Abstract:

Internationalisation of higher education has been the response to strong globalisation forces, such as mobility of higher education seekers. In multilingual universities students are challenged to learn and adapt not only to new linguistic environments, but also to new and complex cultural contexts. The need to become interculturally competent has become as important as to be linguistically and professionally competent, if one wishes to thrive in a global economy. The present study reports a case of intercultural competence development of an international student enrolled in Romanian higher education. To monitor and foster awareness and competence development, self-reflective diary entries were used with a student who engaged in Romanian language and culture learning with the intended goal of adapting for study and work in the target culture. The results confirm that reporting experience is a useful learning tool which gives the subject the opportunity to reflect upon own development and enhance intercultural compentence.

Keywords:

Intercultural competence, intercultural awareness, foreign language learning, learning diary, internationalisation.