Interculturality in Institutions. Symbols, Practices and Identities

This book provides qualitative analyses of intercultural sensemaking in a variety of institutional contexts. It derives from the assumption that in an increasingly culturally diverse world, individuals often enter contexts that have communal, historically determined and stable sets of values, norms and expected identities, with little cultural compass to find their bearings in them. The book goes beyond interpreting differences in people’s ethnic or linguistic roots and discusses instead people’s interpretive efforts to navigate different sociocultural situations. The contributors examine such situations in educational, organizational, medical and community settings and look at how participants with different levels of sociocultural competences try to cope with and understand symbols, practices and identities in institutional contexts. In particular, they analyse how migrants and children cope with institutional constraints and expectations, and how their creative adjustments come to light. This book provides insights from the fields of psychology, education, anthropology and linguistics, and is of interest to a wide readership interested in cultural meaning-making.