Daryl McCarthy earned his professional doctorate in non-profit organizational leadership from The School of Intercultural Studies at Fuller Graduate School. He also has graduate degrees in theology and philosophy of religion. He taught philosophy and theology for several years. In 1988 he was a co-founder of an international academic NGO and since then has worked with universities on every continent. His areas of interest are effective leadership and management, the role of ethics and morality in higher education and the ways theology contributes to human flourishing.
PLENARY TALK
It’s Not Good, It’s Not Bad, It’s Just Different—Effective Strategies for Intercultural Communication
We are all shaped by our own culture. Our culture defines for us what is normal, right, proper, polite, intelligent and beautiful. But as the globe shrinks, academics as well as students must engage more and more in intercultural communication. The growth of the European Union and particularly the Bologna Accord mandates that those of us in higher education become proficient and effective in intercultural communication. For the past 25 years I have worked with universities around the world and have traveled to more than 50 nations lecturing and meeting with university officials and students. I have made many cultural mistakes during these years and in the process I have learned many ways not to relate interculturally. But thankfully, I have also observed and learned some effective means of intercultural communication as well. This presentation will explain some of the ways in which our cultures shape us and will give several strategies for effectively working and communicating interculturally as students, teachers and academic leaders.