In intercultural relations, practitioners face a crucial question: How do I know what is real? This is the central issue in what is called “ontology,” and intercultural researchers must be familiar with alternatives to the positivist research tradition in arriving at answers to the question. This course will explore, through a phenomenological perspective, cultural differences in the search for meanings. Symbolic interactionism and ethnomethodology provide a foundation for exploring nonwestern ways of insight about human experience, via the paradigms of Consciousness, Transcendence, and Connectedness. Nonwritten channels for expression of learning will often be explored.

Course Objectives:

• Explore different ontological systems and associated research strategies, both as a way to expand skills and to increase awareness of the issues that underlie learning across cultures
• Increase sensitivity to information which is nonverbally shown and develop skills (such as empathy and critical analysis) useful for interpreting intercultural communication at this level
• Expand experience with the range of forms which can be used to tell information, and practice using them with an awareness of what they might show about the underlying ontology
• Recognize the relation between knowledge and uncertainty, in order to develop greater comfort with uncertainty