Abstract

Seminar based on Leeds-Hurwitz's book. Book applies various social approaches to investigations of real people as they function in a specific context, the family: "Of all the social facts we construct, identity is probably the most critical. And of all our identities, cultural identity is one of the most central to who we think we are. We learn our cultural identities first within families. The authors all examine the families they know best, their own. The chapters examine four critical issues: how family members jointly work to construct identity; how parents convey that identity to their children; the conflict between mainstream expectations and the traditions of discrete cultural groups; and the range of possible ways to display identity within and across groups."

See has also recently presented on “Complex Constructions of Social Identity” so I may ask her to combine this with the topic of "maintaining cultural identity" in the seminar.

Bio

Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz is Director of the Center for Intercultural Dialogue of the Council for Communication Associations in Washington, D.C., and Professor Emerita of Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside. She has been Chercheur invitée at the Ecole normale supérieure de Lyon, France, and Senior Fellow at the Collegium de Lyon Institut d’études avancées. She has served as an expert on intercultural dialogue for UNESCO the past several years. Currently she is in Portugal as Fulbright Senior Specialist at the Instituto Politécnico de Coimbra.

Leeds-Hurwitz is interested in how people construct meanings for themselves and others through interaction; how cultural identity is constructed and maintained; and how conflicting identities or meanings can be conveyed simultaneously. She studies disciplinary history to learn why scholars examine particular topics in specific ways; often stops to consider particular research methods or theories; and always takes an interdisciplinary approach to problems. Her article “Notes in the history of intercultural communication” published in Quarterly Journal of Speech (1990) provides the standard introduction to intercultural communication in the USA. Among her books are: The Social History of Language and Social Interaction (2010), Socially Constructing Communication (2009), From Generation to Generation: Maintaining Cultural Identity over Time (2005), and Wedding as Text: Communicating Cultural Identities through Ritual (2002). Leeds-Hurwitz earned her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.

Leeds-Hurwitz is a Fulbright Senior Specialist who will be working with Dr. Susana Gonçalves at the Escola Superior de Educação de Coimbra, Politécnico de Coimbra, to create a centre for teaching excellence during this visit.

Event organized by the research group Cities, Cultures, and Architecture (CCArq)