Zhenan Tong

Department: Graduate School of Education
Discipline: Education

Project Summary

Research Title

Implementing the Rabat Commitment: The Development of Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC) as a Pedagogical Framework in a Chinese Educational Context.

Research Summary

My study examines the three key stakeholders in the development of intercultural education (including intercultural competences and ICC): policy, theory, and practice (pedagogy) and the extent to which ICC can be developed and implemented within Chinese higher education to the realization of stated political goals at both international and national levels.

Through policy, I examine and discuss UN, UNESCO, and Chinese Government agendas for developing intercultural education.

Through theory, I examine prevailing Anglophone paradigms of intercultural competence and ICC, as well as current Chinese understandings and assumptions.

Through practice and via an exploratory-triangulation research design, I examine how ICC is currently understood and implemented at the practical level within a Chinese University.

Supervisory Team

First Supervisor

Dr Gabriela Meier

Second Supervisor

Dr Justin Dillon

Wider Research Interests

Intercultural Education

Education Policy

EFL Education in Chinese Contexts

Bilingual and Multilingual Education

International Relations and Diplomatic Studies

United Nations, Peacekeeping, and Disarmament