Intercultural Education as a “Soft power” Tool

Journal of Siberian Federal University. Series: Humanities & Social Sciences. 2017. Vol. 10. No. 3. P. 432–439.

Tarev B., Tareva E. G.

Nowadays intercultural dialogue is regarded as one of key points in various fields of knowledge: philosophy, sociology, political science, linguistics, methods of teaching foreign languages. Despite the crisis of the idea of “interculturalism”, the interest to the dialogue of cultures is not going down. On the contrary, it is becoming stronger and stronger. The status of intercultural dialogue is changing, its role as a social and human phenomenon is being revised. These changes are taking place due to the fact that the modern nature of international cooperation and cross-cultural communication is complicated by political, social, cultural processes caused by globalization, the opposition of civilizational values. The global society faces many challenges in the process of preparing younger generations to unexpected, often conflict-prone, complicated conditions of international cooperation and communication. There is a need to find specific tools that can reduce the intensity of confrontation, to diminish the devastating effects of modern globalization shifts and deformations. The article raises the question of the application of the intercultural approach as a soft power tool in university educational environment.

Keywords: образование в вузе, межкультурный подход, soft power, university education, «мягкая сила», soft power tool, culturally-based approaches, intercultural approach, инструменты «мягкой силы», культуросообразные подходы