Critical Pedagogy and Intercultural Communication: creating discourses of diversity, equality, common goals and rational-moral motivation

The mainstream pedagogy of intercultural contact and communication has tended to give precedence to linguistic and cultural knowledge, the 'translation' of such knowledge, hence 'intercultural competence'. This paper argues what has been overlooked is the essential power saturation of intercultural encounters, where power is defined as textual practice of domination, exclusion or prejudice as well as contextual background of such relations and practices. As its central task, the paper suggests accordingly that new and alternative pedagogical discourses of combating power are needed and how such discourses can be implemented. Basically, this discursive transformation of intercultural pedagogy means that we teachers, trainers and consultants should try to introduce the discourses of diversity, equality, common goals and above all rational-moral motivation with respect to the Other - to society at large, starting with its youngest members possible. Methodologically, this work requires that we abandon the traditional role of imparting linguistic, cultural, and translation knowledge and try instead to develop a dialogue with students and practitioners through which we jointly initiate, (re-)formulate, debate and execute such new discourses.