Transcultural competence

Transcultural competence is made up of three levels of ability:

1. Ability to see each culture as an addition to one’s own, not as a subtraction (*)
2. Ability to transcend cultural affiliations and cross the boundaries between cultures and affiliations (*).
3. Ability to adopt a universal perspective that goes beyond the particularities of one’s own culture (*).

More specifically, it includes the following capabilities:

1. The ability to feel at one with a group, large or small, with all humanity, above and beyond one’s own cultural background.
2. The ability to connect across cultural divides, through a shared appreciation of common human values.
3. The ability to overcome fears and thrive in the growing cultural mix to feel one and connected above everyone else’s cultures.
4. The ability to convince people that living in peace across cultural divides is an essential choice for preventing civil violence, or even a new war in one’s own country.
5. Ability to encourage transcultural convergence around oneself.

Source:
Synthesis of L’Introduction aux approches interculturelles en éducation, pages 98 and 102, Abdeljalil Akkari, Professor of International Education, UNIGE, Faculté de psychologie et des sciences de l’éducation, Carnet des sciences de l’éducation, 3rd edition, 2016.