Final conclusions about the course

Final conclusions about the course

Firstly I must say that it was an interesting and eyes opening experience. For me it was a lecture out of my comfort zone. Mostly because I´m not a very open minded person. Secondly, I´m not very certain about my English – it´s a little sleepy. I understand everything perfectly, but I´m not very fluent in speaking. So, I had to listen, instead of talking. Also not my favourite thing to do. But very educational. 

About the course. Sadly, I had to miss lectures few times, but luckily I remember the lectures I was able to attend. My favourite lecture was the very first one, because of its message. The message was “Love – as the common ground of differences”. At that time, I wasn´t so sure about it. Now, being the part of the lecures and reading all the blogposts about the topics, I´m sure. My mind-set is much more open minded and my point of view about diversities is much more tolerant.

I have to say, that never before I have given deeper thoughts about the real meanings of definitions like morality, diversity, ethics, humour etc. But in this course, I had to take the time. Mostly because of the blogging issue. Most meaningful and evolutional, was not the writing, but reading the thoughts of other students. How they cope and understand the given definitions.

We have to agree, that the given themes are not very commonly argued. You just don’t argue about them in the sauna, around the Christmas table or at the working place. So, it was educational.

But let’s go back to love. You can´t define the meaning of love, but deep down we all know the soft meaning of that phrase. Sure, the phrase has a several meanings, but you can´t miss much by saying, that love also means caring. In turn, caring means understanding and understanding means accepting. Accepting and understanding are the fundamentals of healthy multicultural environment.

As a conclusion I learned that coping with ease at the multicultural environment, you don’t have to agree with everything, but it´s about the understanding of the differences and it’s much easier to do so, if you know the softer meaning of the word “Love”.

Ethics of 21st century

Ethics of 21st century

Normally we think about ethics as the norms of the society. Ethics is a concept of right and wrong. But is there possibility for universal ethics or is the ethics universal concept? Something that everyone can understand and live through equally?

I don’t think so. I think that ethics is very subjective and everyone perceives it differently. 

A few weeks ago I finished the Jean Sasson book “Princess”. Shortly it´s a true story, detailing gender inequalities experienced by Saudi Arabian women. Honestly, for me it wasn’t a very nice reading. And mostly because about the dilemmas I had between right and wrong. I tried to understand the behaviour of Arabic man and their attitude towards women, but I couldn’t approve it. I know that I don’t need to agree with others understanding of the truth and I know what´s moral behaviour from my point of view. Despite the fact, I need to understand it! It’s a question about tolerance. It´s a question about the historical concepts and understanding. It´s a question about the scholarliness.

So it´s far too much, and it´s a bit stupid, for one person to decide how the others should live their lives or how to act, not knowing the baseline.

For the individual point of view, if it’s not business, I think that we all can make our choices, considering our own view to ethics, about what’s right or wrong.

What we can´t do, we can´t forget that our neighbour has exactly the same rights and we don’t know the background for it.  Until we don’t know the cause of somebody’s actions, we should not hurry to evaluate those acts for right or wrong. We just have to try to understand them. I think that the understanding is ethical behaviour and this is the meaning of ethics of 21 century.

Diversity as it is

Diversity as it is

What is diversity and how we indicate it?

Diversity is all around us – in business, sociology, politics, law, communications, science, technology etc. It’s everywhere. I think that diversity is the most common phenomenon in society.

We can go back to Adam and Eve – man and women. To accept each other and to exist, they had to learn and adapt with the differences between a man and a women. Same basics goes through every social communities. 

The main areas of unquestionably, where members of society perceive diversity are multiculturalism or ethnic diversity, the promotion of multiple ethnic cultures and the cultural diversity, the respect of different cultures and interculturality.

Also it’s very common that the relationship ‘self’-‘other’ is considered to be the basic mechanism of identity construction and the main indicator of cultural diversity. The so called “other” could be perceived as ethnic, national, racial, cultural, social or civilizational “other”.

Not only individuals but also groups, need the other to affirm what they perceive is typically and uniquely theirs. The opposition self-others also highlights contemporary national identities and images.

The bottom line is, that the diversity gives us a change to be different, to know what or who is different and to position ourselves. Without diversity we could not evaluate and cherish the things we like. Thanks to diversity the life is much more richer.

Even if we don’t like diversities, we have to know how to recognise them and accept them, because diversity is all around us – do we want it or not.