Education as Transcultural Education: A Global Challenge

Abstract

In all European countries, education has been related to nation building. It has contributed to the building of national identity, national consciousness and the development of a nation state. Since the Second World War and above all since the fall of the Berlin Wall, education in the European Union has also included a consideration of European and cultural diversity. Culture does not designate a self-contained, uniquely definable ensemble of practices, values, symbolization and imaginations. The borders between cultures are dynamic and change according to context. Globalization must be understood as a process in which two global developmental tendencies that define the present are advancing reciprocally in a manner that is not without conflict. One tendency is toward universal standardization of the world; the other tendency is toward provision of room for cultural diversity in the process. Both tendencies also create new forms of globalization. The mission of trans-cultural education is contact with the other and with alterity in a manner that is free of violence. Within the scope of trans-cultural education, the terms differentiation, transformation and hybrid formation play a central role in dealing with the foreign, the other and alterity. These terms are interrelated. Their inter-connectedness is obvious. In education from a trans-cultural point of view, it is important to make use of these three concepts for the analysis of cultural phenomena and relations. Trans-cultural learning, which is oriented toward a better understanding of the other and toward a reduction in violence toward other people and future generations, will also have to develop innovative forms of learning. In a radical perspective, a trans-cultural education for sustainability oriented toward peace and social justice leads to a far-reaching reform of the educational system. In conjunction with the realization of a complex multi-modal learning process, four perspectives play an important role: mimetic learning, performativity of learning, inquiry learning, and rituals of learning and communication.

Keywords: trans-cultural education, globalization, sustainability, cultural diversity