ICC - ASSESSMENT

ASSESSMENT OF INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCE

To be intercultural competent in not a child’s play. And I think that a person cannot become intercultural competent communicating via Skype, filling and reading questionnaires…: these experiences can only be seen as a starting point of a long and challenging process which makes you consider others’ cultures as important and “worthy” as yours. I think it is one of the most difficult thing in the world!

Taking nothing for granted and trying to enter into others’ point of view is a hard work for your mind: all this requires lots of personal (both intellectual and emotional) efforts and studies. To be intercultural competence is not an innate quality but, as the word “competence” implies, it is an ability people learn to acquire in time.

In this second semester, we have the chance to have some contacts with American students and to start to reflect on how to manage a conversation with non-Italian persons.

I have never communicated via Skype. However, I keep on reading English web-sites, comparing American and Italian cultural aspects, following news…I think reading helps very much to come closer to other outlooks.

When you meet foreign people, one of the most important thing is to be able to speak their language. The language allows you to communicate effectively, to ask and answer, to reason and explain: if you do not have a common code, there cannot be good exchanges.

So, even if sometimes it is boring and hard, reading can help you to understand better, for example American culture, not only for the contents you read and things you've learnt, but also for the lexicon you’ve acquired. In other words, you become more educated but above all, you improve your reading and written skills, you enlarge your vocabulary. All these things provide you with those proper means or tools which make you manage a conversation with persons who do not share your cultural background.

When you study, new notions make you reflect on your own culture and lifestyle: being aware of the fact that your values, traditions, habits…are not the only ones possible in this world, help you to assume a more relative point of view from which to consider things, events and the other people.

I think that cultural notions and language represent a good basis for a very good exchange.

FINAL PROJECT: REALITY SHOWS

A curious topic for our final project could be comparing reality television in Italy and America.
This genre of TV program has had an unexpected success and every year new formats go on the air always enjoying great popularity.

People seem to be fascinating by watching “private life” becoming of “public domain”: bounds between private and public sphere overlap, and as a consequence, to distinguish what should be private and “secret” from what that can be made public becomes rather hard.

Programming is invaded by too many people with no particular competence or ability: their aim is to become popular but their widespread presence reduces further on the quality of TV programs.

It is also interesting to consider what effects reality television has on teenagers who do not have adequate tools to judge and understand that what they are watching is not real life.

POLITICAL MARKETING

A NEW KIND OF MARKETING

I think it is a little boring to follow a topic like elections because after a while the things you read in newspapers are more or less the same. In their speeches and interviews, candidates repeat their political platforms, repeat their slogans and even if they try to use different words, in the long run their statements seem to become idle chatter. I mean, important issues such as health, economy, immigration, work…seem without content and everything seem to be reduced to oratory exercises: candidates speaks as if they were selling a product. I think that in the last decades, politics has followed communication styles belonging to advertising: slogans, jingles, placards, symbols, adds (on TV, radio, in magazines, leaflets, e-mails…), photos with smiling people…are used more and more. Perhaps we can start talking of “political marketing” to all intents and purposes!!!

In this last week there wasn’t big or interesting news…at this stage of campaign, everything has already been said and now candidates start to attack, overtly or covertly, the opposition. So, you read lines and lines of nothing…
I think that both in American and Italian campaigns, candidates endeavor to persuade those part of undecided voters who can really determine the winner.

As regards Italy, foreign papers wrote about Alitalia near bankruptcy, holders of accounts in Liechtenstein banks and mozzarella cheese with dioxin. In general, Italy continues to be seen as a country with big problems that are hampering its growth and whose population is discontent and weary.
Italian papers update thousand times a day their pages with candidates’ silly statements: you read articles on politicians’ empty statements which often have no real connection between them.

As regards America, things are not so different. For example, some headlines are: “Obama and Clinton exchange slurs”; “Obama blames Clinton era for crisis” and so on. Somehow, the tones of the campaign are becoming harsher.
In order to persuade people, journalists often interview famous actors which becomes sorts of testimonials: for example, George Clooney and Brad Pitt support Obama, Angelina Jolie supports Clinton.

The stake game is high and of course, candidates try all-out to be the winner.

Politics dot-coms

POLITICS DOT-COMS

Reading on-line articles I notices that when newspapers have to deal with their nation’s domestic politics, news are updated more than once per day, detailed and a little repetitive.
In any case, there are some basic elements I think are common in journalism in general and some elements which characterized only on-line journalism. Some of them are:
- the title which, as a sort of showcase of the news, has to catch the readers’ attention; it contains puns or simply politicians’ statements or sorts of slogans;
- most times there is also a subtitle which sums up in few words the content of the article;
- photos and imagines (in general one per page);
- hyperlinks and clickable words
- related articles.

What I really enjoy on on-line newspapers is that you can use their “inner” search engine to look for the topics you want, and their archives; you can read people’s comments and posts, and write your opinion; you can easily “jump” from one topic to another and quickly understand or find out the meanings of words thanks to glossaries or clickable words.

Comparing Spanish (La Vanguardia, El Paìs ), English (Financial times) and Italian (La Repubblica) on-line newspapers I did not see great differences in style in that they tend to be straightforward and to stress key-words.

'La Repubbica' talks about Senator Obama as a charismatic leader who has great communication ability, a clear political platform and the desire to give American people hopes for their future. He is seen as a man who can gather people together thanks to his powerful and straightforward speeches.
Italian papers and newscast always deal with foreign countries: for example in these days we have read or listened to news about American, Spanish, French, Iranian elections. We are somehow “pro-foreign”! In general our foreign correspondents learn most important news from news agencies (which are reliable sources) and they treat events more or less objectively and trying to understand their dynamics. It is not just like that when they have to do with domestic politics.
Also Spanish papers remark how important communication is in campaigns and how Senator Obama is good in his debates and talk.
In English papers, Obama is seen as an important candidates who is achieving consensus and popularity day after day, proved by election results and polls as well. Of course there is also room for scoops, for news about Senator Obama’s past, disputes between Senator Clinton and him and so on.

As regards Mr. Veltroni, Italian journalists write about his tour, his speeches and political platform and, since he says are more or less the same things (obviously he has his own and fix platform), articles are about the same things and often about trivial quarrels between two or more politicians.
England and Spain look at Italy as a country who has to cope with lots of problems. They perceive that Italian people are confused. Following Italian event through other’s eyes is very interesting: sometimes I have the feeling that I understand better what is going on here from foreign magazines than from our papers.
Mr. Veltroni is seen as a polite and moderate person who tries to avoid offending (or even naming) either side.

Finally, I noticed that while English articles are sometimes quite long and journalists (as Spanish ones) tend to write in first person, we tend to report foreign news in an impersonal way, maybe in order to convey a sense of objectivity and truth.

ELECIONS 2008

ELECIONS 2008

I am going to compare Barack Obama and Walter Veltroni’s communication style. Both of them are on the right but they work in a very different political system and context.
Of course my observations cannot be neutral for two reasons: as a non-American person I'm following American elections with curiosity and a sort of enthusiasm; as an Italian, since I know the political situation of my country, I'm following the campaign in a rather skeptical and disillusioned way.
Let’s star talking about Barack Obama.

As everybody knows, Senator Obama is a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the U.S. presidential election scheduled for November 4, 2008. He is a Washington outsider and, as such, he is a new figure. As someone said here in Italy, he represents the American melting-pot because he is too black to be a white man, but too white to be a black man: he could well represent America .

Watching some videos on the web, I have found some of those elements which makes so effective his speeches. Some of his most famous and very recognizable slogans, above “yes, you can”, are “this campaign is about you”, “our time for change has come”, “I will a president who will not just say what you want to hear but what you need to know” or “change does not happen from the top down, it happens from the bottom up”. These are only some of the refrains I’ve caught but I think they are enough in order to convey the impression that his campaign is about the voters, oriented to the change without dividing America (“red America against blue America”).
Analyzing his speeches I have found that he uses some very simple devices. For example, he uses:
- figures of speech such as anaphora, that is the repetition of the same word or expression at the beginning of successive clauses (e.g. “you are choosing unity over division; you are choosing hope over fear; you are choosing…”); epistrophe, that is, the repetition of the same word or expression at the end of successive clauses (over all, “…yes, we can”);

- he uses words which succeed in creating collective symbolic imagines in people’s mind;
- he uses simple words to be as clear as possible (in particular in order to communicate with those who are not very educated): it seems he wants to give simple answers to complex political questions;
- his communication is very straightforward and forceful.

Regarding this last point, it is important to notice that in order to maintain his audience’s attention during his speeches, he varies the speed at which he speaks, he varies the volume emphasizing key-words such us “Americans”, “hope, “change”…Finally, he uses pauses very well, placed at the right moment making what he says really impressive.

An other important point in his campaign is the idea of a “new American dream”: also his last book titled “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream” he wrote “…we’ll need to remind ourselves, despite all our differences, just how much we share: common hopes, common dreams, a bond that will not break.”.
The last thing I want to point out is that the American band Black eye peas has written a song using some of Obama’s most impressive clauses: I think it is a further way to make Senator Obama’s messages reach young people.


In Italy, Mr. Walter Veltroni, mayor of Rome, is running for the Prime Minister election scheduled for April 13-14, 2008. He is considered one of the most popular centre-left politicians in Italy and he is the leader of the Democratic Party. He is a relatively young face in Italian politics.

He found out the slogan of his campaign without great difficult: he translated the American “yes, we can” into Italian.

His is rather ambiguous both in his political contents and in his communication: he is too clearly searching for Italians’ consensus, he is too clearly trying to be liked by people with the result that his speeches are not very impressive and convincing.
Among his most famous slogans, I’ve noticed “in reality, we dream of the same things”, “we must not be afraid of what is new. Future is the only time toward which we can go”. It is also famous his expression “but also” when he tries to mediate and reconcile opposite things.
He uses the pronoun “we” when he talks about his party, staff and supporters; he uses a very general “they” when he talks about his opponents in order to not vilify them and to maintain a relaxed atmosphere.
His way of speaking is placid: he doesn’t chance very much tone, speed and volume (sometimes I have the impression to listen to a speaker of a documentary film…I mean, to listen to Piero Angela!!). His way of dressing is sober and what I think it’s really appreciable is that he doesn’t want to look younger than he is.

He travels throughout Italy by bus (an ecological bus) in order to give the imagine of a politician who lives between ordinary people, who is not far from everyday problems. He also decided as soundtrack of his campaign the song by the Italian singer Jovanotti titled “mi fido di te” (“I believe in you”)…I have no enough words to express my opinion on these improbable choices…
Anyway, Mr. Veltroni is with no doubt a very educated persons but unfortunately in his speeches he tends to be bit too philosophical and to use too many metaphors.
The messages he gives are very similar to (or copied from) those given by Obama: change, hope, a new way of thinking politics, optimism....

The two campaign share some aspects but they are also different, in particular in the use of technology. Obama is a candidate who has integrated the web into his communication (see e.g. websites, forums, blogs, Youtube…): in this way many young people follow him on their own computer for themselves.
In Italy we are not yet ready for this kind of communication innovation: we still watch too much television and only in the last five-six years parties and leaders have had their own websites . I think it is due to a cultural factor: only in recent time we have started to be a little more computer-oriented.

PLE

Better later than never!!
I must admit I have left aside my blog for a good deal of time…but now I want to put right! I say sorry to you, group H, for my terrible delay…You are always on time with your work while I have been a bad girl!!!

I read all your posts and, since we have a similar school career and more or less the same age, I think we consider the same things. As Alessia wrote, learning is a continuum, that is, neither you can divided sharply the various experiences or steps of your have done during the years nor you can always clearly distinguished a formal environment from an informal environment (our curiosity often lead us to explore things which are nothing to do with academic topics!!).

Also I agree with Caterina when she wrote that learning a language is a difficult and long process in which experiences such as travels, Erasmus, tandem-learning…play a great role.
Nowadays, Internet offers us an opportunity we hadn’t six or seven years ago, namely, “to do in English” what we “do in Italian”…I mean you can read websites, books, newspapers, watch movies, sketches, adds...look for anything you like in different languages.

As always, when you talk about learning or improving a language, the only real thing to do is to go into a country where the idiom you are studying is spoken: in this way I think that your “PLE” is really exploited in every its aspect and opportunity.

In brief:
- in a formal environment (school, university): lessons, thesis, exams, discussions, exchanges between universities, text books, essays, translation.

- in an informal environment: travels, listening to radio or music, watching movies and TV programmes, audio-books, websites, podcasts.

Dear group H!
For the next ten days I am abroad (from the 3rd to the 12th December) and so I thought to write these few lines to inform you that I am not writing any post, not only in my blog but also in yours!!
Good work!