and developed a basic ability to express those concepts through the soft skills necessary for a professional career in the hospitality and tourism industries.

Assessment criteria, good (3)

3 (Good) You are able to present a clear understanding of the various elements of intercultural interaction and can demonstrate through the soft skills the relationship between knowledge and practice in intercultural contexts.

4 (Very Good) You can demonstrate understanding of intercultural issues, perspectives, and concepts, how these relate to the tourism and hospitality industry, and can present well many of the soft skills introduced during the course.

Assessment criteria, excellent (5)

5 (Excellent) You consistently demonstrate your ability to synthesize various perspectives on and concepts related to culture and intergroup interaction as well as reflect well on how those components of culture impact your own life and future work in the tourism and hospitality industries. Additionally, you can demonstrate significant skill in the various soft skills introduced throughout the course.

Materials

Most materials used in the class will be distributed through Moodle by the teacher and, when appropriate, guest teachers. Typically, these are peer-reviewed academic journal articles or materials prepared by the instructor. The instructor may also require you to identify, read, and reflect on peer-reviewed journal material that you personally gather from reliable academic sources (i.e., library databases).