AIE Alliance for International Education World Conference Internationalizing

AIE (Alliance for International Education) World Conference, ‘Internationalizing Schools: Sharing Good Practice and Addressing Challenges’ Space travel for internationalizing young minds? Educational appeals of a galactic community, from literary and film criticism and physical training viewpoints Dr. Konrad Gunesch, Associate Professor American University in the Emirates, Dubai

AIE (Alliance for International Education) World Conference, ‘Internationalizing Schools: Sharing Good Practice and Addressing Challenges’ Ruimtereisfictie voor het internationaliseren van jonge geesten? Educatieve aantrekkingskrachten van een galactische gemeenschap, gezien door literaire en film kritiek en lichamelijke training Dr. Konrad Gunesch, Associate Professor American University in the Emirates, Dubai

Definition of Multilingualism • Quantity (Number of Languages) • Quality (Degree of Mastery) • Toughest literature definition: • 3+ foreign languages • at working proficiency

Definition of Cosmopolitanism: Matrix • Global and local straddling in life • Knowledge about places lived or visited • Engagement with cultural diversity • Mobility to travel, but not “typical tourists” • Nation-state & “home” relationship: complex

Empirical Investigation Revealed 3 Ideal Types of Students: § Advanced Tourist § Transitional Cosmopolitan § Interactive Cosmopolitan

The Advanced Tourist • Languages view and use: professional • Identity forms: local

Professional Usefulness of Language Learning • “I chose Spanish because…Latin America is for Political Scientists a very interesting field of study… To have more possibilities afterwards with the language… in a job market that is getting more international. ” • “It just seemed that languages would be more useful, later…I knew I wasn’t going to live in Norway all my life, and…I would need languages for what I wanted to do. ”

The Transitional Cosmopolitan • Nation-state / home country: critical relationship • Internationalism: strong features

Linguistic Mediation of ‘Internationalism’ • “I have been treated as a xenomaniac by my friends sometimes. Comme si j’étais un traître. Ou si je critique la Grèce en étant en Grèce, comme si je n’avais pas le droit de faire ça, et c’est une alliance with a traitor. The fact that I can criticize Greece, it means for them [Greeks] I am a bit of a foreigner. ”

The Interactive Cosmopolitan The ideal type that is the most: • Open • Giving • Two-way Communicating • Culturally Engaging

Linguistic Mediation/ Complexity of ‘Home’ • “Knowing the language well doesn’t make you feel at home. But you cannot feel at home unless you know the language. ” • “[Home] is also where you’re born, but other home places accumulate…It captures all of your senses, it’s what you see, it’s also what you smell… Then again, it depends on the context… ‘A home’ is a place where I can live any mood, a range of different situations. ”

Star Trek and Internationalism • Starfleet crew’s 5 -year mission: “to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, [and] to boldly go where no man has gone before. ” • USS Enterprise: just 1 of the countless starships in “The Federation’s” vast fleet. • “United Federation of Planets” = future’s interstellar governmental and military body = futuristic combopack of today’s UN and NATO.

The Physical (“Stellar”) Star Trek Universe

Star Trek and Internationalism • Star Trek basics/origins: liberal internationalism. • Crew regularly ignores Prime Directive of Nonparticipant Observation to meddle in other-worlds affairs. • International Relation’s Doctrine of Non-Interference regularly breached because morality demands it.

Star Trek and Americanism • Optimism re Transportation/Communication technologies • “Melting Pot” + “Rationalism” to limit: modernity, reason, science → productive, peaceful and thriving world. • Universality to limit: stable, ethical society based on: Ø classless society founded on reason, Ø freedom of gender/ethnic etc. biases, Ø internationalism/world government/interstellar relations.

Star Trek and IR Theory 1960 s-1980 s: Realism • The Good Ones: • Interstellar Federation + Internal World Government • The Dark Side: Ø Klingons = USSR Ø Romulus = China Ø Vulcan = Japan

Star Trek and IR Theory 1980 s-2000 s: Idealism • • Star Trek: The Next Generation Gorbachev and Reagan: Glasnost and Perestroika ↓ US authority: Vietnam, Watergate, Iran Contra Culmination: Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history”

Star Trek and IR Theory New Millennium: Globalization • Starting with 9/11 • Complexity/fragmentation of world/universe affairs • Rogue terrorist groups rather than states or empires: smaller groups of renegades against Federation • Into Darkness: Khan = Eugenics + top terrorism; Federation not just victim but partly responsible • Realism = simplest theory + “highest concept plots”

Star Trek and Communication • Global English – what else could they use? • Klingon: takes all of Uhura’s wits/resources. • Tama: breakdown of universal communic. /government: universal freedom includes inability/rejection/opting out • So, from the TV series back to the cinema movies, and from the big screen to classroom/cultural life

The Over/Supercompensation Principle

The Over/Supercompensation Principle

The Over/Supercompensation Principle

The Over/Supercompensation Principle

Space Travel History and Motivation • • Contemporary problems; fictional yet timeless models Excitement of medium aids message Space travel literature throughout history: Hindu epic Ramayana (≈ 500 BCE – 200 CE) Lucian of Samosata’s True History (2 nd century CE) 1001 Nights story The Ebony Horse (9 th – 11 th century CE) Johannes Kepler’s books Somnium and The Man in the Moon (17 th century) • Jules Verne’s novels From the Earth to the Moon and Journey to the Center of the Earth (19 th century).

Star Trek, Space Travel, and Student Inspiration World Government need: • In Star Trek: Ø Nation-States = political liabilities (WWIII in the 1990 s) • In courses taught: Ø The Politics of Sustainable Energy Ø Environment and Climate Change Ø Cultural Diplomacy • Reflecting current world affairs/student opinions Ø Dissatisfaction/irritation with Trump presidency/policy

Conclusions • Whatever it takes to get students going • (For me, it was Karl May’s heroism ) • Student in last week’s class of Public Opinion and Propaganda: world citizenship dream + movie buff

Recommendations • Students out of IR classroom to local multiplex • Always having an easy movie quote on the lips • A picture says more than a thousand words: 2 -minute movie clips as mid-term exam discussion case study