How to lighten the

social agenda in a
"culturalistic"
culture? 
Th e so cial and t he
cult ure
The social agenda
- I am sick, can the municipality help me?
- Help me to find a job to my son?
- We need a place to meet
Cu lt ure a re la nguages

 Can we understand each other?

 The method: Learn to do by knowing and

to know by doing
Ou r m ethode t o cope
wit h the la nguage
dif fe re nces
:
 Preparation: Participants and speaker
and chairwoman
 Organize the participants in language
groups
The intr od uctory speaker
was as ked :

 To talk slowly and

 Not too long sentences and
 To give time to translate in the groups.
Aims

 Our aim has been to learn the

consequences of different cultures, i.e.
languages and how to cope with these
when having a dialogue between migrant
citizens and politicians on social issues.
Key Outcomes:
 Even with 5-6 different languages it was no
problem to handle this:
 - The quick-translation in the groups
functioned well
 - The groups showed respect to the
chairwoman of the meeting
 - The speakers followed our guide: Speak
slowly, not too long sentences, and make
pauses.
 - The atmosphere at the meetings was in
general friendly, which meant, that several of
the women dared – without help from
translator – to take the word and ask
questions.
A g la ss of wa te r

 “Look at this glass of water. You can look

at it as half empty or as half full. I
suggest you look at it as half full – look at
your life this way, so you don’t look at the
problems all the time” – and thereby he
did not take position of the questions and
the contact between him and the women
lost quality.
Pr oble ms
 We experienced, that our method was not
efficient to meet the more complex problems,
as when the participants decline contact and
thereby decline to establish a meeting with
each other.
 We asked:
 How to understand the mayor’s speaking of the
glass of water?
 How to understand the hint of anger in the tone
of some of the women?
What went wrong?

 Neglect of attentive contact ?

 Neglect of taking position to each others
questions?
Cu lt urali sm

 I have my culture (in my country) and you

have your culture (in your country)
– too bad if you do not have a country!
 There is room for all cultures at the same
time at the same space
- So we say yes and no to deathpenalty at
the same time – got that?
En d of t he social
questio n?
The politician can neglect the social
questions by pointing to the culture as
the barrier for solving the social
problems
And the citizens can likewise point at their
culture as a barrier for taken personal
responsibility