Intercultural citizenship through participation in an international service-learning program: A case study from Taiwan

Abstract

Byram’s (2008) intercultural citizenship framework includes the following orientations: cognitive, evaluative, comparative, action, and communicative. Using this framework as a theoretical basis, this study explored the international service-learning (ISL) experiences of four Taiwanese non-native English speakers (NNES) during a two-week trip to a poor community in the Philippines. Data collected from these students’ individual reflections, interviews, and public presentations illustrate their acquisition of the knowledge, skills and attitudes of intercultural citizenship. This study thus demonstrates that ISL allowed students to engage beneficially for themselves and their hosts with other NNES, instead of following the tradition of study abroad in countries where English is spoken natively.