Intercultural communication (IC) and autonomous learning (AL) are two important concepts in education. Edward Hall first used the term IC to describe communication between people of diverse national, ethnic, and religious groups (Loch and Pal, 2020, p. 1126). Individuals from each group bring unique experiences and values, and language is perceived to be a crucial element in IC (Ilie, 2019, p. 265). People should have complex skills, leading individuals to suspend their cultural beliefs and establish cross-cultural relationships (Loch and Pal, 2020, p. 1127). Henry Holec introduced the concept of AL referring to learners being responsible for their learning (Du, 2019, p. 13). AU can be defined as an individual’s ability to set goals and learn according to those goals, which is a significant aspect of studying foreign languages (Du, 2019, p. 13). AU offers people freedom of choice and control over learning, but autonomy is difficult to be trained, and its degree differs depending on various characteristics, such as personality (Papamitsiou and Economides, 2019, pp. 2-4). Upon researching several articles, I have developed an understanding of the two concepts as they relate to my interest in constantly advancing myself.
Intercultural communication can be defined as contact between individuals from different cultures (Ilie, 2019, p. 264). Autonomous learning is the capability to take control of one’s learning process (Papamitsiou and Economides, 2019, p. 3).
Intercultural communication is a connection that people from different backgrounds form to reach common goals. Autonomous learning represents one’s ability to identify their objectives and study towards them.
Intercultural communication is important to my language learning, as I strive to communicate with people from various parts of the world. I believe autonomous learning to be crucial, as learning a language depends on each individual and the effort they put into studying.
Reference List
Du, Y. (2020) āStudy on cultivating college students’ English autonomous learning ability under the flipped classroom modelā, English Language Teaching, 13(6), pp. 13-19.
Ilie, O. A. (2019) āThe intercultural competence: developing effective intercultural communication skillsā, Knowledge-Based Organization, 25(2), pp. 264-268.
Loch, A. and Pal, A. (2020) āDeveloping intercultural communicative competence through telecollaborative modules integrated in foreign language and intercultural communication university coursesā, Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences & Humanities, 28(2), pp. 1125-1141.
Papamitsiou, Z. and Economides, A. A. (2019) āExploring autonomous learning capacity from a selfāregulated learning perspective using learning analyticsā, British Journal of Educational Technology, 50(6), pp. 1-18.