Increasing Intercultural Competence in the Anglophone Caribbean: Experiences and Recommendations

Abstract

Since the early 1990s, many professionals have realized the importance of teaching intercultural competence inside the classroom to prepare students to live in multicultural and more gradually complex, and interconnected societies. This chapter describes how a didactic project was created aiming at developing intercultural competence in students of Spanish at The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus (B1 CEFR level). Firstly, several surveys were conducted to investigate the opinions and attitudes of Caribbean students on intercultural competence. Secondly, fifteen Spanish textbooks were analyzed to look at the way intercultural competence could be better integrated into activities and didactic units. All this data enabled the creation of a tailored-made didactic project that increased students’ intercultural sensitivity, interest, and empathy towards the target culture, reinforced their identity, and reduced negative stereotypes by explaining the reasons behind many of them. Some experiences and recommendations are shared for others implementing similar innovations in their context.