Browsing by Subject "päiväkirjatutkimus"

Aims. This study is built on the researcher’s own experience as an exchange student. The research material was the researcher’s self-kept diaries during the exchange year. The aim of this study was to analyse the content of these diaries and to examine the nature of intercultural sensitivity found in them. The intercultural sensitivity is part of teacher’s profession. Multicultural educator’s competence specifically underlines cultural awareness and ability to interact interculturally sensitively. According to previous research both professionalism and intercultural sensitivity of a teacher develop reflectively. This study examines the orientations of M. J. Bennet’s Model of Intercultural Sensitivity Development (DMIS) in the diaries. The study is a self-reflective learning process according to J. Mezirow. Methods. The research material consists of private diaries kept by the researcher during the school year 2004 — 2005. The diaries are a biographical narrative, which was written during a stay at a zulu-family in South Africa. The research material was analysed by the method of content analysis and theory based content analysis by M. J. Bennett’s DMIS. The diaries were construed as a description of a critical event, which the exchange student year was. The subjective basis of this study made it relevant to apply J. Mezirow’s theory of Transformative Learning for critical reflection’s and meaning perspectives’ part. Results and conclusions. There were three main themes discovered in the diaries: the challenges with adjustment, the life style and the growth process. Both ethnocentric and ethno-relativistic orientations of Bennet’s DMIS appeared in the research material – host family mainly ethnocentric and self mainly ethnorelativistically positioned. The challenges related to intercultural sensitivity development were clearly marked in the diaries. A self-reflective study such as this one takes a form of a learning process which concludes more specified under- standing and better consciousness of one’s own intercultural sensitivity.