Diversity Dialogue Research Articles

Investigating Speaking Skills Acquisition Through the Audio-Oral Method in Higher Education: A Case Study of the Department of Arabic, The New College, Chennai, India

This research aims to investigate the teaching of speaking skills using the audio-oral method among students at the Department of Arabic, The New College, Chennai as well as to identify the challenges faced in this approach. Employing a qualitative methodology, data was gathered through observations, interviews, and documentation. Data analysis was structured around three key components: data reduction, data presentation, and extrapolation. To ensure data validity, triangulation was utilized. The findings indicate that speaking skills are taught using the audio-oral method by providing dialogues that are subsequently translated and modeled in the Arabic dialect. Students listen to these pronunciations and practice imitating them; at times, a mobile phone recorder is employed to enhance their proficiency in speaking Arabic accurately. The teaching process is complemented by additional exercises involving diverse Arabic dialogues. The challenges encountered in teaching speaking skills using the audio-oral method at this institution are primarily related to the language environment, the influence of the local language, and issues stemming from a monotonous teaching approach and inadequate learning materials.

The Proof is in the Pudding: Workers Care About Evidence‐Based Diversity Cues

ABSTRACTOrganizations promote their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) while facing increasing public scrutiny concerning their progress in the domain. This research examined how value‐based (i.e., DEI statements) and evidence‐based (i.e., progress in minority representation) diversity cues, together or separately, influence workers' company perceptions (perceived corporate hypocrisy) and individual outcomes (inclusion, organizational commitment, person‐organization fit, negative affect, and turnover intentions). The goal was to assess the relative importance of these cues. Two studies were conducted. In Study 1 (N = 440), participants reacted to a hypothetical situation in a 2 (value‐based cue: diversity talk present vs. absent) × 2 (evidence‐based cue: diversity progress present vs. absent) experimental design. In Study 2 (N = 242), value‐based and evidence‐based cues were measured, and participants were reporting about their organization. Our results show that evidence‐based diversity cues systematically influenced workers' perceptions of the organization and their work‐related experiences, while the role of the value‐based diversity cues remained ambiguous. Moreover, perceived corporate hypocrisy mediated the effect of evidence‐based diversity cues on workers' experiences. Our research highlights the key, but often underestimated, role of evidence‐based diversity cues for workers and raises questions about the conditions under which value‐based diversity cues might be effective.

International Conference on Renewal and Reform of Islamic Thought and Civilization (ICRITC24): A Review

It is now almost inevitable that an agenda to identify the relevance of the thoughts of past scholars to the present-day circumstances facing the ummah is to be set that must look criticality of the 'Methodology and Measures' for progress of the ummah in OIC and beyond. This is in its efforts to avoid any labelling of Islamophobic mindset to be in hailed by the present-day media. Islamic studies, and civilisational discourse in our higher learning institutions especially for Muslims and others alike be planned, to give a chance to the idea of alliance of civilizations to prosper rather being dragged into otherwise an alien agenda of clash of civilizations, to be established. Thus, an International Conference on Renewal and Reform of Islamic Thought and Civilization-Enriching Islamic Discourse for Global Civilizational Relevance, was organised to offer audience problems and solutions to create incredible ideas which may have positive impacts during the conference. International Conference on Renewal and Reform of Islamic Thought and Civilization (ICRITC24)-Enriching Islamic Discourse for Global Civilizational Relevance, therefore was a reality and was well organised. Papers in English, Bhasa Malayu and Arabic languages were presented and discussed. The themes covered during two days event mainly but not limited to were:  Intellectual Renewal and Ethical Philosophy;  Science, Technology, and Environment;  Educational Reform and Islamic Thought;  Radicalisation, Social Integration, and Gender Issues;  Islamic Revivalism, Intellectual Renewal and Societal Change;  Education, Knowledge Integration and Interdisciplinary Approaches;  Islamic Thought and Society: Integration, Renewal, and Ethical Engagement;  Intellectual Renewal, Ethical Philosophy and Regional Studies; and  Islamic Arts, Cultural Diversity and Civilisational Dialogue.

How Can Storytelling Help Restore Mires? Applying Place-lore Fieldwork Methodology in Ecological Restoration

ABSTRACT As ecological restoration changes the landscape and influences various social and ecological actors, restoration also needs to seek methodologies that integrate different kinds of knowledge and create multi-voiced discussions. We show how studying local environment-related narratives, i.e. place-lore, can be adopted in restoration activities. We argue that as place-lore expresses relationships between people and environment and such stories involve semiotic meanings from the environment, they have a great potential to motivate authentic and diverse discussions in restoration. As an example, we focus on wetland restoration and discuss the experience from the LIFE Mires Estonia (2015–2021) project where place-lore fieldwork was integrated with other restoration activities. Results from the project indicated how integrating the study of place-lore into restoration activities facilitates collecting various kinds of valuable data, addressing different stakeholders’ concerns, detecting possible conflicts, and, most importantly, empowers environmental relations and knowledge that benefit restoration outcomes. KEY POLICY HIGHLIGHTS Enabling different, even conflicting viewpoints around ecological restoration is crucial, to prevent closed, hermetic, or dogmatizing communication. Restoration discussions need to be open to methodologies that focus on small-scale local narratives because the ecological expertise that these kinds of narratives express can directly benefit restoration outcomes. Place-lore fieldwork serves as a participatory method that allows for more inclusive and diverse dialogues between restoration experts and people influenced by restoration.

A Multicultural Approach in Islamic Education to Increase Tolerance

This study aims to explore the application of a multicultural approach in Islamic education as an effort to increase tolerance among students. In the midst of cultural, ethnic, and religious diversity in Indonesia, Islamic education is faced with the challenge of not only forming a religiously devout person, but also respecting differences and living in harmony in a pluralistic society. This study uses a qualitative method with a literature study approach. Data were collected through observation and analysis of documents, then analyzed qualitatively to identify patterns of application of multicultural values in the curriculum, teaching, and social interaction in schools. The results of the study show that a multicultural approach in Islamic education can strengthen the attitude of tolerance among students. The implementation of values such as respect for diversity, empathy, and cross-cultural dialogue in the teaching and learning process has been proven to be able to reduce prejudice and increase cooperation between groups. However, the success of this approach is highly dependent on teacher commitment and support from educational institutions and inclusive education policies. Therefore, it is recommended that Islamic educational institutions integrate a more systematic multicultural approach in their curriculum to create a more tolerant and harmonious educational environment.

Generative commonsense knowledge subgraph retrieval for open-domain dialogue response generation

Grounding on a commonsense knowledge subgraph can help the model generate more informative and diverse dialogue responses. Prior Traverse-based works explicitly retrieve a subgraph from the external knowledge base (eKB). Notably, the available knowledge is strictly restricted by the eKB. To break this restriction, Generative Retrieval methods externalize knowledge from the language model. However, they always generate boring knowledge due to their one-pass externalization procedure. This work proposes a novel TiLM Traverse in Language Model (TiLM), which uses three ‘Chain-of-Thought’ sub-tasks, i.e., Query Entity Production, Topic Entity Prediction, and Knowledge Subgraph Completion, to build a high-quality knowledge subgraph to ground the next Response Generation without explicitly accessing the eKB in inference. Experimental results on both Chinese and English datasets demonstrate TiLM’s outstanding performance even only with a small scale of parameters.

A Bibliometrics Analysis of Scopus-Indexed Research on Teachers’ Well-Being from 1995-2022: Emerging Research Trends

<p style="text-align:justify">Teacher well-being has gained significant prominence in academic publications indexed by Scopus in recent years. This study employs rigorous bibliometric analysis to trace the evolution of teacher well-being literature, examining 326 relevant publications from 1995 to 2022. Our findings reveal two crucial inflexion points in 2013, driven by the global economic downturn, and 2020, propelled by the widespread repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic, including teacher unemployment. These inflexion points underscore the real-world events' profound impact on academic discourse in teacher well-being. Traditionally, authors from the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom have shaped this discourse. Dutch scholars have also gained recognition, accumulating substantial citations. This paradigm shift is paramount as emerging nations like Iran, Ireland, China, and Austria increasingly contribute, challenging the dominance of Western authors. This shift underscores the evolving dynamics of scholarly contributions in teacher well-being research, emphasizing the need for a more diverse and inclusive academic dialogue. This study provides a panoramic view of the trajectory of teacher well-being research, shedding light on the interplay between global events and scholarly responses. It highlights nations' evolving roles in shaping this discourse, acknowledging established influences while recognizing the contributions emerging from voices in the field. These findings enrich the global dialogue surrounding teacher well-being and offer insights into the dynamic forces shaping this vital field of study, compelling the academic community to adapt, diversify, and foster a more inclusive conversation on teacher well-being.</p>

Діалог культур як основа сучасного мультикультурного cоціуму в умовах культурної глобалізації

The article examines the origins of multiculturalism and changes in the understanding of its essence. The concept of multiculturalism, its main characteristics and features are analyzed. The problematic field of multiculturalism is defined: ideas about the cultural involvement of people, the inevitability of cultural diversity, pluralism and intercultural dialogue. It is proved that even in the early development stages, the meaning of "multiculturalism" was quite inconsistent. In the political sphere, the term multiculturalism has been used since the late 60s of the twentieth century in connection with the development of the movement for the human rights expansion, as well as with the intensification of migration flows, which led to an increase in the cultural diversity of host countries. The practical implementation of multiculturalism as an integration policy took place in the 1970s in Canada, Australia, and the United States, in particular through criticism of assimilation policies. The common factors that facilitate or hinder the implementation of multiculturalism are examined. The ethno-cultural context of Ukraine's development is highlighted. Since Ukraine gained independence, representatives of national minorities and ethnic communities have been able to unite in various national and cultural societies that allow representatives of national minorities to be involved in the social and cultural life of the country. It is confirmed that the life of ethnic communities largely depends on the initiative of the communities themselves, on the activity of their cultural, educational and artistic institutions, holding art events, national culture festivals, book publishing, distribution of media in their native language, etc. Multiculturalism and intercultural dialogue should become a strategy for Ukraine. This will contribute to the further democratization of society, European integration and Ukraine's entry into the world community.

Pancasila, Islam, and Harmonising Socio-Cultural Conflict in Indonesia

The compatibility of Islam and Pancasila, the Indonesia’s national philosophy, is still interesting to elaborate even though there have been numerous discussions on the theme. Notably, this paper addresses the harmony of Pancasila and Islam as the umbrella for nationhood and statehood in Indonesia. The writers argue that Pancasila and Islam coexist harmoniously in Indonesia, and this kind of harmony is a valuable esteem to reinforce unity, diversity, and cultural heritage within the society. The acculturation of Pancasila is an effort to integrate its values into daily life through traditions and practices involving various stakeholders. This acculturation will encourage acceptance of diversity and prevent religious extremism. On the other hand, conflicts between political Islam and nationalist groups in Indonesia affect cultural-religious expressions and disrupt harmony. Pancasila is vital in addressing these conflicts and promoting diversity and ongoing dialogues.

Tourism and Intercultural Communication: A Theoretical Study

All aspects of social life are involved in communication, which is an important component in the formation and processes of culture. In a modern society characterized by globalization, cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue are highly discussed topics. One of the main topics in the study of intercultural communication is cultural differences. Having an understanding of other people's cultures is essential to recognize the nature of these differences and to relate to others through an attitude of understanding and tolerance, which is the basis for actual intercultural discussions, especially in the field of tourism. Communication is an act of human connection, but it is culture that drives it. In tourism, the quality of communication is related to the culture and means used. The experience of intercultural communication not only helps travelers to learn and appreciate other cultures, but also helps them understand their own culture better.

Training Psychology and Psychiatry Diversity Dialogue Facilitators.

This article describes a Diversity Dialogue Facilitator Training Program for Trainees, an innovative project that prepares psychology and psychiatry learners to facilitate diversity dialogues with healthcare professionals (i.e., clinical and research faculty, staff, and learners) in academic healthcare settings. Through participating in this program, trainees learn to facilitate discussions in which participants reflect upon oppression, discrimination, and disparities; explore their biases; connect and exchange views with colleagues regarding challenging societal events; and delineate action steps for advancing equity, inclusion, social responsivity, and justice in their professional and personal lives. After outlining contextual factors that informed project development, implementation, and dissemination, the iterative process of creating and implementing the training curriculum is detailed, with the aim of offering a model for other academic health center-based training programs interested in establishing a similar initiative. Lessons learned also are shared with the hope of contributing to future efforts to advance training in diversity dialogue facilitation and expand the role of psychologists in medical settings.

Статус и особенности диалога в искусстве

The article focuses on the types and features of dialogue in art, based on the exteriorized and interiorized inter-action of its subjects. Based on the research of dialogists, the author of the article hinges primarily on a broad interpretation of dialog as a form of being in culture, a form of communication between cultures, taking into account the form of understanding culture. The essence of this joint existence or co-existence is the interaction of its participants, expressed in replicas, including “reciprocal equal word”. Particular attention is paid to interior-ized (“unarticulated”, “monologic”) dialogue, which is more difficult to instrumentalize. It is subdivided by the author into the dialog of the creator-creator, creator-customer, creator-viewer. Under the influence of this “multi-place” and diverse dialogue, as emphasized in the article, there is not only a transformation of the inner world of its subjects, but also the formation of a cultural tradition.

A call for innovation culture in Polish academics’ vision of an ideal-type university

ABSTRACT This article aims to explore the innovation-related qualities of an ideal-type university as perceived by Polish academics at a public university who are characterized by attachment to the tradition of academic self-governance, Humboldtian ideals, autonomy, and academic freedom. The study employs Weberian ideal-type methodology and analyzes qualitative data from 12 online focus groups involving 49 academics. The research unveils their perspectives on key organizational culture facets, categorized under: mission, leadership, socialization, information, and strategy. The findings highlight that academics envision an ideal-type university as an institution that nurtures conditions conducive to innovation. Such an institution fosters an organizational culture that champions openness, diversity, creativity, and constructive dialogue, thereby fostering inter- and multidisciplinary collaborations transcending traditional boundaries. Their ideal university model promotes an innovation culture to unlock academic staff potential, fostering capabilities, agency, self-efficacy, and entrepreneurship. Addressing a research gap in the contemporary analysis of the needs and desires of Polish academics this study serves also as a foundational reference for future investigations into the alignment of their vision with the actual landscape, while also generating inquiries and hypotheses to understand variations. By informing decisions, strategies, and practices linked to fostering innovation within higher education institutions, this study tackles the universally recognized challenge of stimulating innovation within academia. Consequently, it offers insights for policy formulation and practical implementation within the realms of higher education and innovation management, extending beyond Poland to broader international contexts grappling with challenges like bureaucracy, excessive regulation, and hierarchical structures.

SOFT POWER OF EASTERN ORTHODOXY IN KAZAKHSTAN

Religious institutions play an active role in a variety of public activities, including state affairs, in modern times. Religious leaders in particular engage in global affairs, making them key players in intercultural communication and public diplomacy. This article explores the activities of the Orthodox Church in Kazakhstan through the lens of «soft power». It presents contemporary discourses on the actors, foundations, and possibilities of «soft power» as an alternative to traditional diplomacy. It is worth noting that there is debate about which countries, ideologies, and cultures possess the potential for «soft power». The article analyzes the narratives and messages of the Orthodox Church in Kazakhstan as tools of «soft power», influenced by the general attitudes of Russian foreign policy. Additionally, it examines the resource potential of the Orthodox Church in Kazakhstan, which is realized through network organization and multi-vector activity. However, despite its significant resource potential, the effectiveness of Orthodox «soft power» in Kazakhstan also depends on other geopolitical factors. Overall, this topic is relevant because the concept of «soft power» is viewed as a peaceful mechanism for maintaining interstate relations, as well as promoting multiconfessional diversity and intercivilizational dialogue. This study’s significance lies in the fact that modern-day partnerships extend beyond mere cooperation, and countries must create an attractive «image». The article concludes that the Orthodox Church possesses several resources and «soft power» potential.

Towards Informative and Diverse Dialogue Systems Over Hierarchical Crowd Intelligence Knowledge Graph

Knowledge-enhanced dialogue systems aim at generating factually correct and coherent responses by reasoning over knowledge sources, which is a promising research trend. The truly harmonious human-agent dialogue systems need to conduct engaging conversations from three aspects as humans, namely (1) stating factual contents (e.g., records in Wikipedia), (2) conveying subjective and informative opinions about objects (e.g., user discussions on Twitter), and (3) impressing interlocutors with diverse expression styles (e.g., personalized expression habits). The existing knowledge base is a standardized and unified coding for factual knowledge, which could not portray the other two kinds of knowledge to make responses more informative and expressive diverse. To address this, we present CrowdDialog , a crowd intelligence knowledge-enhanced dialogue system, which takes advantage of “crowd intelligence knowledge” extracted from social media (with rich subjective descriptions and diversified expression styles) to promote the performance of dialogue systems. Firstly, to thoroughly mine and organize the crowd intelligence knowledge underlying large-scale and unstructured online contents, we elaborately design the C rowd I ntelligence K nowledge G raph ( CIKG ) structure, including the domain commonsense subgraph, descriptive subgraph, and expressive subgraph. Secondly, to reasonably integrate heterogeneous crowd intelligence knowledge into responses while ensuring logicality and fluency, we propose the G ated F usion with D ynamic Knowledge- D ependent ( GFDD ) model, which generates responses from the semantic and syntactic perspective with the context-aware knowledge gate and dynamic knowledge decoding. Finally, extensive experiments over both Chinese and English dialogue datasets demonstrate that our approach GFDD outperforms competitive baselines in terms of both automatic evaluation and human judgments. Besides, ablation studies indicate that the proposed CIKG has the potential to promote dialogue systems to generate fluent, informative, and diverse dialogue responses.

European Approaches to Stopping Islamophobia are Inadequate: Lessons for Canadians Combating Anti-Muslim Racism and Hatred

The United Kingdom, France, and Spain have in common a large and growing Muslim population. The influx of immigrants and refugees has left many European states fearful of Muslim migrants because they perceive potential increases in terrorism and job insecurity, which would have significant social and economic policy implications. European governments have sought to strengthen security measures and immigration laws, often with consequences that disproportionately and negatively affect Muslims. At the same time, European governments have increased their efforts to address Islamophobia and improve Muslim integration, partly in response to the growth in the reporting of anti-Muslim hate crimes. Each of the aforementioned states has adopted different approaches to tackle issues affecting Muslim communities. Although some of the countries (e.g., Spain) have taken positive approaches in the fight against Islamophobia, others (e.g., France) pave the way for social disintegration and segregation by entrenching low socioeconomic status, passing discriminatory laws, and blaming violent attacks on Muslims as a whole. It appears that the European nations examined in this comparative analysis have failed, to varying degrees upholding values of equitable diversity and encouraging meaningful dialogue with Muslim organizations. Their approaches demonstrate a clear lack of adequate governmental response to growing levels of Islamophobia.

Pendidikan Agama Kristen Sebagai Agen Restorasi Pendidikan Dalam Mewujudkan Kehidupan Beragama Yang Harmonis Di Sekolah–Sekolah


 Abstract: Christian religious education has the goal of teaching students the principles of Christian life, including moral values such as love, forgiveness, justice, and brotherhood. Christian religious education can help students understand and appreciate other religions with an inclusive attitude, tolerance, and respect for religious differences. However, there are several challenges that need to be overcome in implementing Christian religious education as an educational restoration agent to create a harmonious religious life in schools. One of the main challenges is the lack of understanding of religious moderation. In this research, the writer took the step of doing a literature study. Christian religious education plays a vital role as an educational restoration agent in creating a harmonious religious life in schools. Through teaching moral values, respect for religious diversity, character building, and interreligious dialogue, Christian religious education contributes to shaping students who live according to religious values and in harmony with fellow human beings. 

YOUTH AGAINST RELIGIOUS RADICALISM: AN INTRARELIGIOUS APPROACH IN KOMUNITAS SANTRI BATANG IN KABUPATEN BATANG, JAWA TENGAH

YOUTH AGAINST RELIGIOUS RADICALISM: AN INTRARELIGIOUS APPROACH IN KOMUNITAS SANTRI BATANG IN KABUPATEN BATANG, JAWA TENGAH

A New Synagogue, a Garrison Church, and a Mosque: How Religious (Re)Building Animates Religious and Secular Life in Postsocialist Potsdam

In postsocialist Potsdam, religious diversity has risen surprisingly in public life since 1990 although more than 80% of the residents have no religious affiliation. City and state authorities have actively embraced issues around immigration and integration as well as the promotion of religious diversity and interreligious dialogue and have linked this to the agenda of rejuvenating the city’s religious heritage. For years, negotiations have been going on about the need of a mosque, the reconstructions of a synagogue and the so-called “Garrison Church,” a landmark military church building. These initiatives have been dominating the public space for different reasons. They implied, beyond religion, questions of memory, identity, immigration, and culture. This article puts these three cases into perspective to offer a nuanced understanding of the importance of religious spaces in secular contexts considering city politics.

A Task-oriented Chatbot Based on LSTM and Reinforcement Learning

Thanks to the advancements in deep learning, chatbots are widely used in messaging applications. Undoubtedly, a chatbot is a new way of interaction between humans and machines. However, most of the chatbots act as a simple question answering system that responds with formulated answers. Traditional conversational chatbots usually adopt a retrieval-based model that requires a large amount of conversational data for retrieving various intents. Hence, training a chatbot model that uses low-resource conversational data to generate more diverse dialogues is desirable. We propose a method to build a task-oriented chatbot using a sentence generation model that generates sequences based on the generative adversarial network. The architecture of our model contains a generator that generates a diverse sentence and a discriminator that judges the sentences by comparing the generated and the ground-truth sentences. In the generator, we combine the attention model with the sequence-to-sequence model using hierarchical long short-term memory to extract sentence information. For the discriminator, our reward mechanism assigns low rewards for repeated sentences and high rewards for diverse sentences. Extensive experiments are presented to demonstrate the utility of our model that generates more diverse and information-rich sentences than those of the existing approaches.