Exchanging each country’s culture by exchanging each other’s hearts
Be Related In Diverse Global Exchange Project
While the summer of 2012 is almost over, what did you do this summer? Did you go on a vacation? Or did you enjoy movies, television, sleep and etc.? While some students take a rest from their hard-living lives, some decide to take a new opportunity in a new culture. July 16th through August 17th, for six weeks, BRIDGE Project (Be Related In Diverse Global Exchange Project) took place in Sookmyung Women’s University. The BRIDGE Project consists of Koreans and foreigners sharing each others’ cultures in a cross-cultural exchange. Korean students could sign up to be part of this program and the foreigners participating were the interns from AIESEC. AIESEC is a non-profit organization by students with the purpose to transmit internships overboard and receive interns from other nations.
Korean students and foreign interns had six weeks of culture-exchanging through the BRIDGE Project. Since hallryu has been raised to many people’s interest in the topic of Korean culture, AIESEC noticed that spread of hallryu has been only through one-way culture sharing and also commercial. To supplement the missing elements of a “real culture exchange” AIESEC decided to hold a project where many cultures can be shared at once. In order for a cross-culture exchange program, the BRIDGE Project was made. To know more about this program, an interview with YuJin Lim, the section manager of BRIDGE Project, is as the following.
Q. The three topics of Bridge Project is correct culture exchange, cross-cultural contents and hallryu’s topic relationship with globalization. Why did AIESEC choose these three topics?
A. When AIESEC was first picking the topics for the project was not to end the project by simply introducing and advertising Korean culture. Instead it was more focused on actually showing the Korean cultures and Koreans learning foreign cultures together. AIESEC focused on cross-cultural exchanges. We worried and wondered a whole lot about how to introduce each other’s cultures in the term of fun. The decision was made to first listen to the speeches and training. By receiving back ground knowledge, students participate in debate. Lastly the students were to take a more active role related with the topic. Through the big picture, AIESEC chose three topics.
More than that the three topics are related with globalization, they are more connected to the key of cross-culture exchanges. At first, we believed that before starting culture exchange, students needed to know about what really is the correct culture exchange. With the base of such knowledge, we wanted a more fun type of culture exchange. We believed that by making culture exchange contents, the natural cross-culture exchange can happen. This thought of “fun” decided on our second topic. Lastly, since hallryu is one of the representatives of Korean culture, we chose the topic of hallryu’s topic and relationship with globalization.
Q. Bridge Project involved many foreigners. Where are these foreigners from?
A. The foreigners that participated in the Bridge Project are the students from AIESEC internship program. AIESEC is an organization is working with the vision of world peace and human potential. When the AIESEC organization was first made, the people in part organization believed that culture exchange and internship is necessary for the vision to come true. Therefore the main business for our organization is internship transmission. As I have mentioned above, Bridge Project was made as a sort of an internship. The foreigners are the interns that came to Korea through AIESEC. The foreign students are college students from variety of countries such as China, Slovakia, Indonesia, Germany and etc.
Q. In the 21st global century, culture exchange is one of the hot topics. During culture exchanges, what should people be aware of or what kind of attitude should people have?
A. Through the Bridge Project, I personally learned how important attitudes are while culture exchanging with foreigners. Also many participants agreed with me. To me, I think the best attitude is not to just think that foreign cultures are different from ours. People in culture exchanges should have the attitude to learn why there are such differences. I was able to learn that both Asians and Western friends are all different. In small gestures or face expressions, I could see the small cultural differences with foreign friends. When I felt such cultural differences, I didn’t simply end my thinking with “Oh, they’re different.” Instead I thought to myself, “Why is it different?” After being aware of such differences, trying to learn the differences is the key to the true culture exchange.
Also before starting culture exchange, throwing away fear for English is a step that the person has to take. At first, many people believe that only people who speak fluent English can communicate with foreigners. However, as the participants in the Bridge Project experienced 6 weeks of long communications with foreigners, they realized that that was only a prejudice. People need to break out of their shell and free themselves from the language barrier.
Q. Recently, the biggest key in culture exchange has been through Hallryu. Besides Hallryu, what other cultures can we share? Or what areas of cultures should Koreans improve in order to share with the world?
A. Hallryu is currently too concentrated on K-pop music and commercial contents. There is a need to expand the areas of Hallryu. Also songs, dances, movies and etc. types of entertainments are easily spread to other nations. However, it is hard for other contents to draw attention of foreigners’ eyes. Therefore it is important to have a powerful advertising in foreign countries. As a personal opinion, I believe that the other area to improve besides hallryu is food. Through the Bridge Project, I learned that South Korean dishes have variety of tastes and foods, compared to foreign countries. By enlightening such strengths of Korean dishes, it will be great to globalize our food more than the present.
Photo Credit to BRIDGE Project
At the end of the six weeks, on the 17th of August, the participants of the BRIDGE Project put together a boot in the Seoul Plaza. There was a booth for each nation, consist of the natives from the particular nation-China, Indonesia, Slovakia and Korea. It consisted of many cultural items in each nation that was learned throughout the project. “The works of six weeks of culture-exchanging was visible through the booth. It was great to see that this project was not simply about learning the Korean culture-rather it was sharing each others,” answered Samuel Vandyke, a native-speaker teacher who had a chance to visit the booth. It is great that Korea is trying to share one another’s cultures rather than forcing learning on ours. Instead of natives representing and preparing for their booth, one nation’s student should prepare for a country that is not their race. That way, there may be more active culture exchanging. However, most importantly, if you want to participate in culture exchange in some sort of way, it is important to exchange your hearts with them first.
ABOUT AIESEC
AISEC is the abbreviation for ‘Internationale des Etudiants en Sciences Economiques et Commerciales’ in French, meaning global leadership student organization. This organization has students participating over 110 different countries, 2,100 universities and over 60,000 members. AIESEC has a history of 60 years and now is the world’s largest youth-run organization. Through AIESEC, many students can reach an opportunity to take experiences across the borders. They offer global internship programs, global leadership programs and global learning environments. If you would like an opportunity to expand experiences in the global network, you can join AIESEC. Fill out the registration form in http://live.myaiesec.net/ and make sure that you contact your local office.
More information about AIESEC can be found in http://www.aiesec.org/
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