Episode 4: Tara Harvey on the Relationship Between Intercultural Learning and Global Learning

Tara Harvey, Ph.D., is the founder of True North Intercultural, a consultancy which provides training, tools, and support to educators who want to facilitate deeply transformative intercultural learning experiences at home and abroad. On this episode, Harvey offers practical definitions for two widely used terms, intercultural learning and intercultural competence, and discusses theory and research behind best practices for facilitating both. Harvey and Doscher explore the relationship between intercultural and global learning, and discuss methods educators can use to simultaneously promote both intercultural competence and students’ global awareness, perspective, and engagement.

Resources Mentioned

• True North Intercultural
• Tara's Blog
• Interculturally Competent U: The What, Why & How of Building Intercultural Competence in Higher Education
• The Parable of the Blind Men and the Elephant
• The Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity, Milton J. Bennett
• Intercultural Development Inventory
• Global Perspective Inventory (GPI)
• “Recap of the CILMAR Intercultural Learning Leadership Retreat,” by Tara Harvey

Great Quotes

"Intercultural competence, while it sounds like either something that you have or you don't, I really see it very much as a developmental continuum. So when I talk about intercultural development, intercultural learning, that's really the process of developing one's intercultural competence."

"It comes down to the fact that intercultural learning is not just about learning how to interact with somebody from a different country or culture. It's really about self-development and growing as a human being and becoming a better person in the world."

"The more we connect on a deeper level with people who are different from us, the more we expand our experiences of the world and how we want to impact it."