In the digital age, characterized by superdiversity and the rapid spread of information through online communication streams (e.g., news portals, messaging services, and social media), the study of language, identity, and culture has become more relevant than ever. Moreover, as is now widely known, with the internet, consumers have gained a multiplicity of active participatory possibilities in public debates by producing their own content, which has marked a switch from their framing as mere users of content controlled by the media industry to “produsers.” This paradigm shift opens space for raising voices in terms of political participation, international collaboration, decentralized online pedagogies, and online customer-company communication, to name a few.
In this course, we will investigate the blending of language, interculturality, and digitality in connection to the concept of ‘digital interculturality,’ preliminarily defined as: “the complex merging of the digital and the intercultural” as well as “the hyper interculturality of the digital world with its potential for a myriad of new and diverse connections” (Lenehan, 2022: 6). Throughout the course, we will try to approach the following questions: Who engages in practices of digital interculturality, in what ways, and with what implications?
The course will combine theory and empirical analysis of digital communication data. The theoretical reflections will address aspects of intercultural communication and digital communication, while the empirical analyses will be done on the basis of data selected by students. The data are explored in data sessions within the course hours.
While the actual classes will take place only in September, enrolled students are expected to do considerable work before the sessions.
- Kursleiter:in: Milene Mendes de Oliveira