CONSTRUCTING CULTURE IN GHANA: THE STUDY ABROAD EXPERIENCE
By
Kathryn M Patch

A DISSERTATION
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
Anthropology – Doctor of Philosophy
2017

ABSTRACT
CONSTRUCTING CULTURE IN GHANA: THE STUDY ABROAD EXPERIENCE
By
Kathryn M. Patch
Currently, over 313,000 U.S. students study abroad for credit each year (Open Doors
2016); this is a 300% increase from twenty years ago. However, this figure still highlights that
less than 3% of the U.S. undergraduate population participates in an academic program abroad.
A proliferation of students studying abroad took place in the 1990s when higher education
institutions began building and offering short-term, faculty-led programs. Fifty years ago, the
typical study abroad student went to a private liberal arts college and spent a semester or a
year abroad. Today, 63% of all students studying abroad go on short-term programs, followed
by 34% on semester-long programs and 3% going for the entire academic year. Students at
large state universities as well as community colleges are now the major demographic included
in the short-term numbers. These shifts (from liberal arts to state universities as well as from
semester-long to short-term) has sparked debates among institutions and educators about
whether students on short-term, faculty-led programs can obtain just as much cultural
competency as semester-long programs.
Case studies from a short-term, faculty-led program to Ghana explore how U.S. students
navigate “disorienting dilemmas” such as attending a bonesetter healing session, making
friends with local counterparts, conducting health related field exercises in a peri-urban village
and working on a service learning project. Ethnographic vignettes presented in this dissertation

qualitatively capture the complexity students’ face as they struggle to learn about their new
community in Ghana as well as themselves.
This dissertation argues that U.S. study abroad students studying on faculty-led, shortterm programs can obtain cultural competency abroad, and that qualitative, ethnographic
research can be used to understand students’ of cultural competency on short-term study
abroad programs. I suggest that transformational learning occurs when certain pedagogical
factors are in place, such as faculty knowledge of the field site, structured writing assignments,
and a theory/praxis engagement. I also demonstrate that anthropological theories and
methods are useful frameworks for helping international educators develop and assess “high
impact” study abroad programs. Finally, I argue that using qualitative, ethnographic data on
study abroad outcomes directly and successfully contributes to the comprehensive
internationalization of higher educational institutions.

Copyright by
KATHRYN M PATCH
2017

In loving memory of:
Dr. Marjorie Horn, a wonderful aunt who first introduced me to Ghana
and who allowed me to grow as an individual and academic.
Dr. Dennis M. Warren, an academic mentor who left the field too early.
I strive to keep his legacy alive today.
And finally,
Dale P. Patch, a steadfast and thoughtful father who shaped my work ethic
and believed in me even in times I did not.

v

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I have so much appreciation and gratitude for the guidance and persistence of my
committee chair Anne Ferguson. From my first year in graduate school, I have worked for and
with Anne through two offices, two study abroad programs, and multiple special projects.
Beyond her academic support, her mentorship as an administrator illuminated a similar path
for me. A special thanks to Laurie Medina who helped shape my theoretical knowledge and
arguments from the very beginning. She also shared baby clothes, a crib, and other items she
knew I would need before I knew I needed them. I thank committee members Andrea Allen
and John Metzler for lending their expertise to the project and for sharing their passion for
study abroad. An additional thanks to Lynne Goldstein, who helped me navigate bureaucratic
structures over the years. And to Bill Derman, who provided academic and theoretical
guidance.
The cliché proverb still holds true: “It takes a village to raise a child/academic.” I am
indebted to many colleagues, mentors, family and friends over the years. To my community at
Michigan State University, a thank you to the following individuals, Lisa Fine, Peter Berg and
Dana Berg for support, food, and babysitting during crucial moments of deadlines. Merritt
Sargent for great food, wine and conversations over the years. A special thanks for collegial
support and friendship from my peer colleagues: Keri Brondo, Heidi Connealy, Julie Friend,
Rohit Jindal, Christine Labond, Karin Rebnegger, Marisa Rinkus, and Mamta Vardhan. To my
colleagues at The College of Wooster, a special thanks to Heather Fitz Gibbon and Ashleigh
Sims, Pam Rose for her loving encouragement, Peter Abramo for his non-loving, Marine-style

vi

encouragement, and Lisa Kastor – my sister in spirit. To my family, a heartfelt appreciation for
all the support over the years. A special thanks to my mother, Karen Patch for her unwavering
support and love and for multiple road trips to babysit so I could go into the field, attend
conferences and write. And, to my dear friend, sister and colleague Sonya Johnson: to Mexico
and beyond. A grateful thank you to Kate Wiegele for her wonderful editing and guidance on
the manuscript.
Portions of the dissertation research were made possible through several generous
fellowships and grants from Michigan State University, including Title VI Foreign Language and
Area Studies Fellowship from the African Studies Center, Center for the Advanced Study of
International Development, and Women in Development (now Center for Gender in Global
Context), an NSF-Culture, Resources and Power Fellowship through the Department of
Anthropology, and Grants from the Graduate School.
Finally, a special thank you to my daughter, Vivian. It is a wonderful blessing being your
mother. Thanks for your patience. And now that Mommy’s “big paper” is finished, we can begin
new adventures.

vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES...............................................................................................................................x
LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….xi
KEY TO ABBREVIATIONS...............................................................................................................xii
Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………..1
Purpose/Importance of the study……………………………………………………………………………………………4
Intercultural/Cultural Competency………………………………………………………………………………………….4
Situating the Problem………………………………………………………………………………………………………….….7
History and Current State of Study Abroad/International Education……………………………………..13
Organization………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………....18
Chapter 1: Mapping Assessment Trends in International Education………………………………………21
Comprehensive Internationalization…………………………………………………………………………..…………21
Study Abroad Assessment…………………………………………………………………………………………….….……24
Pedagogy in the Study Abroad Field…………………………………………………………………………………...…31
Chapter2: Locating Culture between Anthropology and Study Abroad…………………..………..……35
Locating Culture in Anthropology…………………………………………………………………………………..…..…36
Regional Culture……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………37
Liminal Culture………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………39
“Othering” as a means to “Authenticity”………………………………………………………………………….……40
Commodifying Culture………………………………………………………………………………………………………..…41
Applying Anthropology……………………………………………………………………………………………………….…43
Chapter 3: Research Sites, Methods and Positionality …………………………………………………………..46
Background Pre-dissertation Research……………………………………………………………………………….…48
Field Sites: Identifying the Gap………………………………………………………………………………………………50
Research Sites……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….………51
Ghana as a Field Site……………………………………………………………………………………………………..………53
Traditional versus Western Health Care in Ghana…………………………………………………………….…..54
Rationale of Research Sites……………………………………………………………………………………………………56
The Study………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………57
Selection of Subjects……………………………………………………………………………………………………..………59
Interviews………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..……61
Journals…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………61
Participant-Observation……………………………………………………………………………………………..…………62
Methodology…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………63
Instrumentation………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…………63
viii

Data analysis………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….........64
Positionality………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…….…65
Situating knowledge………………………………………………………………………………………………………………68
Chapter 4: Inventing Culture ………………………………………………………………………………………….….…..71
Imagining Africa and Ghana……………………………………………………………………………………………..……72
Community Diagnosis (Disorienting Dilemma 1)………………………………………………………………..….75
Friendship (Disorienting Dilemma 2)…………………………………………………………………………………..…79
Bonesetter (Disorienting Dilemma 3)……………………………………………………………………….……………81
Service Learning (Disorienting Dilemma 4)………………………………………………………….…………………84
Chapter 5: Transformational Learning toward Cultural Competency ……………….……………………91
Rubric for Cultural Competency………………………………………………………………….…………………………94
Chapter 6: Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………………….………………….99
APPENDICES…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..105
Appendix A: Pre-Dissertation Data of Study Abroad Students………………………………………….......106
Appendix B: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience……………….…109
Appendix C: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience…………….……113
Appendix D: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience……………….…116
BIBLIOGRAPHY...........................................................................................................................118

ix

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Seven Components of Overseas Programs for Level Classification (Engle and Engle,
2003)...............................................................................................................................................9
Table 2: Study Abroad Student Demographic Information..........................................................59
Table 3: Cultural Competency Rubric for Short-Term, Faculty-Led Study Abroad Programs…..…95
Table 4: Pre-Dissertation Data of Study Abroad Students………………………………………………..…….106

x

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: The Process Model of Intercultural Competence. Source: Deardorff (2006: 256)………..5
Figure 2: American Council on Education Comprehensive Internationalization Diagram
(2017)………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………22
Figure 3: Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions. Source Hofstede 1986 (recreation model).........……..27

xi

KEY TO ABBREVIATIONS
ACE

The American Council on Education

BCE

Before Common Era

BEVI

Beliefs, Events, Values Inventory

CI

Comprehensive Internationalization

CIEE

Council on International Educational Exchange

CIGE

Center for Internationalization and Global Engagement

CIKAD

Center for Indigenous Knowledge for Agriculture and Rural Development

GPI

Global Perspectives Inventory

HIV/AIDS

Human Immunodeficiency Virus/ Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome

IDI

Intercultural Development Inventory

IIE

Institute of International Education

IES

Institute for the International Education of Students

IFSA-Butler

The Institute for Study Abroad, Butler University

IK

Indigenous Knowledge

ISU

Iowa State University

MU

“Midwestern University” Research Alias

NAFSA

Association of International Educators

NYU

New York University

PA

Program Assistant

SIT

School for International Training

SPSS

Statistical Package for the Social Sciences
xii

TBA

Traditional Birth Attendant

US

United States

USAID

United States Agency for International Development

USD

United States Dollar

xiii

Introduction
Prior to leaving for Ghana, I attempted to make no assumptions or create any false
expectations of what my experiences would be like. I did this with the intention that I
would be more open to the cultural differences and learning opportunities. However,
upon arriving in Accra, I found myself thinking, ‘This isn’t what I expected it to be like’ or
‘This is different,’ to the point that I have yet to find something to be exactly like my
unspoken expectations. Though I had done Google image searches and looked at photos
from National Geographic to see the amount of greenery, I was unable to shake that
elementary idea that all of Africa is dry desert.
Most surprising of my experiences here in Ghana has been the people. Everywhere we
have been, people are excited to see or talk to an Obruni.1 The way Ghanaians have
accepted us (the whole group of students) was something that made me think a lot
about Western culture. Back home, you are the most important person to yourself, and
you rush around your day oblivious to what is going on around you. Especially with the
availability of iPods, computers, and other technology, human to human interaction is
severely limited. Here you are greeted with a smile, and when given the chance people
ask about you, how you like Ghana, where is home to you, etc. The U.S. and many other
Western countries have become so depersonalized, that I will miss the genuine human to
human interaction when I go home. (22-year-old female U.S. study abroad student,
journal assignment)
The narrative above reflects a U.S. study abroad student’s first impressions upon beginning her
study abroad program in Ghana. She, like many of her peers, strives to be “open-minded” and
does not wish to construct “false expectations” of Ghana before her program begins. The
comparison between culture in Ghana and the U.S. begins even before students depart.
This dissertation argues that U.S. study abroad students studying on faculty-led, shortterm programs can obtain cultural competency abroad, and that qualitative, ethnographic
research can be used to understand students’ of cultural competency on short-term study
abroad programs. I suggest that transformational learning occurs when certain pedagogical
factors are in place, such as faculty knowledge of the field site, structured writing assignments,

1

The Akan/Twi word for foreigners.

1

and a theory/praxis engagement. I also demonstrate that anthropological theories and
methods are useful frameworks for helping international educators develop and assess “high
impact” study abroad programs. Finally, I argue that using qualitative, ethnographic data on
study abroad outcomes directly and successfully contributes to the comprehensive
internationalization of higher educational institutions.
Throughout this dissertation, I draw on Wagner’s theoretical concept of The Invention of
Culture to understand the ways in which study abroad students construct culture, which in turn
leads to cultural competency. Wagner explains the process of inventing culture in the following
way: “when an anthropologist studies another culture, he ‘invents’ it by generalizing his
impressions, experiences, and other evidences as if they were produced by some external
‘thing’” (1975:26). This “thing,” Wagner argues, is the pre-conceived notion of what constitutes
culture, the criteria anthropologists are taught to look for in the field: kinship, religion, family,
language, etc. Study abroad students construct their new host culture in a similar way.
Students grapple with understanding that “the culture in which one grows up is never really
‘visible’ – it is taken for granted […] it is only through the ‘invention’ of experiencing a new
culture that the subject culture becomes ‘visible’” (1981:4). For example, U.S. undergraduate
students begin to construct their college identity upon arrival during freshman orientation.
They may start identifying themselves by which high school they attended or which part of the
city, the state, the country, or the world they are from. The majority of university or college
students in the U.S. who study abroad are U.S. citizens, but an increasing number are
international students. For many U.S. study abroad students, their home culture is hegemonic
(Gramsci: 1971). So while students in this study come from diverse backgrounds in the U.S.,

2

students understand their homes culture to be the shared, dominant culture among 18-22 year
olds during 2005-2010.
Once students on faculty-led programs form a group and travel abroad together, their
shared identity begins to solidify both in terms of how students see themselves within the host
culture (as Americans2) and how they begin to see the “other” host culture. Students are begin
to not only construct their host culture, they begin to see that they are “Americans” and are
being assigned all the attributes that the host culture thinks they should have as “Americans.”
It is this very process of “inventing” culture (both U.S. and host) that Wagner argues occurs in
the field. In turn, I argue that this same process allows U.S. study abroad students to
understand their own culture as they experience and learn about a new one.
This research suggests that short-term, faculty-led study abroad programs can lead to
transformational learning. Over the past twenty years, a shift has taken place in the types of
study abroad programs most students go on, with more students participating in short-term
(eight-weeks or less) programs. Older literature suggests that students obtain more intercultural competency by studying abroad longer, however, emerging literature suggests that this
may not be the case. This dissertation draws on anthropological concepts of culture in order to
examine cultural competency outcomes for students on short-term programs. This research
will not explore the reasons why anthropologists are not engaging with study abroad theories
and themes. Instead, the goal is to demonstrate through using anthropological theories that
ethnographic research can be an effective, or perhaps even a better way to enhance and assess
the value of the study abroad experience.

2

Even when the study abroad program has non-U.S. citizens participating, the group is seen as “American.”

3

Purpose/Importance of the study
Currently, over 313,000 U.S. students study abroad for credit each year (Open Doors
2016); this is a 300% increase from twenty years ago. However, this figure still highlights that
less than 3% of the U.S. undergraduate population participates in an academic program abroad.
A proliferation of students studying abroad took place in the 1990s when higher education
institutions began building and offering short-term, faculty-led programs. Fifty years ago, the
typical study abroad student went to a private liberal arts college and spent a semester or a
year abroad. Today, 63% of all students studying abroad go on short-term programs, followed
by 34% on semester-long programs and 3% going for the entire academic year. Students at
large state universities as well as community colleges are now the major demographic included
in the short-term numbers. These shifts (from liberal arts to state universities as well as from
semester-long to short-term) has sparked debates among institutions and educators about
whether students on short-term, faculty-led programs can obtain just as much cultural
competency as semester-long programs.

Intercultural/Cultural Competency
The term intercultural competency emerged from the intercultural communications
field where it is understood to be a set of skills obtained over a defined period. Many study
abroad offices use variations of these skills to assess how students learn while on their
program. For example, Darla Deardorff created an intercultural competence framework to
assess how to interact successfully with those from different cultures (Deardorff 2006). Her
framework includes the following:

4

•
•
•
•
•

Attitudes: openness and curiosity to move outside ones’ comfort zone;
Knowledge: cultural self-awareness (ways in which one’s culture has influenced
one’s identity and worldview), culture-specific knowledge, and understanding
the world from other’s perspectives;
Skills: observation, listening, evaluations, analyzing, interpreting, and relating;
Internal outcomes: attitude, knowledge and skills lead to internal outcomes
consisting of flexibility, adaptability, and empathy;
External outcomes: behavior and communication of the individual based on
their attitude, knowledge, skills and internal outcomes.

Figure 1: The Process Model of Intercultural Competence. Source: Deardorff (2006: 256)

Deardorff argues that intercultural competence is a life-long process. The aim of
assessing students is to understand how they acquire these skills. However, this model can be
interpreted as limiting in that the term “inter” denotes a dichotomy; between or among two
groups. I argue for the term cultural competency as it is a more accessible term; it is broad
enough to include all aspects of culture and is not limited to competency between two groups.
The term “cultural competency” alludes to plural possibilities, where the goal is to understand
all the dimensions of culture(s), such as those within the student’s dominant culture, the
5

cultures that make-up the study abroad group, and the cultures that are found in the various
host communities. Study abroad students navigate multiple groups simultaneously. They
navigate their own identity, the intragroup dynamics that accompany a study abroad group
such as identity and power, and the host community that also has multiple identities and power
hierarchies, etc.
Cunningham’s model for transformational learning (2010) is a better framework for
understanding how students understand complex cultural issues on faculty-led study abroad
programs. Cunningham argues that transformational learning occurs when students encounter
disorienting dilemmas abroad. These dilemmas (Mezirow 1997) occur when students encounter
unfamiliar sights, sounds, and concepts and can result in high intensity dissonance (the process
where students reexamine their assumptions). I argue that disorienting dilemmas resulting in
transformational learning lead students to the overarching goal of cultural competency.
This dissertation demonstrates how an ethnographic approach to assessing students
understanding of culture and cultural competency is a valuable and complementary method to
use alongside positivist assessment tools currently used in the field of international education.
Using Wagner’s (1975) framework, I argue that the “invention of culture” is a process that
students undergo throughout the duration of a study abroad program. The process begins
when students first encounter disorienting dilemmas (Kiely 2005) abroad. These dilemmas can
teach students how to navigate their way toward a resolution by understanding the cultural
factors underlying the issue. Study abroad students begin to understand another culture
because they begin to understand that they have their own culture. This shift in thinking can
result in transformational learning, the process whereby previously taken-for-granted

6

assumptions, values, beliefs, and lifestyle habits are assessed and, in some cases, radically
transformed (Kiely 2005:7). In turn, transformational learning leads to cultural competency.
Through this research, I use an ethnographic framework to demonstrate how study abroad
students on a short-term faculty-led program to Ghana navigate the construction of culture to
obtain cultural competency
Although this research addresses the overarching arguments involved in assessing the
cultural competency of students within university and college structures, it does not
deconstruct or critique the term cultural competency. Borrowing from the international
education literature, I define cultural competency as a series of stages students navigate within
a diverse cultural context which lead them to transform original assumptions and values.

Situating the Problem
In 2013, the New York Times hosted a “Room for Debate” series entitled, “Should More
Americans Study Abroad?” This five-perspective discussion examined the value of study
abroad, proposing: “At a time when it seems as if every American college and university has a
study abroad program or has agreements with institutions that offer the experience, one has to
wonder: Is it worth it (Behring 2013)?”
The discussion included representation from the Institute of International Education
(IIE), a former U.S. Ambassador, two graduate students, and one undergraduate student. Many
of the commentators agreed that study abroad is expensive. The debate, therefore, focused on
whether the value of the experience was worth the financial investment. The opinions focused
on the following points: It is Essential, It Can Be a Waste of Time, A Gap Year Is Much Better,

7

More Students Should Do It, and The Cost of Not Going Is Real. All five perspectives reflect the
current debate occurring on U.S. college and university campuses. Administrators worry about
the cost to the institution. At the same time, they are eager to have assessment data showing
their students are culturally competent. Some faculty feel the experience is a glorified travel
opportunity where students drink and party, and they discourage their students from going
abroad. Other faculty/academic departments who believe in the value of study abroad require
their students to go for an entire semester. Students want to participate but are limited by
finances and/or curriculum requirements, resulting in only a small percentage of students
studying abroad. International educators and career planning professionals dedicate their
entire careers to helping students go abroad. Parents question whether the opportunity to go
abroad is worth the already large investment in their children’s education. The debate is
complex and ongoing, and the number of students studying abroad for credit continues to rise.
In the late 1990s and throughout the 2000s, assessment models proliferated to address
the value of study abroad. As mentioned before, study abroad is not a discipline in and of itself.
Fields such as psychology, education, and language acquisition all tackle the issue of how
students learn abroad. Engle and Engle (2003) were some of the first scholars to help frame
classifications related to overseas experiences in order to evaluate the quality of programs.
“The fact that we in the profession speak more frequently of language acquisition and crosscultural competence, of outcomes and assessments, bespeaks a long-needed shift of emphasis
(2003:1).” They described seven components of overseas programs as a way to systematically
breakdown the experience. They also created level classifications that include program

8

duration. These classifications have provided the foundation for many of the program
structures used today.
Table 1: Seven Components of Overseas Programs for Level Classification (Engle and Engle, 2003)
Seven Components of Overseas Program

Level Classification

1. Length of student sojourns

Level One: Study Tour

2. Entry target language competence

Level Two: Short-term Study

3. Language used in course work

Level Three: Cross-Cultural Contact Program

4. Context of academic work

Level Four: Cross-Cultural Encounter Program

5. Types of student housing

Level Five: Cross Cultural Immersion Program

6. Provisions for guided/structured cultural
interaction
7. Guided reflection on cultural experiences

Many scholars (Dwyer 2004; Medina-Lopez-Portillo 2004; Kehl and Morris 2007; Vande
Berg 2007:2009; Paige et al 2009; Behrnd and Porzelt 2012) use and/or align with Engle and
Engle’s classification to justify the need to push students toward semester-long programs as
they believe that the longer students are in abroad or immersed in another culture, the
stronger the students cultural competency. Although the data from assessment models used in
many of the above author’s work show that students gained cultural competency, many of the
researchers do not explain in detail the qualitative or contextual factors that went into
constructing the pedagogy, how many times and in what ways faculty and staff intervened to
help students reflect, participant-observation data, etc. For example, Medina-Lopez-Portillo’s
research compares two programs to assess the relationship between program duration and the
9

development of intercultural sensitivity: a seven-week program in Taxco, Mexico, and a sixteenweek program in Mexico City, Mexico. She gives no information about her role as the faculty
director on the programs, how many times she taught/interacted with the students, or the
cultural determinants of each location (the programs were run through different universities).
By failing to describe her own position within her research, she jeopardizes the validity of her
work. It’s unclear what other factors may have contributed to her students’ deeper levels of
intercultural sensitivity on the long-term program versus the short-term program.
Mary Dwyer (2004), in her article “More Is Better: The Impact of Study Abroad Program
Duration,” argues that studying abroad for a full year has a significant impact on students’
growth in the following areas: language learning, academic attainment measures, intercultural
and personal development, and career choices. Dwyer, CEO of one of the largest study abroad
providers, the Institute for the International Education of Students (IES), collected self-reported
participant surveys from the past fifty years, an impressive set of data, no doubt. At the same
time she notes that, with regards to short-term programs, “In some categories of factors,
summer students were as likely or more likely to achieve sustainable benefits from studying
abroad in comparison with semester students (2004:161).” She ponders that one explanation
for the counter-intuitive outcome is that “well-planned, intensive summer programs of at least
six weeks’ duration can have a significant impact on student growth across a variety of
important outcomes (161).”
Vande Berg’s work also contributes to this study as he argues that cultural competency
cannot happen without goal setting and ongoing intervention. He believes that cultural
competency learning goals must be set before the student begins the program. Faculty and

10

staff must continue to intervene and work with students before, during, and after their longterm programs to help study abroad students obtain skills. “Unless we give students the tools
to learn effectively in another culture, they will continue to learn like they do on the home
campus” (2007:398). Although Vande Berg recommends intervention for long-term, directenroll study abroad programs, the same tools can apply to short-term, faculty-led programs.
Both Dwyer and Vande Berg’s study influence this research project, as I attempt to
demonstrate that short-term programs can provide substantial and in-depth intercultural
experiences. Using anthropological frameworks, this ethnographic research approaches the
issue from a different angle, one employing a triangulation of data in order to demonstrate that
students on shorter-term programs can meaningfully develop their understandings of culture.
This research will also explore a larger question that the field of study abroad is just beginning
to ask: should the same goals for cultural competency be applied to short-term and long-term
programs?
Generation Study Abroad, sponsored by the Institute for International Education (IIE), is
a five-year initiative started in 2005 to double the numbers of students studying abroad. IIE is a
non-profit organization that partners with the U.S. government to help promote international
education. This new initiative is part of a plan to increase the number of students who study
abroad to 600,000 per year on credit and non-credit-bearing programs. Currently, international
students studying in the U.S. outnumber U.S. students going abroad by a ratio of 10:1. Fewer
than 10% of U.S. students go abroad on curricular and co-curricular programs.

11

At the first Generation Study Abroad Summit held in Washington DC in October 2015 3,
about 600 government employees, for-profit companies, higher education providers, study
abroad advisers, and university administrators gathered in the large ballroom of the Grand
Hyatt five stories below the street. Throughout the summit, there were several interviews with
New York Times reporters, student entrepreneurs, and others trying to define the importance
of students engaging internationally. Conversations ranged from how to double the number of
U.S. students studying abroad to how to best use celebrity endorsements to motivate students.
Informal consensus via chatter among many in the audience revealed a perplexing question:
just what is this summit about? Session topics ranged from how to pay for more students to go
abroad (either at the family level or at the institutional level), how the big players (University of
Minnesota, Michigan State University, and University of Texas, Austin) came up with innovative
initiatives such as aligning career goals with global companies in their communities and how to
help students unpack 4 their study abroad experiences.
While these ideas fit the needs of institutions with strategic priorities to internationalize
their campuses, needs such as funding for scholarships, support staff, and grants to create new
programs, for many higher education institutions, these initiatives are unrealistic. Many liberal
arts colleges in fact limit the number of students who can study abroad due to revenue budgets
based on a home tuition model. These models run on the premise that students pay their
home institution tuition for the semester they go abroad. The home institution then pays the
tuition to the study abroad program provider and allows all financial aid (merit based, federal,

3
4

I attended as part of my study abroad administrative responsibilities.
A term used in study abroad to describe the process of unpacking the students’ experiences abroad.

12

etc.) to be used. For example, if home school tuition for a semester is $20,000 and the student
receives $10,000 in aid, the college only receives $10,000 income. If the study abroad provider
program tuition is $15,000, then the college is left with a $5000 deficit. Multiply this (on
average) by 200 students and the college has a $1,000,000 deficit. Liberal arts colleges want to
support study abroad, but only at a certain cost. Doubling numbers of study abroad students
for these institutions would not only increase their bottom line deficit, but doing so is nearly
impossible due to other factors as well, such as curriculum barriers (classes only offered certain
semesters), lack of faculty support, and additional cost barriers to the students. Moreover,
most liberal arts institutions send students via provider programs such as IES, IFSA-Butler, CIEE,
and SIT World Learning since their college offices have very small staffs. Therefore, liberal arts
college study abroad advisers cannot increase the number of students who go abroad, nor do
they own or control the quality of the programs they offer through these providers.

History and Current State of Study Abroad/International Education
In this section, I present an overview of the field of study abroad as seen through the
international education literature to understand the current state of study abroad within the
United States. International education draws from literatures in psychology, linguistics,
comparative education, and intercultural communication. The goal of the section is to highlight
the current discourses occurring on university and college campuses regarding how and why
study abroad is valued. I begin with a short history of study abroad.
According to Hoffa and Depaul and Hoffa’s lengthy two-part volume, “A History of U.S.
Study Abroad: Beginning to 1965 and 1965 – Present, (Hoffa 2007; Depaul and Hoffa 2010)”

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studying outside one’s own culture dates to before 600 B.C.E. “Centers of learning” were found
in present day India, Greece, Rome, the Middle East, and Asia. These “ancient academies were
not universities in the later European sense. Rather, they were places where traditional
knowledge, sacred and secular, was passed on from generation to generation” (2007:3). At
these educational centers, wandering scholars could learn older, traditional wisdom. They were
not spaces where new knowledge could be created (as might be found with some present-day
study abroad programs). During the Renaissance period, the concept of the “grand tour”
prevailed among elite families who invested in their sons’ travel with the intention that he
obtain the literal and proverbial “feather in the cap” foundations of knowledge. Many of these
(often royal) families sent their sons to secure important political alliances as well as to obtain
classical knowledge from predominant universities. Another tradition arose in Europe around
the same time-period: the wanderjahr, which Hoffa describes as a year of experiential learning
rather than academic study. Artists, writers, craftsmen, and the like often wandered around
mostly Europe, working formal or informal jobs and returning home after funds ran out and/or
homesickness took over. These historical traditions, Hoffa argues, form the basis for what
emerged on campuses in the United States in the twentieth century (2007:19). In sum, these
pedagogical principles are not new to higher education as the core attributes of global
knowledge have been in place for thousands of years.
Study abroad programs within the United States took root when U.S. higher educational
intuitions opened in the late 1700s and early 1800s. Later, World War II and the Cold War
marked a significant shift in the history of study abroad when programs such as the GI Bill,
Fulbright, the National Defense Act, and Area Studies became increasingly important to U.S.

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political and security concerns. Some scholars took offense at the highly political motive behind
funding large educational initiatives at many U.S. higher education institutions while others
embraced the new funding opportunities to carry forth programming and data collection in
places where this would otherwise have been impossible. In any case, these governmental
programs boosted opportunities for students and scholars at all levels to study abroad.
Influence by Engle and Engle’s (2003) classification of programs, the field of study
abroad generally agrees upon the following models/categories for semester-long programs.
1. Direct Enroll: Students direct enroll at a foreign institution abroad where they live and
take classes alongside peers from the host country and around the world. An example is
University of Edinburgh in Scotland. This institution welcomes thousands of international
students to study for a semester on their campus. Visiting students generally live in dorms
around campus with local students. Based on their U.S. institution program model, students
can either go on their own to the university or they can use a third-party provider to help them
with the application, attend a supplemental orientation, and participate in cultural excursions
hosted by the provider. Students who participate in this program model are expected to be
self-sufficient and pro-active as the level of advising and outreach to the student is minimal.
2. Hybrid: Students work with a third-party program provider that has an on-site, incountry resident center where students take thematic classes in English as well as language
classes pertaining to the host country. Students with sufficiently high language proficiency can
take one or two classes at a local partner university. Advising and oversight is high on these
programs as the center faculty and staff use a liberal arts college model of small classes with

15

plenty of time for advising (course-related, housing, or cultural). Students can live on campus
among the university population or with each other in apartments.
3. Island: Students participating in these programs conduct all of their coursework
within the resident center structures abroad, which are often located in large urban cities.
Students typically take courses with other American students, although many international
students studying at U.S. institutions now participate in these programs. Faculty are often from
the U.S. and students live together in apartments, leaving little structured opportunity to
interact with the host community(ies).
4. Immersion: Students live with host families, often in rural settings, for the duration of
the program. The coursework is primarily field-based learning where students are in local
(urban and rural) communities or in remote ecological areas of interest for their coursework.
Local language instruction is usually required in-country so that students can communicate with
their host families and the community. These programs are often found in the global south,
whereas most of the first three study abroad models are based in Europe or other western
countries.
Short-term programs are harder to categorize as there are many options available to
students. Many times, colleges and universities use their own definitions of short-term
programs sometimes to align with their curricula. Other times they use terminology carried
from previous years. Short-term faculty-led programs are categorized to include a faculty
member from the credit-bearing institution that owns the program. They vary in duration from
eight days to ten weeks, and run at different times of the year—typically fall/spring breaks,

16

winter breaks, or summer breaks. Sometimes programs are embedded within a semester-long
course where travel occurs in the beginning, middle, or end of the course on campus.
A conflict characterizes the current state of study abroad: that between providing
increased opportunities for all students (particularly within institutions that have shaped their
revenue stream to reward high numbers of student participants) and conserving in-depth
engagement with the critical thought processes that occurs when a limited number of students
study abroad for a longer period (a semester or a year). In other words, quantity versus quality
of study abroad is one of the predominant debates within the field.
Lewin, in his introduction to the “Handbook of Practice and Research in Study Abroad
(2009),” demonstrates this duality through a unique comparison between Horkheimer and
Adorno’s critique of “The Culture Industry” versus Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of
Mechanical Reproduction.” Juxtaposing the decline of critical thought against the increase of
mass culture, Lewin argues that Horkheimer and Adorno’s work represent the viewpoints of
study abroad critics. These critics argue that profit-driven programs that feature cultureconsuming activities such as visiting museums, eating local food, and seeing historic sites
diminish in-depth critical thinking. In other words, are study abroad program pedagogies
enabling a mass consumption of culture by traveling through four or five countries? Benjamin’s
work, on the other hand, provides an alternative view on study abroad. As Lewin posits,
Benjamin’s logic allows a recognition that “the space globalization has opened up between
students and the cultures they are studying […] (creates) an opportunity for (students) to foster
a new and constructive criticism” (2009; xvii). Therefore, could programs be designed to allow
students to think critically about how the host community values its museums, local food, and

17

historic sites? To address these criticisms of study abroad, a push to assess student engagement
abroad has become increasingly important within the last twenty years.
In the field of study abroad, debates continue over program duration, location, model,
and pedagogy. The one goal that unites the field is the belief that studying, learning, and
engaging abroad and outside one’s own culture benefits the student. I take the position here
that studying abroad is immensely beneficial. My argument centers on the belief that shortterm faculty-led programs can be just as successful in developing cultural competency as longterm programs. The focus of this ethnographic account is to illuminate anthropological
theories and methods as a qualitative alternative to larger quantitative assessment
instruments.
Organization
This dissertation is organized into the following six chapters.
Chapter 1: Mapping Assessment Trends in Education (IDI, BEVI, GPI, and Ethnographic
Approaches). Here I review the current assessment models used in international education by
universities and colleges. As more institutions strengthen or build internationalization plans on
their campuses, assessment tools are used to determine how students understand global
processes.
Chapter 2: Locating Culture between Anthropology and Study Abroad (brief overview of
key arguments). In this chapter I contextualize the study abroad questions considered in this
thesis within anthropology’s debate surrounding the term culture. A brief review of the
literature as well as an in-depth discussion on Wagner’s Invention of Culture inform how the

18

research on culture frames this dissertation. Connections between anthropological theories on
culture and study abroad pedagogy illuminate parallels between the fields.
Chapter 3: Research Sites, Methods and Positionality (US/Ghana sites, positionality,
instruments). In this chapter, I describe the methodological process in which this project was
conceived, how locations were determined, how participants were chosen, and how data was
collected and analyzed. The research was multi-sited, and took place both within the U.S. and
Ghana. Finally, a discussion on positionality highlights the challenges of working in multiple
locations with both U.S. students, faculty, and staff, as well as host community members.
Chapter 4: Inventing Culture. Here I describe how U.S. students began constructing
their understanding of culture in Ghana during the pre-departure stage and while they
participated in the program abroad. Ethnographic vignettes highlight the disorienting dilemmas
that fundamentally affected how students understood and interacted within their host
communities. This chapter also examines the parallel process through which students construct
understandings and meanings of their own home culture. I also depict through ethnographic
accounts how students think about their own culture as they struggle to situate their feelings
about Ghanaian culture.
Chapter 5: Transformational Learning toward Cultural Competency (Relevance to Study
Abroad and Anthropology). In this chapter, I argue that understanding culture in a study abroad
context is complex. Students are asked to engage in a high-level cultural program outside their
home culture while simultaneously constructing their own understanding of what it means to
be an “American” or to be from a Western culture. I demonstrate that students can
successfully learn cultural competence on short-term programs with the on-going guidance of

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faculty instructors who can interpret cultural misunderstandings, teach culturally specific
aspects of the culture, and provide reflective mechanisms for students. In so doing, I
demonstrate the relevance of an ethnographic and qualitative approach to study abroad
learning and assessment.
Chapter 6: Conclusion (future paths for study abroad). Final conclusions draw attention
to anthropology’s valuable contribution to study abroad in providing a more nuanced way to
cultivate and understand the cultural skills obtained by students who study abroad. A
discussion of new paths forward for universities and colleges illuminates how administrators,
faculty, and students can think about global engagement in the future.

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Chapter 1: Mapping Assessment Trends in International Education
Comprehensive Internationalization
Internationalizing U.S. universities and colleges became a trend in the early-to-mid
2000s as institutions began to strategically centralize their global engagement efforts.
Organizations such as the Association of International Educators (NAFSA 5) and the American
Council on Education (ACE) became policy hubs for comprehensive internationalization (CI), a
term ACE’s Center for Internationalization and Global Engagement (CIGE) defines as “a
strategic, coordinated process that seeks to align and integrate policies, programs, and
initiatives to position colleges and universities as more globally oriented and internationally
connected institutions (2017).”
ACE developed a model for comprehensive internationalization, which includes six
pillars of internationalization, or what they call “interconnected target areas for institutional
initiatives, policies, and programs.” They believe all six pillars are needed to successfully
develop a comprehensive internationalization plan.

5

Association name changed to reflect an updated field. The original name of this organization was National
Association of Foreign Student Advisers.

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Figure 2: American Council on Education Comprehensive Internationalization Diagram (2017)

ACE’s CIGE runs an internationalization laboratory in which staff members work with
institutions to help collect data in all six areas as well as analyze and help formulate strategic
plans. At a price tag of $30,000 for the internationalization lab, a college or university cannot
afford to forgo an articulated institutional commitment (pillar 1).
John Hudzik, former President of NAFSA, chaired an International Dialogue Task Force
for NAFSA in 2009-2010 that resulted in a publication, “Comprehensive Internationalization:
From Concept to Action.” This 42-page document advocates for a larger constituent of
stakeholders who shape and share the vision for CI. As Hudzik stated, “Internationalization is
moving from the periphery of campus to campus center stage” (2011:5). NAFSA, via Hudzik,
defines comprehensive internationalization in this way:
Comprehensive internationalization is a commitment, confirmed through action, to
infuse international and comparative perspectives throughout the teaching, research
and service missions of higher education. It shapes institutional ethos and values and
touches the entire higher education enterprise. It is essential that it be embraced by
institutional leadership, governance, faculty, students and all academic service and
support units. It is an institutional imperative, not just a desirable possibility.

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Comprehensive internationalization not only impacts all of campus life but the
institutional external frames of reference, partnerships and relations. The global
reconfiguration of economies, systems of trade, research, and communication, and the
impact of global forces on local life, dramatically expend the need for comprehensive
internationalization and the motivations and purposes driving it. (2011: 6)
His call to action provides institutions a tangible framework for 1) understanding the
rationale behind CI, 2) how to understand and assess what global foci are already happening on
campuses, 3) how to build the scale and scope of strategic global initiatives including the
organizational culture for CI, 4) understanding the issues, barriers, and challenges of CI, and 5)
how to achieve “buy in” in order to ultimately implement comprehensive internationalization.
A focus on students is at the heart of these large comprehensive internationalization
initiatives. ACE argues that “high quality education must prepare students to live and work in a
world characterized by growing multiculturalism and diminishing borders. Higher education
institutions across the country are rising to this challenge through internationalization
strategies” (Green 2005: vii). Hudzik notes, “Internationalization can be a means to prepare
graduates for life and work in a global market of products, services, and ideas” (2011: 8).
However, Hudzik also stresses that internationalization can “seek to harness institutional
research energies for a wide set of purposes including security at home and abroad, and
economic, social, and cultural development in an increasingly borderless and interdependent
world” (2011:8). In other words, beyond value to students, the process of internationalizing
has multiple economic and political benefits. Michigan State University, where Hudzik resides,
saw success in receiving outside funding by strategically aligning global efforts on campus with
foundations or corporate interests.

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Both ACE’s internationalization laboratory and Hudzik’s Concept to Action policy paper
are now seen as standards in comprehensive internationalization for higher education. Both
were developed to serve the needs of higher education institutions that found themselves
wanting to enter, or in some cases strengthen their position within the global arena. However,
these frameworks were developed for medium to large research institutions. They are not
easily accessible for private liberal arts or community colleges. These institutions want to
internationalize their institutions for similar reasons (increased international student
population and internationalizing the curriculum), but the pathways to internationalization vary
due to differences in institutional organization, tuition revenue models, and access to global
partnerships.
In the race to internationalization, all colleges and universities, regardless of institution
type, share a common theme: study abroad. Student mobility is key to internationalizing the
campus either through in-bound, international students or out-bound study abroad students.
Therefore, understanding specifically how student mobility and study abroad effects and
interacts with the other components of internationalization such as curriculum, partnerships
and collaborations, and organizational structure is crucial.

Study Abroad Assessment
U.S. institutions that intentionally internationalized their campuses and pumped large
amounts of money into building more study abroad opportunities need to show data on
participation numbers and performance to justify these efforts and investments. The pressure
to build assessment models to document where and how students globally engage has become

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increasingly important. Most study abroad supporters agree it is necessary to understand
student cultural comprehension. However, scholars differ on which models should be used and
how often they should be administered.
This chapter discusses the various assessment models used in study abroad. Most
models are designed for large numbers of students and are for the most part quantitative.
Ideally, universities and colleges assess their students to better understand what motivates
study abroad participation, if and how participants’ world views shifted, if they gained global
competency, and if and how their learning addresses larger institutional learning goals.
Measuring students’ global competency and awareness is becoming more important as
campuses are intentionally globalizing their curricula and co-curricular.
To understand how assessment tools work, it is important to highlight some popular
schools of thought or theoretical camps found within the large study abroad field. As
mentioned before, the field of study abroad is vast and undefined as a single discipline. Many
scholars pull pedagogical frameworks from fields such as intercultural communication,
psychology, and linguistics to examine how students understand the process of studying
abroad. In each of the examples provided below, the concept of culture comes into play, but in
varied ways. To situate an anthropological approach to understanding study abroad
frameworks, it is necessary to review other frameworks and discussions surrounding how
students understand their learning.
Deardorff, introduced in the previous chapter, has sought to develop an agreed upon
definition of intercultural competence. As higher education institutions try to globalize their
campuses, Deardorff has advocated for a standard approach to implementation and

25

assessment. She never defines intercultural, but based on other readings and lectures, she
identifies with Hofstede’s cultural dimensions of cultural variability. In the mid-1980s, Geet
Hofstede proposed the idea of cultural dimensions, also known as “Hofstede’s Dimensions.” His
six dimensions of cultural variability include Power--Distance, Individualism-Collectivism,
Masculinity-Femininity, Uncertainty-Avoidance, Long Term Orientation-Short Term Orientation,
and Indulgence-Restraint. Hofstede’s research became a standard in the international educator
literature by taking complicated ideas surrounding culture and breaking them down into
essential categories. His approach quantifies various aspects of cultures into numbers and
compares them with other “cultures,” which for him consist of countries and regions. For
instance, he measures the “Arabic World’s” cultural dimensions with the cultural dimensions of
Argentina, Australia, and Austria. Likewise, he measures West Africa alongside Venezuela,
Uruguay, and United States (Hofstede 1986). For example, Hofstede’s individualism versus
collectivism principle might highlight the differences between the United States and China. In
the U.S., most people adhere to a principle of individualism according to Hofstede--the idea
that one person can “pull themselves up by their bootstraps.” The task of decision-making
among individuals in the U.S. rests on the individual to make their own path and “move up in
the world.” Concurrently, collectivism is a principle that guides daily life in China. Individuals in
society make decisions that benefit a collective group such as the extended family or the
political party. Making a decision that benefits the individual would not be respected.
Hofstede would rank these two cultures on the opposite side of the individualism/collectivism
index.

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Figure 3: Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions. Source Hofstede 1986 (recreation model)

As the field of international education engaged with assessing students’ knowledge,
they had to be able to categorize cultural dimensions. Although many social scientists would
argue critically against Hofstede’s model, it was a starting place for the field of study abroad.
Many intercultural trainings that occur at national and international conferences such as NAFSA
(The Association of International Educators) and the Forum for Education Abroad focus on how
to break down culture and teach it. For example Bruce LaBrack, a trained anthropologist,
teaches educators the tools of learning culture. Through his federally funded project, What’s

27

Up with Culture, he has created a website that takes students and educators through a series of
modules explaining culture and how it’s interpreted around the world. He states,
Culture has been defined in literally hundreds of ways for different reasons. For study
abroad purposes, culture can be most broadly defined as the shared sets of values,
attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors which are widely held by members of the host culture.
A sojourner will not only need to be aware of these cultural patterns but will have to
respond to them appropriately (2017).
The interactive website highlights various modules such as Cultural Distinctions, for
example, that break down the differences between individualistic and collectivist societies. He
explains how these categories fit within the larger system of culture. He places human behavior
into three categories: “1) Universal refers to ways in which all people in all groups are the same;
2) Cultural refers to what a particular group of people have in common with each other and
how they are different from every other group; and 3) Personal describes the ways in which
each one of us is different from everyone else, including those in our group (2017).” For
example, if a student boards a bus in a crowded terminal in China, the student should work
through the series of steps to determine that China is a collectivist society and that being
pushed by an older woman is a cultural behavior (i.e. older women in the U.S. would likely not
push a younger person out of the way to board a bus).
Deardorff (2006) has been attempting to create standard theory, practice, and
assessment relating to intercultural competence. As universities increasingly develop
intercultural competence models to assess their students’ global understandings, there are
disagreements on definitions, approaches, and assessment of students. Deardorff conducted a
large survey among top universities that were in the process of creating intercultural
competence guidelines. She surveyed scholars and administrators to gain a better

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understanding of what definitions are in play and how institutions are outlining assessment
models. Her outcome shows that there is no consensus on definitions and practices of
intercultural competency between university administrators and scholars of international
education. Her research validates what is demonstrated within the field of study abroad; that
there is no agreed upon theory or approach to understanding students’ comprehension of
culture.
It’s a challenging time in the field. Higher education institutions are being asked to
create more programs and opportunities for students to engage abroad while at the same time
being told they must administer assessment data by accreditation agencies. Often programs are
built before learning goals and objectives are in place, which leaves outcomes assessment as an
afterthought. Nevertheless, the field moves onward and scholars continue to present new
assessment models and theories.
Braskamp, Braskamp, and Merrill offer an alternative to Deardorff’s notion of
intercultural competence by proposing and utilizing the term “global learning and
development,” which combines human development (acquisition of knowledge, skills, and
attitudes) and intercultural communication (awareness of communication and intrapersonal
relationships) (2009:103). As a result, Braskamp and colleagues developed the Global
Perspective Index (GPI) as a way to measure a person's global perspective. They developed the
GPI with the idea that all persons--students, faculty, staff--are on a “journey of life.” They
advocate asking these three major questions:
‘How do I know?’ reflects the Cognitive dimension. Cognitive development is centered
on one's knowledge and understanding of what is true and important to know. It

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includes viewing knowledge and knowing with greater complexity and no longer relying
on external authorities to have absolute truth.
‘Who am I?’ reflects the Intrapersonal dimension. Intrapersonal development focuses
on one becoming more aware of and integrating one's personal values and self-identity
into one's personhood.
‘How do I relate to others?’ reflects the Interpersonal dimension. Interpersonal
development is centered on one's willingness to interact with persons with different
social norms and cultural backgrounds, acceptance of others, and being comfortable
when relating to others (2017)
Other assessment models include the Intercultural Development Index (IDI) and the
Beliefs, Events, and Values Inventory (BEVI) which both aim to assess the difference between
what students learn versus how they think. The IDI is one of the older intercultural assessment
tools. Developed in 2004, this short survey (50 questions) is designed to measure an individual’s
awareness of and sensitivity to cultural differences. Administrators of the IDI must be certified
(for a fee) by the Intercultural Communications Institute and each survey begins at $5.00 USD.
If an institution wants conduct a pre and post survey, the price doubles (Bennet and Bennet
2004). The BEVI is an assessment tool designed by multiple institutions that examines 1) how
students acquire beliefs, values, and worldviews and if they are likely to shift within these
dimensions; 2) what influences students’ motivations within controlled behavior; and 3) how
complex processes and environments affect behavior (Forum 2017). The IDI is positivist in
nature and does not capture complex issues that affect students’ learning about culture, power,
and identity. The BEVI is a mixed-methods assessment tool (quantitative survey and artifact
collections via an e-portfolio) that can only be interpreted by a select few administrators across
the country. The cost is quite substantial, especially for institutions who send large numbers of
students abroad.

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Duarte Morales and Tony Ogden created the Global Citizenship Scale, which assesses
students on a three-point scale: social responsibility, global competence, and global civic
engagement (2010). The scale provides an alternative to larger, more expensive assessment
tools. The authors have published their design and methodology for colleagues in the field, and
offer the assessment tool free of charge. They argue that other assessment tools have
methodological shortcomings, not the least of which is the tendency to rely on students’ selfreporting about their own perceptions of their experiences (2010:17).

Pedagogy in the Study Abroad Field
Deardorff, Hofstede, and to some extent LaBrack’s work are cited often within the
international education literatures and all are leaders within the field. And as such, they set the
standard on defining and using culture or intercultural concepts. All three scholars approach
their theories using an ahistorical framework – not allowing for changes in socio-political,
economic, and/or other factors that might change how students view local culture. In contrast,
post-modern scholars in international education are working to situate culture outside its
bounded representation. Giroux, known for linking critical pedagogy and cultural studies,
argues that culture is a “contested terrain, a site of struggle and transformation (1992: 74).” He
also challenges educators to move beyond the romanticized notion of culture to examine
power relationships between the periphery and the core of society. In other words, educators
need to become cognoscenti of culture, grasping its complexity and understanding that those
on the margin often lack a voice in determining how their own culture might be viewed by
others. He states, “Questions of culture are deeply political and ethical and necessitate

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theoretical and pedagogical practices in which educators and cultural workers engage in
continual dialogue” (Giroux 1992:164).
Phyllis Cunningham uses a framework of critical pedagogy to examine social movements
and transformative learning. She writes against the individual both as a cultural concept
(individualistic versus collective), as well as scholarship that focuses on the individual student
experience (in the psychology literature, for example) -- work that emphasizes the students’
cognitive understanding of their international experience. “In order to think clearly about adult
learning at the edge of social movements, I believe we should divorce our thinking from the
cultural and hegemonic blanket of individualism which almost unconsciously frames our
thinking” (Cunningham 1998:15). Cunningham sees the individual as a social construction
“contextualized in this history, culture, and social fabric of the society in which she lives”
(Cunningham 1998:18). As an advocate of transformational learning, she situates agency in an
historical framework, in contrast to the implicitly ahistorical frameworks of others.
We do not have to take for granted social constructions such as slavery, classism,
patriarchy, racism, and imperialism. These social constructions and their cultural
meanings were made by our predecessors and have been handed down to us by them.
As human beings we can use our own agency and ability for critical reflection to
negotiate with one another for better social constructions than we have now.
(Cunningham 1998:17).
Although Cunningham’s work is primarily concerned with social justice movements, she
nevertheless presents an alternative framework for approaching culture. She questions the
broader context of study abroad, pondering if faculty educate students for the work place or
help them engage in “constructing more democratic and equalitarian societies” (Cunningham
1998:16). During the late 1990s, when many in international education were beginning to
discuss intercultural competency based on the criteria outlined above (Deardorff, et al.),

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Cunningham was grappling with why we send students abroad and what role social activism
might play in their learning and construction of meanings outside their own culture.
In yet another approach, Ogden examines student learning abroad by positioning the
learner through a tourism lens in his article, “The View from the Veranda: Understanding
Today’s Colonial Student (2008).” Here, he is critical of the “island” program experience, a
continuing trend in study abroad. In “island” programs, students are isolated from the host
culture either by physically living in a separate housing structure and not homestays, and/or by
taking courses only with U.S. students and U.S. faculty. Critics in the study abroad field believe
that cultural engagement does not occur on these programs. Ogden takes the argument a step
further by situating the power and privilege of students against the cultural learning landscape.
He places the agency of being a colonial student at the institutional level, accusing education
abroad offices and faculty of not creating meaningful experiences that allow students to engage
with local cultures. “Students are best served when they are enabled or empowered to want to
step outside of their comfort zones” (Ogden 2008:45). For example, New York University (NYU)
has a campus in Accra, Ghana with classes taught at the University of Ghana, Legon by NYU
professors. Students also live in luxury accommodations (by local standards) and have little
interaction with Ghanaian students and community members. Ogden states,
The colonial student casts a striking likeness with the early colonial travelers, who also
moved across borders within the confines of a political and bureaucratic system of
established protocols and practices. Colonial students yearn to be abroad, to travel the
worlds different from their own, to find excitement, to see new wonders and to have
experiences of a lifetime. They want to gain new perspectives on world affairs, develop
practical skills and build their resumes for potential career enhancement, all the while
receiving full academic credit… colonial students have the sense of entitlement… new
cultures are experienced in just the same way as new commodities are coveted,
purchased, and owned. (Ogden 2008:37-38)

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Post-modern international education scholars are writing about social class and its
effects on learning. Scholars engaged in critical pedagogy, which is often rooted in Marxistbased philosophy, believe education plays and important role in determining political and social
relations. Some of these scholars engage Marx differently than those who examined the
consumption of culture as a commoditization. Others scholars link commoditization of culture
with social movements in learning. Lewin, as mentioned, highlights the current “quantity versus
quality” debate in study abroad. Juxtaposing Horkheimer and Adornos’ work against Benjamin,
Lewin discusses the mass consumption of culture camp (that believes all students should go
abroad no matter what model of program) versus the critical inquiry camp (that argues for
increasing critical thinking goals for students who study abroad). Do students obtain cultural
competency simply because they go abroad? Or do students in programs designed with critical
thinking outcomes and reflection demonstrate more in-depth knowledge of cultural
competency? Because the scholars cited above argue that power is a key component in
understanding students’ epistemological viewpoints on culture, they align closely with postmodern anthropologists who also examine power. These arguments mirror the discussion of
culture within anthropology somewhat; structural/functionalism and symbolism versus postmodernism. Chapter 2 will examine these debates in further detail.

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Chapter 2: Locating Culture between Anthropology and Study Abroad
This research does not aim to define culture, how it works, or how it is formed. The
intention is to examine how study abroad students understand the term and how they learn to
navigate the concept. I elicit from Roy Wagner’s work, The Invention of Culture (1975) a
framework for illuminating how study abroad students understand other cultures and their
own. Wagner argues that anthropologists construct the idea of culture in order to fulfill
fieldwork expectations. “’Culture’ itself is presented as a kind of illusion, a foil (and a kind of
false objective) to aid the anthropologist in arranging his experiences” (1981: xii). In the process
of “studying” another culture, Wagner argues that budding anthropologists invent the notion of
culture based on their assumptions, which can often restrict and confine the boundaries of
what that other culture might encompass. Whereas doctoral students are trained in theories
and practice prior to their fieldwork period, study abroad students are exposed to a limited
amount of training and information. Cultural relativism is a notion doctoral students are
engrained with since the first day of graduate school. However, study abroad students often
participate in programs without much prior knowledge of the countries and cultures they are
about to enter, and without much knowledge or understanding of cultural relativism. Instead,
students often use their own culture and assumptions to frame their experiences before and
during their program.
Wagner’s work is a useful way to frame an ethnographic study of how U.S. study abroad
students encounter and navigate another culture. The goal(s) for entering a culture can vary:
the doctoral student/anthropologist aims to conduct a research-oriented quest to produce
knowledge with the end goal of graduating with a degree. The study abroad student may have

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several reasons for studying abroad, some of which are not related to any notion of learning
about culture. Anthropology doctoral students are expected to be proactive and take control of
their learning and engagement during fieldwork; undergraduate students are often passive
learners dependent upon the knowledge of their faculty and staff advisers and admittedly, their
peer students. Faculty are expected to give some cultural context of the area where they are
taking students. Some faculty, however, invent their own understandings of culture, which they
may or may not pass on to their students.
Wagner argues that the process of constructing another culture leads anthropologists to
realize that they, themselves, have their own culture. “In the act of inventing another culture,
the anthropologist invents his own, and in fact reinvents the notion of culture itself” (1981:4).
Both anthropologists and study abroad students struggle with this idea. Both populations may
find themselves explaining aspects of their home country’s culture, such as family structures
and traditions, without fully knowing how to understand their own culture(s). The idea of
constructing and reflecting upon culture forms the nexus of this study. How do U.S. study
abroad students understand and construct culture? How do their instructors (U.S. and local)
articulate information to students? And how do students use their newly constructed
understandings of culture as frameworks for understanding their own cultures?

Locating Culture in Anthropology
The long, winding road of anthropology’s theoretical postures have left many of us
“next generation” anthropologists both mesmerized by the various “camps” of thought, and
utterly jealous of the famous debates and loyalties that some of our mentors witnessed and/or

36

became a part of during their doctoral work (not all admitting to this, of course). As Ortner
states,
Although anthropology was never actually unified in the sense of adopting a single
shared paradigm, there was at least a period when there were a few large categories of
theoretical affiliation, a set of identifiable camps or schools, and a few simple epithets
one could hurl at one’s opponent. (1984:126)
To situate oneself in a theoretical camp or school of thought as an emerging
anthropologist these days is daunting and messy. Phenomena such as study abroad occur
across disciplinary boundaries and literatures. Therefore, although there are many schools or
“camps” of culture located within American anthropology’s history, I will not cover these
debates in detail. Instead, I will situate some of anthropology’s broad theoretical culture
concepts within ethnographic field contexts to examine how anthropological theories on
culture can be understood and applied to study abroad.

Regional Culture
Study abroad programs are often advertised regionally or by the nation-state. For
example, databases offer students the option to search for programs by region or state and
then by academic theme; a student just needs to pull down the menu for where they want to
go. Hard copies of study abroad program brochures often have the country highlighted in bold
at the top. Informational meetings on programs in Africa or Sub-Saharan Africa are common at
universities and colleges. If the central study abroad office at larger universities hosts these
meetings, then binding the programs by region is an easy way to advertise to students,
assuming they are self-selecting based on location.

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In early American anthropology, the definition and description of culture was often
bound by region. Many early anthropologists saw culture as the cornerstone of the field
through the Culture Area Concept (Herskovits 1926; Wissler 1927; Kroeber 1939; Newman
1970) which emphasizes the study of specific geographic and ecological regions as
determinants of culture traits. Anthropologists tended to not only link culture groups solely
within geographic boundaries for material cultural purposes, but to also to align groups using
an “assemblage of traits” or a dominant theme, such as linguistic similarity. Although many of
these theories are not widely used today, anthropologist still tend identify themselves with
regional areas such as Southeast Asia or West Africa.
During ethnographic fieldwork for this research, study abroad students began their incountry orientation in Ghana by attending guest lectures at the University of Ghana, Legon.
Topics such as the history of Ghana, Ghana’s cosmological origins, and slavery were covered by
Ghanaian faculty lectures. The U.S. study abroad faculty leader, Nancy, arranged for students
to learn about these themes so they had a base for understanding the cultural determinants of
health (the theme of the program). As each guest lecturer discussed their topic, they often
began by explaining some phenomenon in a Ghanaian context. For example, when discussing
Ghana’s history with slavery, the lecturer included information about various ethnic groups in
Ghana: Asante, Ga, Ewe, etc. However, she then used sweeping generalizations such as “In
African culture, brother and sister are terms used outside the biological family.” She often
switched between Ghanaian examples and then African examples. Other lecturers similarly
situated a theme in the context of Ghana and then turned and explain a larger African context.
Students were largely unaware that the term “culture” was used to describe regional, nation-

38

state, and ethno-linguistic differences. A more in-depth discussion of these findings will be
discussed in Chapter 5.
Even among Ghanaian scholars, locating and articulating culture to non-Ghanaians was
complex. New questions arose. Are Ghanaian lecturers purposefully lumping culture into the
large category of Africa because they want to simplify a concept, or do they see various aspects
of the culture as Pan-African? Are these guest lecturers playing into U.S. stereotypes of Africa
(as one large country) and purposefully presenting information in a broad context? The answers
are messy and inconclusive. Some Ghanaian faculty reference notions of Pan-Africanism in
their everyday life. Others did not realize they switch between these spaces.

Liminal Culture
Victor Turner, in his famous work, The Ritual Process: Structure and Antistructure,
emphasized the role that ritual symbols play in interpreting meaning among the culture group,
the Ndembu, in Northwestern Zambia. Specifically, Turner uses the term liminality to explain a
transitional point between two phases: "Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are
betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and
ceremony (Turner, 1969:95). Turner’s work focused on understanding the Ndembu’s culture by
understanding the liminal effect of the symbolism of ritual practices.
Not surprising, study abroad students are also betwixt and between; neither fully in
their home culture nor fully engaged in their host culture. Furthermore, the invention of
culture occurs within this liminal state. Students are “betwixt and between” understandings of

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their host culture and their own culture. Chapter 4 discusses this liminal state where the
constructions of both host and home culture among the study abroad participants take place.

“Othering” as a means to “Authenticity”
Edward Said’s Orientalism, highlights the notion of “the other” and the dangers
associated with looking at another culture through one’s own cultural lens (Said 1979). In
Said’s case, his East/West dichotomy argument rested on the power associated with othering
another culture by comparing it to one’s own. “Othering” is a fundamental process in the study
abroad experience. Students enter the field with the tendency to compare cultures, even
students who try to resist comparisons. The student quoted at the beginning of this
dissertation grapples with this notion: “Prior to leaving for Ghana, I attempted to make no
assumptions or create any false expectations of what my experiences would be like.” However,
she admits: “The way Ghanaians have accepted us was something that made me think a lot
about Western culture. Back home, you are the most important person to yourself and you
rush around your day oblivious to what is going on around you.” She implies that she believe
she should stay neutral and not compare her own way of life to that of Ghanaians, but she
admits that she did. What is crucial, and what I advocate for here, is that students need
intervention and reflective structures to help break down and understand culture (Vande Berg
2007). Chapter 4 discusses in detail how structured student reflection helps them understand
cultural differences.
McRae’s work on theorizing Said’s “Other” is a useful in understanding how culture is
interpreted. “Edward Said provides a model of mobile theory and liminal consciousness that

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performs the core components of tourism – movements through space, fluid connections in
time, and contradictory renderings of identity” (McRae 2003:250). McRae problematizes
tourists’ expectations of seeing “primitive culture,” for tourists have constructed the “other.”
She states, “The notion that ‘primitive’ cultures have maintained an authenticity lost to
contemporary subjects constructs a nostalgic fascination with the other. The key motivation
for the tourist then is to ‘discover’ familiar yet strange practices and beliefs that collectivize a
fictionalized past” (McRae 2003:239). In this case, she is not so much binding culture, but
examining how tourists are bounding a constructed notion of culture.
MacCannel’s work on authenticity can be applied to the question of how study abroad
students understand their host communities. MacCannel argues that tourists want to “share in
the real side of the places visited, or at least to see that side as it is really lived” (1973:594).
Study abroad students also express the desire to see how people “really live.” All the study
abroad research participants in this study mentioned aspects of daily life. And many discuss
“authentic” experiences throughout their program. Although students do not often mention
this desire as a goal prior to the program, they become consumed by the reality of getting to
know people in the community. Whereas MacCannel discusses how tourists end up seeing
“front stage” culture (the aspects of culture the local community wants to show), they rarely
get to see the “backstage” culture (the way local community members live).

Commodifying Culture
Scholars engaging with tourism and tourist processes theorize how culture is
understood, navigated, and in some cases commodified, as in this example from the Comaroffs’

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work in Ethnicity, Inc. (2009). The authors illuminate how the commodification of culture
among the Zulu in South Africa affects the tourism market. Focusing on how South African
markets commodify Zulu culture, their work highlights how “culture” is produced, sold, and
packaged for tourism within a neo-liberal framework. They demonstrate how ethnic groups
mirror and sometimes create culture as a corporation, presenting the question of who gets to
“sell” one’s ethnicity. “Ethnic incorporation rides on the process of homogenization and
abstraction” (2009:12), which produces an ahistorical abstract concept of ethnicity through
small, privatized companies that promote tourism in South Africa.
Shepherd’s work questions whether culture is commodified as he examines the various
discourses on tourism as well as what cultural changes tourism brings to a community.
This ‘becoming other,’ a direct outcome of the objectification and commodification of
both culture and ethnicity, is said to explain the contemporary mass consumption of
identity merchandise by both touristic and local insiders, whose view of themselves is
thereby distorted by the ‘tourist gaze […]in other words, given a monetary value, ritual
and tradition have become valueless for local inhabitants. (Shepherd 2002:185)
He examines in-depth what authentic means and how a perceived non-authentic presentation
(whether a material or a romanticized notion) must be present to have an ‘authentic’
experience (whether material or romanticized). What is missing is a discussion on the role of
agency and empowerment. For instance, do people in the perceived “culture” grapple with
presenting an authentic versus non-authentic experience? Shepherd assumes the local
“culture” presents what it wants in order to be tied into the economic market.

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Applying Anthropology
Of the anthropologists who are running or actively connected with study abroad
programs, some approach the pedagogy solely from an anthropological perspective and might
benefit from collaborations with their institution’s study abroad office. Cassandra White’s
article, “Experiments in Cultural Anthropology Field School,” highlights her field school program
in Brazil. Although a study abroad program by international education standards, she refers to
her program as an ethnographic field school. She explains, “a study abroad program can be
considered an ethnographic field school when students are provided with opportunities to gain
skills in the methods of anthropology” (2010:10). Perhaps she’s alluding to one perceived gap
between anthropology and study abroad: the terminology of the program. Describing the
structure of her program, she continues: “Although many study abroad programs include
homestays and participation in local events, ethnographic field schools require students to
challenge themselves and engage with people in a different way through qualitative exercises”
(2010:10). Many in the study abroad field would adamantly disagree about the level of
engagement as there are many programs (SIT World Learning and School for Field Studies) that
incorporate qualitative pedagogy in their programs that include homestays and field excursions.
However, she’s absolutely correct in understanding that research based programs often
produce what the study abroad field labels as “high impact practices,” which result in a deeper
understanding of cultural competency.
Kiran Cunningham and Hilary Kahn are two of the most active anthropologists writing
and publishing on study abroad pedagogy. Both keep the anthropological lens active within
their own study abroad programs as well as within the field of international education. Kahn, a

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leader in the international education field, focuses her research on comprehensive
internationalization and curriculum integration. In her article focusing on visual approaches to
global learning, she advocates for students to engage in the visual aspects of study abroad so
they may become producers of knowledge and not passive recipients. She explains, “One way
of encouraging students to get off the veranda is transforming them from recipients to
producers of knowledge. They must actively reflect on their own position that might impact the
knowledge they seek and imagine their educational experience as a constant collaboration”
(2010:46).
Cunningham advocates for an increased role for anthropology in study abroad. She
states, “In spite of the breadth and depth of anthropologists’ knowledge of and experience with
intercultural and international dynamics, we have done little as a field to tout this knowledge
and its relevance and insert it into broader conversations about study abroad, service learning,
and other kinds of experiential learning” (2010: 23). As mentioned earlier in the introduction,
Cunningham’s research examines how dissonance and disorienting dilemmas abroad (Mezirow
1991, 1997; Kiely 2005) enable transformational learning outcomes for students. She measures
the transformational process by creating a structured, ethnographic reflection model which
allows her to qualitatively assess how students are moving through an intercultural experience.
Using ethnographic methods, Cunningham argues, “can catalyze the learning process in very
significant ways […] learning skills of observation, interviewing, and writing field notes requires
learning how to separate description and interpretation, which, in turn, requires developing the
ability to bracket one’s assumptions and suspend judgment” (2010:26). In turn, she suggests

44

that ethnography is a useful way to capture and analyze how students are processing
transformational learning experiences.
This dissertation argues that Cunningham’s approach to assessing student learning is the
best framework for understanding how students obtain cultural competency. Through the use
of ethnographic writing assignments, she qualitatively assesses how students process
disorienting dilemmas. The data I present highlights how students think through their own
understandings of culture which results in transformational learning. The data presented in the
following chapters demonstrate that transformational learning occurs on faculty-led study
abroad programs. The data also shows that transformational learning can lead to cultural
competency.
As demonstrated in this chapter, there are significant parallels between literatures in
anthropology and study abroad. Theories exploring how the term culture is understood and
applied inform anthropology’s contribution to this research. Study abroad and tourism
literatures present arguments on ways people interact with the term. As mentioned earlier,
this research does not aim to define culture nor does it argue that one definition is better than
another. Instead, I argue that understanding the various ways scholars use the term culture
allows for a deeper discussion on the ways in which study abroad administrators, faculty and
practitioners can utilize the theories and apply the culture concept.

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Chapter 3: Research Sites, Methods and Positionality
I don’t really know what I thought it (culture in Ghana) was going to be like. I thought it
was going to be a lot of like art and… I don’t even know. Like festivals and singing and
dancing and that sort of stuff, but it is pretty developed and I mean, they do have some
sort of system here but it’s just, it could use a lot of work. But the people, I think are
really great and welcoming and I mean I was so nervous getting off that plane when we
got to the airport and they were just grabbing our luggage and I’m like, what did I get
myself into? But it’s been like so much different than that and it’s nice how nothing is
rushed here. Back at home, everything’s like rush, rush, rush and here, it’s just like our
meals take three hours. It’s kinda nice, you know. You just kinda sit there and chill out.
(21 year old female students, interview)
It's the late afternoon and I am sitting with the student quoted above under a thatchedroof gazebo outdoors at the student’s hostel compound in Accra. Birds are chirping and car
horns are blasting as commuters make their way home for the evening. We have thirty minutes
to chat before the group goes inside. It’s the middle of the rainy season and mosquitos that
carry malaria bite just before dusk. Haley is a 20-year-old, tall, blond female biology student
from Michigan. I have asked her to reflect on how she thinks about culture in Ghana. She is a
little more than half way through her study abroad program, and she can already make
comparisons between life in Ghana and life in the U.S. In fact, she’s doing more than a simple
comparison and more than “othering.” She is placing value on what she is experiencing in her
new community. Like many of her peers, she reflects on her initial assumptions about the
culture in Ghana, on her current viewpoint (which has shifted), and on her values in her home
culture.
Over the past ten years, I have worked with study abroad students as a graduate
student, a faculty instructor, an adviser, and a study abroad director. What continues to
fascinate me is the desire of students to go abroad, the challenging of assumptions they face
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while on their programs, and their transitions back home. This cycle repeats each semester,
each year. One common theme students share is how life changing their study abroad
experience is to them. My passion for teaching and guiding students through this process
continues to grow. And the quest to understand what specifically causes students to believe
their experiences are life changing has led me to this research project.
Through an anthropological lens, I seek to understand how U.S. students think about
and process concepts of culture. As I dive further into the field of study abroad, I find that the
concept of culture remains undefined or perhaps mis-defined within the literature. Many
scholars in this field use the term in an abstract form without defining it. For instance, as
discussed in Chapter 1, there are many assessment tools measuring cultural competency. The
scholars who design these surveys do not necessarily define the term culture, but they imply
that culture is composed of attributes, values, and beliefs found within a community. Many of
these assessment models are positivist and consist of several multiple-choice questions. How
could an assessment model determine students’ cultural competency when anthropologists
have a difficult time defining the term? And why is most of the assessment research limited to
long-term programs?
In this chapter, I outline the various characteristics of my field sites, which include
descriptions of the two main field locations related to the U.S. study abroad program, the
demographics of the people involved with the program, an overview of the methodology used,
and how the data was analyzed. I collected data for this project between September 2009 and
August 2010 by following a U.S. study abroad program to Ghana throughout the entire yearlong cycle. There were four main phases of data collection:

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1. Pre-program: marketing of the program and recruitment of study abroad students
2. On-site: observations and interactions at the field locations within Ghana,
3. Post-program in Ghana: conversations and correspondence with program faculty and
staff after the students departed Ghana,
4. Post program in the U.S.: conversations with students

Background Pre-dissertation Research
During the summer months of 2005, I conducted pre-dissertation research in southern
Ghana where I followed a U.S. volunteer group through a development project in which they
participated. I initially aimed to understand why U.S. volunteers wanted to work in Ghana, how
they understand development, and how they understand the structures of poverty. I followed
a 6-person volunteer group through a seven-week program in a peri-urban village in Ghana. My
wanted to explore how U.S. volunteers understood gender and development before and after
their participation in a service-learning project. I hypothesized that once volunteers were in
country and working at their site, their assumptions about poverty and development would be
challenged. During the program’s pre-departure orientation in New York City, I administered a
baseline survey on the group’s demographics, majors, experience in Sub-Saharan Africa, their
previous knowledge or experience with development projects or programs abroad, and their
views relating to gender and development. This program was associated with a larger U.S.
organization that sends U.S. volunteers (mostly college-age students or a little older) to SubSaharan African each summer to work on a local service projects. (I had been a volunteer on
this program in the late 1990s and understood the pedagogy and philosophy).

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During my fieldwork, I participated in the project alongside the volunteers to
understand the project and to observe how they interacted with locals in the village. I
conducted semi-structured interviews before, during, and after the project to explore whether
their understandings of poverty and development changed as they worked on the project and
lived in the community. It was not until I conducted the mid-way interviews that I realized not
only had the volunteers’ views of poverty and development changed, they were beginning to
make larger connections to the culture. For example, one volunteer reflected that when she
first arrived in the community village she assumed people could not afford “good” roofs and
used metal as means to “just cover the house.” Halfway through the project, she considered
some new interpretations: 1) Is the roof metal because people live in the tropics and the rainfall
is so strong? 2) Is the roof material a tool to help collect rain water? 3) Do metal roofs last
longer than thatched roofs? As I listened to and observed the other volunteers they, too, were
beginning to make connections between how people lived and how they used resources.
Essentially, they were trying to understand the cultural reasons behind how people lived.
When I interviewed local community members about their impressions of the U.S. volunteers,
they were concerned about how the Americans viewed them and their community. Did the
volunteers understand why people lived as they did and what aspects of their culture were
important?
This pilot research project indicated the need to look more broadly at how U.S.
students understand “culture,” how they understood the term and how they constructed their
own understanding of the host community. Furthermore, it was clear that it was equally
important to understand how U.S. students viewed their own culture(s).

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The decision to shift my focus to study abroad students and programs made sense for
many reasons. First, there was a large population from which to select a sample, as many large
institutions have faculty-led study abroad programs and many have more than one program in
Ghana. Second, study abroad programs are credit-bearing courses but often have an applied
field component to them that brings the participants in direct contact with local communities.
Many programs have articulated larger academic/curriculum goals and therefore foster more
in-depth experience for students than tourism or volunteer programs do. These types of shortterm programs are most likely to result in the development of cultural competency. Third, very
few anthropologists study or engage with study abroad programs as their main area of
research.

Field Sites: Identifying the Gap
As noted, anthropologist have been hesitant to fully engage with study abroad
theoretically and in practice (with a few notable exceptions mentioned earlier). Anthropologists
establish field sites early on during their dissertation data collection phase. Many study abroad
faculty leaders are new to taking students abroad and have not established long relationships
within their field site. Therefore, a paradoxical phenomenon exists between these two fields
(anthropology and study abroad) that share logistical and situational similarities but rarely
overlap. One can speculate as to why anthropologists shy away from engaging more in the
study abroad process. One of the primary reasons for not taking U.S. study abroad students to
an anthropologist’s research site could be the fear of impacting professional relationships.
Because anthropologists work hard to build and maintain field site relationships, they could be

50

concerned about bringing in 18-22-year-olds, who might not always make the best choices (e.g.,
getting drunk or offending community members), into their research sites. A secondary reason
for the lack of engagement by anthropologists might correspond to how these activities are
viewed and assessed in the tenure process. Many departments and colleges do not give much
weight to study abroad activities in the tenure process. In fact, many departments discourage
junior faculty from pursuing leadership roles in such programs as these activities take time and
energy away from their other requirements. Mid-level scholars who have achieved tenure
often have started families, so leaving the family for a period of four to six weeks adds
additional pressure. Thus, the desire to develop and lead a program is not necessarily in their
professional or personal interests. However, some anthropologist get grants with primary
educational goals within their institution. For instance, they might be funded to run field
schools to train anthropology students.

Research Sites
Midwest University (MU) 6 was chosen as my field site due to faculty connections I had
there, and as the large number of faculty-led programs available. MU is a large, Research 1
institution with over 40,000 undergraduate students. During the last twenty years,
internationalizing the campus has been a strategic priority at MU. To this end, they have
increased the international student population and grown the number of study abroad
programs. Each college within the university determined its own goals for internationalization,
and these goals are reflected in some of the curricula (integrating study abroad and global

6

This is a pseudonym. The name of this institution was changed to protect confidentiality.

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themes), in the incorporation of international activities toward tenure criteria, and in building
partnerships with institutions abroad.
The Education Abroad (EA) office at MU offers all types of study abroad programs:
academic year, semester-long (both direct enroll and faculty-led), short-term faculty-led, and
international internships. Students have over 300 program choices. MU also has one of the
highest faculty-led programmatic portfolios (among its peer institutions) that includes over 80
programs, most of which occur during the summer. As such, there is increased pressure by
faculty to market and fill the programs or they risk being canceled. In fact, each year anywhere
from 5-10% of the faculty-led programs are canceled due to low enrollment. Many of these
programs are listed each year, but do not garner much interest and/or are relatively expensive
compared to alternatives. The most successful summer faculty-led programs at MU in terms of
filling the target number of students and running the program are those that offer two courses
that count toward general education credits or academic college credits thus providing a valueadded incentive for students; they can fulfill general graduation requirements while on the
program and participate in other courses and activities related to their interests. These
programs cost anywhere from $4,000 to $10,000 depending on the number of tuition credits
and the location of the program. For instance, a nine-week language program in China can cost
nearly $10,000 for six credits of tuition, nine weeks of meals and lodging, and spending money
as well as airfare, visa, and passport costs. On the other hand, a program in a developing
country such as Ghana that includes four to six credit hours can costs around $5,000 total.
If a faculty member wants to create a short-term summer program at MU, they first
begin an inquiry with both their academic college and the Education Abroad office to determine

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the relevance of the program, the uniqueness of the proposed site, and the general support.
The faculty member can then request a site visit (the college and the education abroad office
share the cost 50/50). Upon return, they submit a final site visit report to the EA office. This
report forms the draft for the full proposal which is ideally submitted 18 months in advance of
the proposed dates of program initiation, and must include the approval of the faculty’s
department chair, the academic college’s representative (usually an Associate Dean or a senior
staff member), the EA director, and the Dean of the Global Studies College. One incentive for
faculty to develop these programs is that the institution normally grants full time faculty an
academic year to conduct the program. If they are on a 9-month appointment, this means that
running a program in the summer brings in additional income and sometimes, if the faculty
member negotiates well, can result in a course release for the following year.
My research involved field sites in the U.S. as well as Ghana. Since the U.S. study abroad
group was the focus of the research, its programmatic locations became my field sites. And
although the study abroad program’s in-country portion was of approximately four weeks’
duration, I followed the group for an entire academic year, both in their U.S. university setting
and in the various locations in Ghana.

Ghana as a Field Site
During the pre-dissertation phase, I began researching all the various study abroad
programs located in Ghana originating within a 50-mile radius of my home institution.
Although I anticipated finding peer colleges and universities with programs in Ghana since
Ghana has been a favored site for programs in Sub-Saharan Africa, I did not expect so many

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institutions to have multiple programs there. Some institutions had faculty ties to the region
and others, such as private Christian liberal arts colleges, had religious affiliations.
Ultimately, I chose a program within a large research university (MU) as my case study.
This program had run for six years and had a reputation on campus for being engaged in
communities in Ghana. The program attracted mostly pre-medicine, nursing, and health care
students. The program introduced students to Ghanaian’s health care perspective and included
a community diagnosis research project. The program had been running for five years when
the research began. The longevity of this program made it an ideal case study as it was not a
first-time faculty leader running a program. The tweaks and adjustments many new faculty
face during the first three years running their programs had already been made. The program
was easy to promote as students who participated in it before came back and shared stories
among their friends and peers in their major programs. As a result, this program had a waitlist
each year.

Traditional versus Western Health Care in Ghana
In Ghana, traditional medicinal approaches often reside outside or in conjunction with
western medicine frameworks. Understanding the cultural attributes of traditional health care
is necessary in order to fully grasp why many people there prefer this health care system over
the western biomedical approach. Traditional or “indigenous” health care in Ghana takes many
forms. Herbalists dispense medicine for symptomatic relief, fetish priests help identify the
underlying causes of illness, and midwives administer pre- and post-natal care and assist with
deliveries, for example. Communities in Ghana now have access to Western/biomedical care,

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but many people cannot afford it. Warren notes that during the 1970s in post-independence
Ghana, nearly 70% of the Ghanaian population did not have access to the “formal health care
system” (Western/biomedical care) and relied on traditional healers (1975:11). Incidentally,
Warren helped create the Primary Health Training for Indigenous Healers Project, a partnership
between the local western medical hospital in Techiman, Ghana, and local indigenous healers.
This project worked to disseminate information and care to communities via traditional healers,
as they have significant social status in communities.
While the presence of Western medicine may increase access to some medical services,
there are social stigmas associated with its use. For example, if a mother delivers a baby via Csection, some in the community believe that she cheated on her husband. Post-natal women
recovering in regional, rural hospitals are often separated by natural/C-section deliveries. For
many years, traditional medicine in Ghana include religious beliefs in the causation of illnesses.
However, Kwasi Konadu, in his article, “Medicine and Anthropology in Twentieth Century
Africa,” argues against anthropologists’ ethnographic descriptions of traditional medicine as
“religious.” Instead, he states, “The Bono 7 ideational approach to healing is based on a
composite spiritual-temporal perspective rather than a ‘religious’ grounding, and that
perspective is found in other African societies” (2008:56).
Access to and utilization of health care in Ghana is complex. It’s not a straightforward
topic for undergraduates on a study abroad program. However, it was a topic I was familiar
with as I conducted undergraduate research on the healthcare beliefs among the Bono in
Techiman. During my undergraduate degree, I was originally scheduled to go to Ghana with

7

The Bono are an Akan group located near Techiman in Central Ghana.

55

Mike Warren (the anthropologist whose work I referenced above) along with classmates from
Iowa State University and University of Michigan. However Mike’s untimely passing a few
months before the trip led me to partner with another professor in anthropology who worked
in Nigeria. For two months during my junior year and in the summer 1999, I conducted
anthropological research with market women in Ibadan, Nigeria, and Techiman, Ghana, to
understand why and when women use traditional medicine versus/or in combination with
Western medicine.

Rationale of Research Sites
I selected this program in Ghana for a variety of reasons: I had extensive knowledge of
Ghana through my previous travels to the country due to my undergraduate and master’s
research in Ghana and my knowledge of Akan/Twi, a dominant language spoken on the radio
and among the largest ethnic group, the Akan/Asante. The site also provided an ideal location
to understand how students engaged in cultures that were new to them. Although the number
of students going abroad is increasing, the programs continue to be dominated by those in
Western Europe. This is not to say U.S. students do not face unique cultural challenges in
these European locations, but understandably, more aspects of those cultures are familiar to
the students than not. Lastly, as discussed in Chapter 1, research on study abroad has
consisted mostly of large global quantitative studies on student engagement and not qualitative
research in specific sites. Concurrently, research on study abroad using ethnographic methods
is significantly underrepresented in anthropology and in the study abroad literature.

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The Study
From September 2009 to September 2010 and throughout the entire cycle of the study
abroad program, I worked with the program leader, Nancy, 8 a faculty member in a health
science related field. Nancy was a former U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Ghana and had been
working in the country for the past twenty years. As a result, she spoke Akan/Twi (one of the
predominant languages spoken in Ghana) fluently and often dressed in Ghanaian clothing
around her U.S. campus. She was one of the creators of the program. Nancy was a tall, white
woman with two children, an infectious laugh, and a nurturing personality.
Because I had worked with her on the previous year’s program, she asked me to be the
Program Coordinator for this group. This position involved being her second-in-command and
running the logistical side of the program. In turn, she agreed to help with some of the data
collection by including two structured journal questions in the students’ assignments. She also
turned my first semi-structured interview on the students’ background demographic
information into the students’ first assignment. They had to complete this assignment before
they departed for Ghana.
Nancy recruited her students a year in advance. As mentioned earlier, Nancy had a
waitlist of students each year. She first contacted the students on this list from the prior year
and encouraged them to re-apply. She also participated in MU’s large education abroad fair
which attracted nearly 3,000 students every year. There she met with new students and shared
details about the program. That fall, Nancy also visited some of her colleague’s classrooms and
give students a ten-minute overview of the program. As applications came into the Education

8

Her name has been changed for confidentiality purposes.

57

Abroad office, Nancy reviewed them and accepted students on an ongoing basis. Although she
asked for my input in reviewing students, I opted out so as not to affect the type of student she
chose. Nancy had around fifteen spots available, and she quickly filled her program in
February, weeks before the Education Abroad deadline for summer programs. Her program ran
in Ghana from May 31 to June 24, but she held three pre-departure meetings and mini-lectures
beginning in late April through mid-May (two lectures were in classrooms on campus). The last
one was at her house, where she also held her annual Ghana party, an event that included both
alumni and incoming students. Nancy prepared Ghanaian stews and let the alumni tell stories
and give advice to the new students. I conducted participant-observation during this phase,
along with the first semi-structured interviews, which became the students’ first written
assignments when the course began. Thus I did not meet individually with all the students at
this time.
I arrived in Ghana a few days early to get adjusted and to help Nancy prepare for the
students’ arrival. I lived onsite with the students at the local nursing hostel during the program.
Nancy stayed at a nearby hotel where she resided each year. I had my own room; the students
shared two to each room, except one room that housed three students. During the four-week
duration of the program. I conducted participant-observation by following the students through
their program. I also conducted on-site, semi-structured interviews that asked students
questions similar to those in the pre-departure written interview. The rationale for conducting
similar interviews before and while in Ghana was to gauge whether changes were occurring in
terms of the students’ understandings and constructions of the local culture(s).

58

Immediately after the students departed Ghana, I conducted semi-structured interviews
with the Ghanaian counterparts they interacted with. This included the local course lecturers
and the long-time program bus driver to understand their perspective on how the U.S. students
constructed their experiences within the culture.
Upon returning to the U.S., I conduct the last interview with Nancy herself to
understand her reflections and viewpoints on teaching the U.S. students about Ghana. I also
began data analysis of the journals the students had written as required by the program, the
student evaluations of Nancy’s class, and my participant-observation notes.

Selection of Subjects
The participants in this study include U.S. undergraduate and graduate students, U.S.
faculty, Ghanaian faculty, U.S. university administrators, and local Ghanaian community
members. Eleven undergraduate and three graduate students participated in this program.
Most the participants were 20/21-year-old biology or nursing students who self-identified as
white/Caucasian. Three masters’ students used this program as a field requirement for their
degree in public health. Two students self-identified as non-white (black and white/Chinese).

Table 2: Study Abroad Student Demographic Information
Gender

Age

Female

23

Race/Ethnicity
(self-identified)
White

59

Home State

Major

Michigan

Biochemistry,
BS

Future
Goals
Med
School

Table 2 (Cont’d)
Female

n/a

White

Michigan

Public Health,
MA

Female

20

White

New York

Female

22

White

Michigan

Male

20

White

Michigan

Community
Health, BS
Anthropology,
BA
Physiology

Female

20

White

Florida

Human
Biology

Male

24

Black-African

Public Health,
MA

Female

21

White/Chinese

Sub-Saharan
Africa, living in
Michigan
Michigan

Female

20

White

Michigan

Human
Biology

Female

20

White

Michigan

Pre-Nursing

Male

20

White

Michigan

Female

21

White

Michigan

Biochemistry
and Molecular
Biology
Human
Biology

Female
Female

20
23

N/A
N/A

N/A
Michigan

Nursing

N/A
Public Health,
MA

Career
in Public
Health
Doctor
Peace
Corps
Pediatri
c
Surgeon
Peace
Corp/Do
ctor
PhD in
Public
Health
MA in
Nursing
Emerge
ncy
Medicin
e
Pediatri
c Nurse
Doctor

Medical
Graduat
e School
N/A
N/A

The selection of my subjects was determined by who participated in the study abroad
program. All students, faculty, and staff agreed to participate in the study. Within the U.S., I
could interact with and build rapport with the program faculty and students. In Ghana, my
access to interviewees was impacted by the social capital of the faculty. Because the program

60

had run for five years prior to my involvement, good community partnerships and contacts
were already established.

Interviews
Two semi-structured interviews were conducted among the students. The predeparture questionnaire was filled out by students prior to the departure 14 students filled out
the pre-departure questionnaire prior to the time. Students were then interviewed on site with
a similar questionnaire; totally 28 interviews altogether. All of the students were informed
about the project during the pre-departure phase and every students was given the
opportunity to opt out of the study. They all indicated full participation and each signed an IRB
consent form. Again, because the faculty leader chose the students, there was no sampling
method used to determine who would be interviewed. The first round of interviews included
demographic background questions including age, racial/ethnic identification, academic major,
religion, parents’ occupations, future goals, and previous experiences traveling and studying
abroad.

Journals
Students kept structured, reflective journals as part of the program requirements.
Nancy allowed me to insert two of the six required prompts, but I used all six entries as
qualitative data. The two specific questions I proposed were:
1. Describe two cross-cultural misunderstandings that have occurred so far on the
program. Describe what happened, who was involved, what was the outcome, and
what would you do differently.

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2. Write a letter to your best friend back home and describe and compare life in Ibinito (a
peri-urban village students visit for a few days) with life back in your university town. Be
specific about your thoughts, impressions, and daily life.

These journal entries provided an intimate look at how students articulated their thoughts and
impressions throughout the program, and provided some of the more important qualitative
data. They allowed me to code major themes related to their thoughts about Ghana, the
people they met and interacted with, their own group members, and how they viewed
themselves in the world. I compare this information with what they said in their interviews and
my observations of how they behaved in their daily lives.

Participant-Observation
I kept field notes throughout the duration of the study abroad program, from the first
informational meeting to the re-entry activities. These notes also included context from guest
lectures, notes about the field excursions, and notes from living with the students at the hostel.
I participated in all lectures, projects, and field trips, and took participation-observation notes
on these activities. I compared the information students were exposed to on the program with
their previously stated knowledge about the culture as well as their stated views during their
interviews. Finally, I analyzed the written documents, the field notes and printed materials of
the study abroad program (articles, handbooks, Power Point presentations, syllabi,
informational marketing brochures, and itineraries).

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Methodology
Data collection consisted of a combination of semi-structured interviews, data analysis
of academic readings and assessments (which included student journals), and participantobservation. The bulk of the data collection occurred on-site in Ghana and was primarily
focused on the semi-structured interviews and the participant-observation. For the main case
study, I lived with the students and was employed officially as the Program Coordinator for the
group.

Instrumentation
A triangulation approach to data collection and analysis was used in this project
involving semi-structured interviews, participation-observation, and document analysis of
printed materials. I began collecting baseline information on the students to establish their
previous engagement with Sub-Saharan Africa through coursework, previous travel, friends,
etc., and their class, religion, ethnicity, and educational backgrounds. As mentioned earlier, the
faculty leader agreed to administer this first survey as part of the first assignment, to be
completed before they departed, resulting in a 100% response rate. The second survey was
administered half-way through the program. Finding time to interview all the students was
challenging. The schedule was packed tight with lectures and field-based excursions.
Interviewing students after the program was difficult as well. Students spread out for the
remainder of the summer. When they returned to campus, only a few students connected back
with me. I administered a survey similar the first two surveys, but I did not find a significant
change in answers from the on-site interview to the returnee interview. Colleagues in the study

63

abroad field have also reported few differences between student answers while on the
program and after returning. Because very few programs survey students in the middle of their
programs, it is difficult to speculate as to why there was not a significant change in answers.

Data analysis
I analyzed all three primary data sets: semi-structured interviews, structured reflective
journaling, and participation-observation field notes. The overall analysis revealed that the
semi-structured interviews did not provide significant information on how students were
learning or whether they experienced disorienting dilemmas. SPSS 9 showed little significant
difference between the pre-departure and onsite surveys. Since the first interview was
incorporated into part of the students’ first assignment, they filled out the survey via a word
document or by hand. Therefore, only the second set of interviews needed to be transcribed.
Both interviews (pre-departure and onsite) were coded for themes using SPSS. Since the
comparison of the questions was a temporal one (before they went abroad and while they
were abroad), I looked for whether a shift in answers occurred. For instance, when students
were asked about whether they believed their gender would affect how they were viewed,
their answers shifted from no to yes. Because the data only revealed whether a shift occurred,
another coding process took place with both the interviews and the journal entries. Qualitative
data analysis conducted on both the structured journal assessment as well as the participantobservation field notes provided strong evidence that students were experiencing disorienting
dilemmas frequently. The data also illuminated how students navigated home and host

9

Coding software, Statistical Package for the Social Sciences

64

cultures in relation to working through the disorienting dilemmas. All data presented in the
following chapter were obtained from the field notes and the structured journaling.

Positionality
As mentioned earlier, I have been actively working in Ghana for many years. At the age
of 17, I traveled to Ghana for the first time with my aunt who worked for USAID. She was a
demographer who specialized in HIV/AIDS programs in Sub-Saharan Africa. During one of her
rare visits back “home” to Iowa, I mentioned that I was interested in learning more about SubSaharan Africa and would like to travel with her during one of her upcoming work trips. Her
husband and his children are Gambian, and I had been spending my summer and winter
vacations with them in Washington D.C. Thus, my interest in learning more about where
members of my extended family came from and my own desire to travel outside the U.S. began
early. During the summer of 1994, I was invited to accompany my aunt to Ghana. We met in
London (which was my first time out of the country) and after spending a few days sightseeing,
we heading south to Ghana. During the days, my aunt worked at the U.S. embassy and the
USAID field office while I was introduced to U.S. Peace Corps volunteers, wandered around the
Makola market 10 in Accra, and read next to the American Club pool. I attended parties at the
U.S. ambassador’s house and at other USAID staff’s houses, where mostly Americans met and
discussed current events. It was a very privileged experience with little access to meeting
Ghanaians. I did travel with a Peace Corps volunteer to northern Ghana to an area where she
had worked before a large conflict affected the region in January of that year (a conflict now

10

Makola market is one of the largest outdoor/indoor markets in Ghana.

65

historically noted as a civil war). Many of her male Ghanaian peers were murdered during the
conflict and she was evacuated after hiding many children in her house. It was a traumatic
event for this volunteer. I was grateful to have been invited to see her village, but I don’t think I
understood the full scope of the conflict and it how affected the community. It did, however,
make a lasting impression on my understanding of my own childhood in comparison with this
community in northern Ghana.
This experience also fueled my desire to learn more about Ghana and I ultimately
decided to study anthropology at Iowa State University (ISU) with Mike Warren. Mike was one
of the first Peace Corp volunteers in Ghana in the early 1960s and continued to do research
both in Nigeria and Ghana throughout his career. He created and ran the Center for Indigenous
Knowledge for Agriculture and Rural Development (CIKARD) at ISU where he partnered and
wrote with many colleagues around the world. He incorporated the study of Indigenous
Knowledge (IK) into his courses and encouraged it among his students. As mentioned before, I
had planned to travel with him to Ghana with a group of students from two universities. I
remember going to the study abroad office to apply for funds only to learn that this was not an
official study abroad program. They only had semester programs in Western countries and one
or two faculty-led programs in the design schools. During the mid-1990s, faculty-led, shortterm programs were not well-established at many U.S. institutions, although they were
becoming more popular. Mike’s program would be categorized as a study abroad program
today, however.
With Mike’s passing, I came to work his long term friend and colleague, Norma Wolff, a
visual anthropologist who worked in Nigeria. She was heading into the field to conduct

66

research the following summer and agreed to let me tag along. She arranged for me to stay
with Mike’s widow in Techiman to conduct the Ghanaian portion of my research after I stayed
with her in Ibadan, Nigeria. This field experience was stressful and traumatic for many reasons.
First, conflict broke out within my market research site in Ibadan. Rumor was that a Hausa
man’s cow ate cabbage from an Igbo man’s stall, who in turn, attacked the Hausa man with a
machete. Tensions were high in this market (where I had just received research permission
from the Queen mother of the market) and I had to change my research location to another
market. One day at this market, as my research assistant and I were picking up a tro-tro (a
small mini-bus used as public transportation), a van pulled up and began shooting into the
crowd. As we ran, we became separated and many people were hurt. We found each other
later and we were both alright, but this experience deeply affected me and I did not want to
continue researching in the markets.
In addition, when I arrived in Ghana I found Mike’s widow grieving and mentally
unstable, which created conflict within her compound. This, coupled with my contracting of
malaria, led me to leave her house and the field site early, notwithstanding the fact that she
told me she didn’t want me to “die in the house,” which would create bad “juju,” and had asked
me to leave. It was mutual at this point and I just needed time to rest and recover before I
could make it back to the capital to fly out. The chief elders of the community intervened and
tried to create peace. Four elders continued to meet with me to make sure I was ok, and to
ensure that I would not go back and tell everyone what had happened. I assured them I would
not and one of the chiefs accompanied me back to Accra to help me return. Had these
incidents not occurred, I would not have understood the local governance system of the chiefs.

67

Nor would I have understood how power is situated in this community. I chronicle these first
experiences in Ghana here to situate my knowledge of both the medical systems and the
cultural expectations of daily life, which benefited me in this research project.

Situating knowledge
I had developed a relationship with Nancy, the study abroad leader, during the previous
few years. We worked at the same institution and overlapped on some projects before I
studied on her program. She shared my desire to learn more about how students were
understanding Ghana before and after they went. She clearly saw remarkable transformations
over the years and understood the outcomes and benefits for students. She asked me to be
the program assistant (PA) for the program and I agreed. This would put me with the group the
entire program--in the classrooms, on field excursions, and in their living quarters. Every
student was asked ahead of time if they were okay with my position as both the Program
Assistant and the “resident anthropologist.” Everyone agreed, and so my positionality began
with these two identities: Program Assistant (which came with knowledge of the course) and
anthropologist (which came with knowledge of the host community/culture(s)).
Before the program began, I shared with Nancy my concerns about becoming a resource
for information on Ghana. I did not want my position as the PA to interfere with her authority
as the expert. As mentioned before, Nancy was a Peace Corps volunteer in Ghana during the
1980s and had much more extensive knowledge of Ghana and of the language than I did. We
agreed on a communication pathway so that if students started asking questions, especially
during downtime in the hostel, I would direct them to Nancy. This concern did not really

68

become a reality, nor did my anthropological research agenda become a concern as students
seemed to quickly forget I was “observing them.” My positionality evolved into a “situated
knowledge” framework based on which group or student(s) I was talking with while on-site. As
Haraway envisions, situated knowledge is a knowledge placed in context with an
acknowledgment towards self-knowledge at the core and related, contextual knowledge
around the periphery (1988). As a program assistant, I related to many of the undergraduate
study abroad students as a gatekeeper to the course. However, because I was also a graduate
student, many of them could relate to me in terms of current student life. Among the graduate
students, I had a different positionality: as a peer graduate student conducting research. With
Nancy, I was both a peer (because of past Ghanaian experience) and an employee-type
colleague although I felt we had much more of a peer relationship than a hierarchical one.
Among Nancy’s Ghanaian colleagues, I was seen as a student, but because I was married and
had a child as well as previous experience in Ghana (including speaking Akan/Twi), my role was
seen as ambiguous, more of an advanced graduate student but with a higher status 11. Being
married with children is very important in Ghana. Cultural values place pressure on individuals
to marry and have children, which carries a significant status. For example, when our group
visited traditional birth attendants (TBA) in rural locations, Addie (Nancy’s counterpart) would
point out who among the group were mothers. The TBAs immediately changed their tone and
information toward us mothers, and shared different information related to prenatal care and
more often about the birthing process itself, giving us knowing looks that indicated we
understand this process.

11

Based on informal conversations with Nancy and her colleagues.

69

It was not until the end of the program that my positionality and role within the group
shifted. As with most study abroad groups, it takes time to get to know each group member.
Living and traveling together accelerates this process. Toward the second half of the program, I
was often brought into group drama between students, or asked to help with sickness issues. I
was also asked to help explain cross-cultural misunderstandings that occurred between
students and community members. This was difficult for me, as I wanted to help explain or give
context to what I thought had happened, but I didn’t want to interfere with their learning
process. I role ultimately shifted in the direction of my job as Program Assistant as I ended up
talking through issues with students. Some students noted our discussions in their journals. As
a researcher it was incredibly difficult to deny a request to help as it created tension when I first
tried to withdraw my assistance and it also affected my rapport with the students. How could I
ask them to reveal their thoughts about the program two days after I refused to help them talk
through an issue? So I stand behind my decision, but disclose that my participation in the
program in my various roles may have indirectly or directly created some bias.

70

Chapter 4: Inventing Culture
Understanding and defining culture is difficult. Anthropologists have argued and
debated its symbolism (Weber 1948; Parsons 1969; Turner 1969; Geertz 1973; Schneider 1977);
functionality/adaptability (Tylor 1871; Morgan 1877; Childe 1942; White 1949; Steward 1955;
Levi-Strauss 1963; Sahlins 1972; Wallerstein 1976; Hart 1982;), praxis (Bourdieu 1978; Giddens
1979; Marcus 1995; Appadurai 1996; Gupta and Ferguson 1997; Tsing 2000), and usefulness
(Wagner 1975; Said 1978; Foucault 1983; Abu-Lughod 1991) in recent decades. Current
discussions of culture rest in the post-modern limbo of a critical cultural critique, viewing
identity, power, space, etc. without boundaries.
Study Abroad students’ process constructing concepts of culture is not intuitive; the
process needs to be guided and mentored. Many faculty-led study abroad programs are
organized around an academic theme such as Marketing in China or Land Revolution in Haiti.
Much of the curriculum in these programs is reimagined from a course taught on campus.
Therefore, understanding the cultural traits of the people may not be a required element of the
course. Oftentimes, culture is on the periphery of the course, consisting of a cultural
performance or in a mini language tutorial. I do not argue that every instructor leading a
program should understand the long debates on culture in anthropology, but I do assert that
the absence of any discussion about the culture(s) of the program defeats the purpose of study
abroad.
In this chapter, I present a series of ethnographic vignettes that describe disorienting
dilemmas that students faced on the program. Some of these vignettes describe students’
construction of culture in Ghana while others demonstrate how students began to compare

71

and “other” culture in Ghana in order to construct their own home culture. Through these
disorienting dilemma examples, I demonstrate that transformational learning occurred and
ultimately resulted in cultural competency.

Imagining Africa and Ghana
It’s a Wednesday evening in mid-April. Students who have been approved for summer
study abroad are gathered in a large, fluorescent-lighted classroom on campus. They are
attending the mandatory pre-departure orientation hosted by the study abroad office. Some
parents are with their children in the audience. A staff member from the study abroad office is
beginning the orientation with the expectation that specific programs will break out for
individual meetings afterwards. Anxious students up front are eagerly writing notes as the
orientation gets underway. Two male students in the back are discussing which girls are “hot.”
A 64-slide PowerPoint presentation covers multiple aspects of the student experience. What to
expect, how policies work, billing, money, immunizations, passports, visas, flight information,
health insurance, security policies, credits, packing, health, and safety are all topics covered.
The session ends after 75 minutes, and the Ghana group breaks out into a small
discussion. Nancy leads and makes most of the presentation to students and their parents. A
handbook is given to each student, and Nancy draws their attention to sections of it. The
passion Nancy has for Ghana is undeniable. Her knowledge and competency are easily
articulated, and parents are nodding in assurance as she speaks. However, as a health care
professional, she quickly changes tone and begins sharing the value of using condoms on the
program, what the Sexually Transmitted Infection rate is in Ghana, and how to stay healthy.

72

Students nervously laugh and giggle, but some parents become visibly uncomfortable. This is
Nancy in her element--approachable in nature, kind, but with blunt facts. A follow-up
orientation occurs at Nancy’s house, a tradition students already know about. Previous
students come and give advice to the new students on topics such as what to pack and what to
expect. Students begin the bonding process, an essential component to any study abroad
program.
Smaller, faculty-led programs such as this allow students to interact and engage at a
more in-depth level than semester-long programs. Members of this Ghana group will come to
rely on each other for support, will share their experiences and reflections, and will experience
similar cultural events together. Longer programs often are structured to keep discussion
within the classroom and students’ co-curricular (outside the classroom) lives separate from the
instructor and other students. This peer learning, I argue, is needed to acquire cultural
competency.
Prior to their departure, I elicited from students their images of both Africa and Ghana.
Establishing the baseline of their expectations provided a foundation from which to examine
how transformational change in constructions of culture(s) can occur before and after the study
abroad experience. When asked about when and why they developed an interest in going to
Africa, students identified numerous reasons such as learning about the “people and customs,”
wanting to see wildlife, understanding the healthcare system, and to “see” and experience
Africa.
Students’ expectations and images of Africa closely paralleled those found in the
mainstream media. The term “Africa” was chosen in the first set of interviews specifically to

73

assess whether students saw Africa as a homogeneous entity or a collection of different nationstates. As evident in the students’ responses, many thought of Africa as a single cultural unit.
As discussed in Chapter 2, there’s a long history in anthropology and study abroad of lumping
regional space. Students often think of their study abroad location as a homogenous unit.
Another question focused on how students constructed their concepts of culture itself at the
beginning of the program. In my experience teaching and advising studying abroad students
over the past ten years, I have realized that students often lump large, multiple concepts
together at first to comprehend complex material. Faculty teaching introductory courses in
their fields use the same technique when introducing theory or other concepts in class. Larger,
complex issues often need to be lumped into categories first and then deconstructed into
smaller pieces later on.
Students were then asked why they chose Ghana for their study abroad program. Many
discussed the program’s reputation on campus as well as Ghana’s political stability and
democratic form of government. Others responded that they selected Ghana because it was
“interesting” or simply gave no answer at all. Students provided little elaboration in these
answers; many answers consisted only of one or two words. However, when asked what their
images of Ghana were, students began describing many attributes of what they believed to be
culture. For example, one female student stated, “I envision Ghana to look like a “third world
country.” I picture a lot of poor people selling anything to make a living. I also picture a group of
people with a fun-loving culture.” Other students speculated about art, drumming, or musical
traditions, what might constitute aspects of “high culture,” while others believed they were
entering a “third world country” where poverty existed on a large scale. I initially questioned

74

this distinction between” high culture” and “culture.” How did students understand culture as a
concept, and then how did they experience it once in Ghana? Students often combined
elements of high culture and culture; they understood culture to mean experiencing art, music,
and dance, but they also believed culture meant families, religion, traditions. Students
understood these concepts as objective facts and as static entities.

Community Diagnosis (Disorienting Dilemma 1)
On a hot, sunny afternoon in June, students are prepping to conduct their first
community diagnosis project in a peri-urban village (Ibinito) 20 miles outside Accra. Ibinito is a
small village of about 100 families. Each year, Nancy brings her class to this village to teach the
students how to collect health care practice information from members of the community.
Nancy’s Ghanaian counterpart, Addie, is a former nursing instructor at a local university. Addie
has been working with Nancy over the years, serving as a cultural liaison between the village
and the program. Even though Nancy has worked on health care issues in Ghana for many
years, she understands that Addie can provide the cultural perspective regarding health and
sanitation practices in the region. Addie, who is in her sixties, is regarded with respect in
Ibinito. Her grayish hair is a clear indicator that she has reached an age of respect in the
community. Her gregarious but firm personality assures students of her authority with the
community diagnosis exercise. Students are split into groups of three and their assignment is to
ask to interview a member of a household about their health and sanitation conditions. I
accompany three students as they negotiate to speak with an older woman who is sitting
outside, preparing beans. We are invited to sit with her, pulling up wooden stools to form a

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semicircle around her. Students begin asking a series of questions, such as how old is the
woman, is she married, how many children does she have, how many people live in her
household, did she attend school, what is her occupation and her religion, how does she
procure water, where does she go to the bathroom. Many Ghanaian village households do not
have plumbing, and people will often use the fee-based main private toilet in the middle of the
village or go out in the bush. These are all questions given to the students with the
understanding that they are looking at sanitation practices (e.g., where is the nearest toilet,
does she have trash lying around her house). The woman looks uncomfortable answering the
questions and the students look equally uncomfortable asking what they perceive to be
personal questions.
As the students wrap up their questions, we hear shouting and angry voices in the
distance. We quickly leave and go to the scene where we find a drunk man in his 30s yelling at
three of Nancy’s students. A group of students and residents circles the argument and a few
community members drag the man away from the scene. One of the female students is crying,
and Nancy and I take her away and ask her what happened. She explains that they asked a man
sitting outside a local canteen if they could interview him. They began asking the same personal
questions our group did, when a drunken man approached them and began shouting “You
always come to the village and you never do anything!” He continued to insult a local Ghanaian
woman who accompanied the students as an interpreter and began calling her “stupid.” A few
more village men came over and began yelling at the female students, insulting them about
how they come to their village each year but nothing ever gets better. The men who were being
interviewed began shouting back and the situation escalated until the drunk man was taken

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away. As the group reflected upon the incident that night, students grappled with
understanding the situation. The discussion centered on why the men got angry, but more
interesting, the students began questioning the exercise. Should they have been asking such
personal questions of people, where they went to the bathroom and how often the bathed?
Until this village exercise, the students had been attending in-depth lectures on mother/child
infant mortality, infectious diseases, epidemiological issues in the region, cosmological/religious
aspects of healthcare in Ghana, and sanitation barriers in development. These lectures were
specific curriculum topics presented outside of a cultural context, not unlike the pre-medical
classes these students were used to taking at their university. So as they dove into the
community diagnosis exercise, they approached the assignment with same lens they would a
term paper: collect the data and then write it up. However, as each group reflected upon their
experiences interviewing members of the community, an awareness developed. These were
real people and asking them personal questions created a power dynamic that they were
unprepared for prior to the exercise. Some students felt guilt, and others were frustrated.
Nancy had not fully prepped them for this reality, as Addie took the lead on this
exercise. Addie reiterated that the students did nothing wrong and that the community
members were not insulted. Students had to decide for themselves how they viewed
themselves in this process. One student reflected on the experience, saying, “I know that if I
was getting interviewed about personal aspects of my life, I would get upset. Also, if people
kept coming and using my information for studies or whatever but nothing was changing in my
community, I would feel used.”

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Kiely (2005) argues that disorienting dilemmas based on occurrences of dissonance
(Mezirow 1997) create transformative learning experiences. Mezirow states that
transformative learning “is a process of effecting change in a frame of reference.” He argues
these frames of reference “are the structures of assumptions through which we understand our
experiences (1997:5).” This change of reference produces dissonance: the idea that two notions
almost line up, but a subtle shift occurs. When high levels of dissonance occur, Kiely notes, a
disorienting dilemma presents itself. A disorienting dilemma is “a critical incident or event that
acts as a trigger that can, under certain conditions (i.e., opportunities for reflection and
dialogue, openness to change, etc.), lead people to engage in a transformational learning
process whereby previously taken-for-granted assumptions, values, beliefs, and lifestyle habits
are assessed and, in some cases, radically transformed” (2005:7). In the case of Ibinito,
students experienced a disorienting dilemma based on a set of high dissonance situations. The
confrontation students faced from men in the community challenged their assumptions about
the goals and purpose of their visit. Students grappled with the power they inadvertently felt
they obtained when they asked personal questions about hygiene. They also began questioning
their roles in the larger picture of why U.S. students continued to come to this village to ask
about health care practices but did not bring money or help to build new infrastructure to
address the problem. The transformative learning shift occurred because students could
debrief as a group in a reflective exercise. They also journaled about it as part of their curricular
assessment. This very process is the key to understanding how students obtain cultural
competencies. The skills students acquire to deal with their disorienting dilemmas are evident

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by their reflection on the experience. In turn, I argue these dilemmas are the foundation for
how students construct their evolving idea of culture in Ghana.

Friendship (Disorienting Dilemma 2)
During my interviews with students in Ghana, many reflected upon the various
friendships they were making or had formed thus far in the country. The following exchange
with a student, David, occurred when I asked students to reflect upon how they think they are
viewed by the people they have met so far:
David: I’d like to think that I’m viewed as a close friend to a lot of them, like Kwame and
Kwesi and… you’re talking about people I met, right?
Me: Yes.
David: OK, I’d like to think, yeah (I’m) a close friend to Kwame and Kwesi and others, but
I also know there’s a hidden, maybe hidden goal behind. Like Kwesi, Kwesi still asks for
money occasionally. When we go out for food. He’ll ask us to bring him food and that
kinda bothers me because I know if I made a friend, I would not have any hidden reason.
And just like what we read in that book, “The Village of Waiting,” there’s a conspiracy
theory. Which is kind of hard because you don’t know who to believe and who’s really
trying to be a good friend. I know Kwame’s generally… he’s sincere. He would never
want anything out of you.
David is discussing his friendship with two Ghanaian men he met on the program. The
two men were in their early 20s and worked for the hostel where the students were staying.
Over the years, this study abroad program had used the same hostel and many of the local
employees had befriend students.
When I read this same student’s reflective journal later, I noticed he was making
connections with how he understands friendship at home:
I think the hospitality and loving attitudes the Ghanaians possess has been what has
surprised me the most. The people here are sincere in everything they do and don’t just
smile just to smile; they actually mean it and want you to be happy too. This is probably
seen the most with the workers at the hostel. I was laying in bed last night thinking how

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people like Kwame and Kwesi are some of the nicest people I’ve ever met and how I will
never have a relationship like that in the U.S. They would literally rip the shirt off their
back to do anything for me/anyone in the group just to make sure we were safe. It’s
really hard to think about that because even though they are happy in Ghana and are
living happy lives, they deserve so much better than what they are living in and could
really do something more if given the opportunity.
David’s depiction of his two friends is different between his interview and his own
reflection in his journal. In the interview, he’s grappling with understanding the motives behind
one of his Ghanaian friends. He even references the book they were required to read, The
Village of Waiting. This novel by George Packer chronicles his life as a former Peace Corps
volunteer in a village in Togo (which boarders Ghana). In the book, the author describes how
his neighbors would take items from his house and then lie about it later, hence the reference
to conspiracy theory. David is indirectly referencing the same idea as he shares his feelings
with me about Kwesi. David, and perhaps the author, are both unaware that the concept of
friendship among people in these communities might be constructed in a completely different
manner. Perhaps friendship in the local context means they can ask for money and they can
walk in and take items. Perhaps these actions, which might seem like a violation of friendship in
a U.S. context, are seen as a virtue of friendship in the local context. Wagner argues this very
point: constructing culture by a pre-scripted framework doesn’t allow for the possibility of an
alternative construction of culture. Friendship, in this situation, is conceived and valued from a
U.S. context.
David is grappling with trying to understand his friendship with Kwame and Kwesi. And
when he is asked by his faculty instructor to complete a reflective journal assignment, he begins
to articulate how he feels about friendship in Ghana compared to his understanding of

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friendship back in the U.S. This process allows David to begin constructing his ideas about
friendship in two contexts. He believes friendship in the U.S. could never resemble what he has
developed in Ghana. Without the reflective component, which I argue should be viewed as an
extension of the faculty’s intervention, David might not have pushed this notion forward.

Bonesetter (Disorienting Dilemma 3)
It’s 6:30 a.m. in Kumasi, Ghana. We are five hours north of Accra and although the sun
has been up for a little while, there is still a thick yellow haze of moisture in the tropical air, a
combination of dew and burning trash. The study abroad students have been up for two hours
and they are sleepily walking from the parked bus on a narrow red dirt path, past half-open
kiosks that overlook one of the main roads in Kumasi thirty feet below. Honking cars and
greetings by people below overshadow the eerie quiet that rests at the last kiosk in the row.
Chickens walk around and pick at the ground as the American students make their way to a Ushaped bench outdoors of the main structure. The wooden structure is no more than eight by
ten feet and appears dark when looking in from the bright outside. Men and women of all ages
and classes are patiently and quietly waiting on the benches. Primary school students wearing
uniforms rest with their backpacks against their small backs. Men in business suits are sitting
alongside mothers who each have their youngest child strapped on their backs. No one is
chatting, which is unusual in this urban Ghanaian society.
Students begin quietly talking amongst themselves about why it is quiet and what is
going on when a loud, painful scream erupts from the wooden kiosk. A second later, the faculty
leader, Nancy, takes two students into the kiosk without talking, and the group is left to ponder

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what is happening. A local boy around five years old appears and begins talking with one of the
students. The words “Hi Obruni, how are you, I am fine” emerge from the boy in one long
breath. A few other students begin talking with the boy to distract themselves from the
screams that continue from the room. About five minutes later Nancy comes out with two of
the study abroad students who are crying and upset. The students knew they were visiting a
traditional bonesetter, but now the realization of what this means is quickly processed by the
students. The two crying students are not able to talk about what they saw for a few minutes.
Nancy brings out the two bonesetters to speak with the students by means of a mini,
informal lecture about the process of bone setting. Ama, the older bonesetter, explains that
she was taught by her mother and passed along the information to her daughter who is
standing beside her. Her mother used her own knowledge of the bones and how they should
set, but now with newer technology, Ama asks her patients to obtain x-rays and then bring
them to her at the first consultation. Her price is a fraction of what a Western medical doctor
would charge, and families often select this route which involves the equivalent of $5 USD paid
upfront for all the treatments. Patients come every day for two to three weeks or as needed,
to manipulate the bones to keep them aligned. No cast is used, however, herbs are often
prescribed for the affected area.
25 patients are waiting to see Ama, so the ten-minute discussion is wrapped up quickly.
Nancy asks for the next four students, but resistance begins to set in. Students begin
questioning their feelings of invading someone’s privacy and witnessing pain. One or two
students opt out after seeing their fellow classmates upset and crying. Ama yells for the next
patient to go in. It is a young, primary school boy all by himself, who visibly looks scared. A few

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students panic and the ones who have already witnessed the process become upset again at
the thought of a scared young boy having to go through the pain. A wave of nausea rolls over
my stomach at the thought of the little boy going through a painful process, and I cannot deny
feeling shaken a bit as well. I wrestle with asking students about what they are thinking versus
just simply observing and watching alongside.
As students reflected and de-briefed later that night, many of them struggled with the
ethics of watching pain and the educational opportunity to witness the event. Half the students
indicated this was “highest” point of their program thus far while others felt this was their
“lowest” point. Nancy holds a “High/Low” session every few days, where students sit in a circle,
share their feelings, and reflect upon their experiences so far. This was the most divisive event
of their entire program. How could one event inflict such strong opposition within a seemingly
homogeneous group?
Here is how one student, Zora, reflects upon her experience at the bonesetter:
As I waited in line to go to the room, I could just hear screams of children. I also saw fear
on students’ faces as they walked out. Some couldn’t even hold back tears. When I
walked into the room, we first watched an older man get his shoulder fixed. Then
entered a little boy. He had such a nervous look on his face and was just shaking. I felt
so bad for him, I just wanted to let him know he would be ok. As she started working on
his arm, he began to scream and move around. His mother was trying her best to keep
him still but it wasn’t working. The bonesetter starting hitting his arms and legs with a
stick which caused him to become even more hysterical. I couldn’t watch anymore so I
left. A couple of minutes later I saw the boy walk out with his tears wiped away. I was
amazed; first off I couldn’t believe how calm the kids waiting to be treated were even
though they knew how painful the treatment would be. I know that in the U.S. if a child
went through all that pain the first time, there is no way they would go back…. I didn’t
know how to handle the situation. I began comparing it to the care received in the U.S. It
just looked so painful, even I was squirming. I also tried to imagine what my parents
would have done if someone was hitting me. One thing I know for sure is they would
never hold me down and allow it to happen. The hardest part about the experience was
trying to sort through it. I felt so bad for the pain these people felt but I also understand

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that it’s the way things work in Africa. For many, this is the only treatment they can
afford. Treatment like this in the U.S. would be considered unethical. But is it really?
Zora, reflecting in her journal about her experience with the bonesetter, begins making
connections between healthcare treatment in the U.S. versus Africa. She touches on many
aspects of culture, including the ethics of pain, the process itself, access to care, and
affordability. She struggles to understand her own views about what she saw and experienced.
She tries to put them into a U.S. context to help makes sense of the experience. This is a
normal process during study abroad, questioning what is going on in a new environment and
comparing it to what they know from their own experience. We know study abroad students
often deconstruct complex ideas into smaller concepts. The important part is reconstructing
the pieces again to fully understand the issues from multiple perspectives, in this case, U.S and
Ghanaian perspectives.
Nancy felt the bonesetter experience needed two different reflection exercises to help
students process it. The first was the immediate, in-person “highs and lows” reflective circle so
that group members could articulate their feelings about the experience and hear from others
as well. The second reflection was the structured journaling. Many students opted to use this
issue as a topic in their journals. Within their journals, concepts of U.S. culture and
understanding their own identity became illuminated.

Service Learning (Disorienting Dilemma 4)
For the first time in Nancy’s study abroad career, she decided to introduce a service
learning project into her program pedagogy. She reflected that over the years, students had

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wished to “give back” and “contribute to the community.” So, at the end of the previous year,
she committed herself to creating an opportunity for students to work on a service project in
Ibinito, the village where students conduct their community diagnosis each year. During the
academic year, Nancy began communicating with Mr. Wendell, who is Ibinito’s sanitation
“engineer,” and who Nancy has worked with to place her students these past years. Mr.
Wendell, of Ga 12 descent, is a short, slender man in his early 60s who grew up in the village but
who also resides in Accra part of the time. Ibinito is only an hour outside Accra, so it’s not far to
commute in and out during the work week. Mr. Wendell indicates that since the program has
focused so much on sanitation over the years, they could use a new public toilet for the village.
Nancy began making plans with Mr. Wendell to outline what supplies needed to be
purchased, what work would be done prior to the students’ arrival, and who in the community
would help. Nancy mentioned the service learning project throughout the pre-departure
meetings and students eagerly raised their own money to bring with them. This included asking
family and friends for money. Many of the students indicated being excited to “help” Ghanaians
and some even alluded to the notion of “saving Africans” although they did not state this
directly.
Nancy also allocated some of the program money to purchase local supplies. The agreed
upon plan was for Mr. Wendell to contract out construction help to build the platform and dig
the well to the water table below before the students arrived, so that the project of making the
cement bricks and building the structure could take place on-site with the students. Money was
wired in advance for the first phase of the project.

12

Ga is an ethnic group residing in Accra.

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Upon our arrival in Ibinito, students settled into their hostel rooms (also located on Mr.
Wendell’s property) and Nancy and I met with Mr. Wendell to begin planning for the three-day
stay in the village. We discussed the logistics for meals (which according to Nancy is always
stressful). There were negotiations for purchasing the food, renting the refrigerator for the
food, paying two or three women to prepare the meals, etc. Once these arrangements were
settled, we solidified plans for the community diagnosis activity. Finally, we asked about the
status of the public toilet and received a vague answer that “things are coming along” and we
could see the site later. But first, we needed greet the chief of Ibinito, a custom when entering
a village in many parts of West Africa.
Guests must be officially invited by the chief, often expressed through a “royal
linguistic;” a term used by a member of the chief’s staff who acts as an official medium
between the chief and his guests. The premise is that the chief is so royal that only the
“linguistic” has permission to speak to him. However, Ibinito is a small village and the
ceremonial protocol were limited to us bringing him a bottle of schnapps. Schnapps is the term
for local gin, which is used to pour libations to ancestors and as a gift to the chief.
The students sat around the chief in a semi-circle, and Nancy spoke on behalf of the
group. The Chief nodded and welcomed the group and gave a speech about how much he
enjoyed this group each year, the partnership between Nancy and Mr. Wendell, and wished us
well. We noticed he did not mention the big public toilet project, which surprised Nancy and
me as this was a major community development project that involved a relatively large amount
of money. We discussed later that we felt something missing from the public toilet discussion,
but being tired from the day, we agree to talk with Mr. Wendell the next morning.

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When we pressed Mr. Wendell further in the morning, we discovered that there had
been “a delay.” At this point, kind and patient Nancy laid into him. “What do you mean there’s
been a delay? You have been giving inconsistent information for weeks. We want to know
what’s going on.” Mr. Wendell fessed up that the project had only begun, some of the trees
had been cleared, but no hole had been dug yet for the well. He claimed this was his
understanding for the beginning. Nancy, beyond frustrated, demanded to see the Chief of
Ibinito. Not only did the chief own the land in the village, he would be the one to agree to the
sanitation project as well. Mr. Wendell agreed to take us, but after the community diagnosis
exercise. As the students walked through the village for the community diagnosis project, they
too became aware that the public toilet project had not begun. They began questioning Nancy
about it and she patiently asked them to wait, that we were going to meet with the Chief and
get some answers.
Later in the evening while the students had some downtime, Nancy and I accompanied
Mr. Wendell to the Chief’s residence. The Chief clearly did not know why we wanted a meeting,
so Mr. Wendell began by framing the story in a much skewed manner, stating that the plan for
the public toilet was that the project was not scheduled to begin until the students arrived. He
switched between English and Ga, a dialect neither Nancy nor I know, and we struggled to keep
up and make sure we understood what he was telling the chief. Nancy patiently waited for Mr.
Wendell to finish. She then explained the story, that the agreement had been to have the land
cleared and the well dug prior to the students’ arrival. She also explained how over the years,
the cost of bringing the students to Ibinito kept rising: more money for food, to hire cooks, for
refrigerators, etc. While she talked, she used very Ghanaian non-vernal gestures such as

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clapping her hands together with her right palm open over her open left palm. This gesture
was a sign of respect and meant she was begging for his understanding. Not unlike the street
kids in Accra using the same gesture to beg for food; it was a humble gesture. She continued to
explain how her students had raised money from their parents and family friends to build this
toilet. He listened intently until she finished. Mr. Wendell tried to interrupt, but the Chief put
his hand up, indicating not to interrupt. The Chief gestured again to Mr. Wendell as Nancy
concluded, and then addressed Mr. Wendell in Ga. Nancy and I could not understand the
words, but we were clearly reading the non-verbal signals and intonation of the Chief’s voice:
he was furious. Throughout the Ga-filled reprimand, we heard the English words
“incompetent” and “liar.” We knew these word were specifically said in English for us to hear,
and it was clear Mr. Wendell was in trouble. When the Chief finished, he addressed Nancy and
apologized to her, admitting that it appeared Mr. Wendell had been lying to her (and him) over
the years and had pocketed quite a bit of the money. The Chief continued to tell us that in
addition, some of the community diagnosis money designated for the village over the years had
never arrived. Then Mr. Wendell, visibly angry, left. The Chief thanked us for bringing this to
his attention and asked again for forgiveness.
Walking back to the hostel, Nancy and I reflected on the meeting. She knew that the
relationship with the village was over. The Chief had been publically embarrassed, and Mr.
Wendell was furious at Nancy for going to the Chief. We knew the students would not wait
until the morning to find out what happened. And the next day was supposed to be the work
day for the public toilet.

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Nancy called a meeting with the students and explained the whole situation, even the
historical information about money and how she believed the relationship with the village was
over. Her empathetic candor and transparency with students was one of her best assets as
students immediately trusted her and appreciated that she included them on decisions. This
situation was no exception, and Nancy asked the group to decide what to do. Students were
upset and mad about the lying and at Mr. Wendell, and asked questions about corruption in
Ghana. Nancy and I teamed up and shared what information we knew about corruption in
Ghana: that it was common, that it was somewhat normalized, that development projects often
got accomplished through corrupt means. And we discussed the cultural value we placed on
corruption in the U.S. and how we thought it was valued in Ghana, prefacing our comments
with the disclaimer that we were not Ghanaian and didn’t have insider knowledge. The
students understood but felt upset nevertheless. Their dream of “helping” would not happen
and this very fact was what many students were upset about. They were empathetic to Nancy
about the fall out, but most of them were looking inward and disappointment that there would
be no tangible structure to help the community. Many remarked feeling worried about telling
their family and friends what happened, particularly those who donated money. Morale was
low in part because of the service learning project and also because many of the students had
fallen ill the night before. We were also over halfway through the program and students were
beginning to “hit the wall;” a study abroad term describing the stage in the program when
students are at their lowest. Therefore the group decided to switch plans and head to the Volta
region of Ghana, where there was a waterfall lodge near the Togo boarder. This also allowed

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students to leave the Akan/Asante cultural region and enter the Ewe region which was
dramatically different than what they had been experiencing so far.
This situation was not only disorienting for the students, it was even more so for Nancy.
She was upset about the fallout in the village and upset for the students. During the last night
of the program, Nancy conducted the final “highs and lows” session, asking students to reflect
on their highs and lows for the entire study abroad program. Half way through the session, a
student shared that the lack of the service learning project was her low and then began to cry.
Other students cried as well and some mentioned their disappointment. Nancy was the last to
share her highs/lows. She began crying when she explained her low as the service learning
project situation. I knew she was upset because she felt she let the students down, but she did
not share this with them. She was too upset to continue her thoughts about the village
incident, so she switched and shared her high:
The thing I enjoy the most is taking you guys to Ghana. I can facilitate and makes connections
and teach about public health […] and (you) to go back as different people. We are so
privileged. Most of the world does not live as we do. Everything in the U.S. isn’t great and
always right. There are other ways of living. It’s not bad, but different and sometimes better. I
value the trust

This last vignette highlights the impact Nancy had on her students. At the end of that
last highs/lows meeting, students clapped for her and many gave her hugs. Beyond the warm
rapport the student felt for Nancy, what was more evident was that without her, the students
would not have understood many of the cultural misunderstandings. Her role was not only to
teach the curriculum, but also to help her students navigate the cultural ambiguities so that
they could understand the experience in a more impactful way, in a culturally competent way.

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Chapter 5: Transformational Learning toward Cultural Competency
As the previous chapter has demonstrated, Nancy’s role as a faculty member was crucial
to the students’ transformational learning. Her knowledge of the language and the academic
topic of health care as well as her experience living in Ghana created the best learning
environment for her students. These four vignettes: Community Diagnoses, Friendship,
Bonesetter, and Service Learning are ethnographic descriptions that demonstrate how students
constructed or invented their own culture(s) as well as how they constructed culture in Ghana.
These accounts stemmed primarily from participation-observation and document analysis of
their structured journals, not from the semi-structured interviews.
As mentioned in the Chapter 3, students were asked the same sets of questions for the
pre-departure survey and their on-site survey. Because the group was so small, SPSS showed
little significance except in two categories of how students viewed culture. Students were
asked a series of two-part questions. Two of these questions showed significant change over
time in terms of moving from one answer/viewpoint to another.
The first question:
In your opinion, which of the following statement is closest to your own viewpoint?
a. People in Ghana share many traits in common and taken together, these constitute
Ghanaian Culture
b. The social diversity found in Ghana means that there is no agreed upon common culture
Data analysis indicated that the majority of students first believed answer (a) was true, but
during the program, the majority of students believed that (b) was true, although the margin
was close.
The second question that registered a significant difference was:

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In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
a. There is only one culture in Ghana
b. There are many cultures in Ghana
Here again, the majority of students believed that (a) was true before the program began, and
then indicated (b) was true during the program, again, by a close margin.
These two data points do not provide enough evidence that cultural competency was
achieved. However, adding the participant-observation and document analysis of journals,
there is enough data to indicate that transformational learning took place for the majority of
the students. For example, in the journals several students mentioned the fieldtrip to the
bonesetter in detail. They shared their thoughts about how they felt watching patients’ bones
being manipulated. Nancy also ran a highs and lows debriefing session after the bonesetter trip
and students also commented on how they felt about the experience. One student’s high for
the week was watching the bonesetter in action, while another student said it was their low. It
was clear this event was a significant learning moment, a significant disorienting dilemma
presented to the students, and they all navigated through it in their own way. However, the
bonesetter experience was never mentioned by the students during the onsite survey interview
despite the fact that every student had participated in the fieldtrip before the surveys began.
Other disorienting dilemmas were illuminated in the field notes and the structured
journaling based on how many students mentioned details of the situations. Students wrote
about other interesting experiences as well, but the four disorienting dilemmas were chosen
because of the frequency with which they were mentioned in the field notes and journals.
Most of the compelling data came from the ethnographic methods most commonly used in
anthropology: participant-observation and structured journaling, which is essentially
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ethnographic writing. The semi-structured interviews, despite their length and in-depth
categories, revealed little to help understand how students navigate their transformational
learning. I suspect the large assessment surveys, IDI, BEVI, and GPI may have similar results,
that specific questions targeting students’ values and beliefs are not the best data points to
assess how students experience transformational learning.
However, the demographic data collected in the pre-departure semi-structured
interviews provided good background information, such as age, hometown, current major,
parents’ occupation, previous experience abroad, and previous experience with multicultural
situations. This data, presented in Chapter 3, highlighted the similarities in demographic
makeup of the group: mostly white females from Michigan who have an interest in health care,
either because they are majoring in the field or because they want to be in the field in the
future. Most of the group had traveled abroad before which was important for two reasons.
First, students who have been abroad before, whether through family vacations or study
abroad, had experienced some initial “othering” just by spending time outside their own,
familiar culture. Many students made connections between their previous experiences abroad
and the program in Ghana. Second, the prior abroad experience of this group indicated a
significant shift in what opportunities they had access to before entering the university.
Administrators who assess cultural competency among students like to have demographic data
about their students to determine appropriate global learning goals. For example, higher
education institutions have never seen such a high level of global experience among their
freshman class. At a private liberal arts college I previously worked for, I surveyed 60% of the
first year students (approximately 270 students). Over half of them had traveled abroad before

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college, several on full gap years abroad, and many (over 5 students) had spent significant time
(more than two weeks) in non-Western countries. Some of this can be explained by the
demographics of liberal arts college students, since come from affluent or mobile families
(including international students studying in the U.S. who are currently abroad). However,
colleagues at other institutions are reporting a similar trend. What does this mean for the field
of international education? Some of the assessment tools for study abroad are not designed to
factor for this rapid shift in the level of global engagement of students. Some assessment tools
may indirectly make the biased assumption that students have little to no previous experience.
They are assuming that cultural competency is achieved by marking off certain values and
beliefs. What if students arrive with these “high impact” experiences and measure as globally
competent at their freshman orientation? How can institutions continue to challenge students’
learning outcomes when their assessment data shows they have peaked early?
In-depth, ethnographic research on study abroad students is more in need now due to
these shifting trends among the current generation of students. Class surveys measuring large
trends at the freshman and senior years many no longer hold as much value to institutions that
assess these cultural competencies. Large and small institutions may need to design smaller
surveys that include qualitative methods in order to get a clearer picture of how students are
engaging while they study abroad.

Rubric for Cultural Competency
The ethnographic data from the field notes and the journals indicates that study abroad
students encountered disorienting dilemmas through their constructions of culture. The data

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also suggest that as students navigated each of these dilemmas they questioned assumptions,
articulated emotions, and came through a transformational learning process. In turn, the
process of transformational learning lead to cultural competency.
The data also support the idea that short-term, faculty-led study programs can result in
cultural competency among student participants with the following pedagogical conditions:
Table 3: Cultural Competency Rubric for Short-Term, Faculty-Led Study Abroad Programs

Theory to Practice
Students should have some
research or experiential
assignment that results in a
theory/practice connection
within the community. The
process of research or
interactive assignment
results in “high impact”
practices. These result in a
deeper understanding of the
host community.

Students must have
structured reflective
journaling

The faculty leader must have
significant experience in
host community.

Framework should include
open-ended questions
allowing students to work
through assumptions and
ambiguities related to their
host community. Some
questions may address the
curricular needs, but the
majority of the questions
should be about the cocurricular aspect of living and
communicating in the
community.

Significant means:
• working knowledge of
the local language
• previous living and/or
work experience in
community
• understanding of
study abroad
pedagogy

These three elements were present in this study abroad case study. Through the
community diagnosis exercise, students experienced power and privilege on an intimate level
when they asked community members about their living and sanitation practices. I would argue
that students learned more about the construction of culture in the village than they did about
the actual community health care practices (the original goal of the exercise). Through the
structured journaling assignments, students were able to process their understanding and
constructions of culture as they navigated ambiguous situations outside the classroom. Nancy,
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as the study abroad faculty leader, was a highly informed and engaged faculty member with
years of experience leading study abroad programs. She had excellent working knowledge of
the local language and because she was a former Peace Corp Volunteer and had worked on
health care projects throughout the years, she was an expert in her field. These three
conditions were necessary for creating the framework to achieve cultural competency.
Theory to practice experiences such as research and experiential activities allow for
disorienting dilemmas to occur naturally. These dilemmas are a necessary part of the road to
cultural competency. Without these dilemmas, students are not forced to navigate
miscommunications and ultimately leave the program without fully understanding how culture
functions in their host community. In some cases, students may reproduce stereotypes as a
result of not understanding the in-depth meaning behind events or situations in the
community.
Structured journaling produces the transformational data needed to verify that students
are obtaining cultural competency. Coding students’ journals reveals patterns and connections
that students make when they analyze cross-cultural misunderstandings or compare life in their
study abroad location to life back home. Any faculty-led program can incorporate this rubric
into their curricular design. And the students have a tangible artifact to include in an eportfolio as well as for their own use years in the future.
An engaged and knowledgeable faculty member is key to successfully creating cultural
competency among students on short-term, faculty-led programs. This faculty member helps
students interpret the ambiguity, which they can obtain from reading the students journals and
from observing their behavior. Faculty can be trained in participate-observation so they can

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determine if students’ behaviors match their journal reflections. Faculty can intervene if they
feel a student is struggling to adjust or to comprehend cultural situations. The faculty are also
crucial in cultural competency learning beyond the student’s own transformation. They play a
pivotal role in creating culturally aware students within the topical theme of the program. For
example, Nancy’s program was focused on health care practices in Ghana. She designed her
curriculum to address theoretical issues relating to health care access, but she also structured
field-based exercises such as the community diagnosis that linked theory to praxis. This resulted
in students learning about cultural competency in the context of the health care field, not just
for themselves.
The implications for implementing the rubric presented above are significant. If
followed, the rubric can create a rich learning framework that can lead to cultural competency
among students. It can also lead to cultural competency in the target discipline. The benefits
are thus two-fold: individual students can potentially obtain cultural competency in the study
abroad location as well as in the academic discipline. As short-term, faculty-led study abroad
programs are discipline-focused on issues like public health, business, language, and
environment, the aim is not only to produce cultural competency per se but to create culturallyaware students in particular fields of study as well.
As this research demonstrates, cultural competency can be achieved on faculty-led
programs with the pedagogical framework that includes a theory to practice assignment,
structured, reflective journaling, and a faculty member who is linguistically and cultural
knowledgeable and engaged in the host community. Therefore the pattern to cultural

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competency looks like this: Disorienting dilemmas -> transformational learning -> cultural
competency.

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Chapter 6: Conclusion
The goals of this research project were to show the following: 1) U.S. study abroad
students studying on a faculty-led, short-term programs can obtain cultural competency
abroad, 2) qualitative, ethnographic research can be used to understand students’
comprehension of cultural competency on short-term study abroad programs, 3)
transformational learning occurs when certain pedagogical factors are in place such as faculty
knowledge of the field site, structured writing assignments, and theory/praxis engagement, 4)
anthropological theories and methods are useful frameworks to help international educators
develop and assess “high impact” study abroad programs, and 5) using qualitative,
ethnographic data on study abroad outcomes directly and successfully contributes to the
comprehensive internationalization of a higher education institutions.
This dissertation demonstrates that students participating on short-term, faculty-led
programs are able to obtain cultural competency with the assistance of a faculty leader.
Literature in the field of international education has suggested that students need to be abroad
for longer periods of time (twelve to sixteen weeks) in order to obtain cultural competency.
However, quantitative assessment instruments measuring students’ cultural competency might
miss key transformational learning moments on long-term programs. This dissertation
demonstrates that ethnographic, qualitative methods such as structured reflective journals and
participant-observation more accurately demonstrate students’ cultural competency than
questionnaires. Examining specific disorienting dilemmas among the group members in this
study revealed several key moments of transformational learning. This learning process was

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aided by the faculty member who helped the students process cultural ambiguities and to learn
a discipline-specific curriculum within the program.
The ethnographic vignettes in Chapter 4 demonstrate that students experienced
disorienting dilemmas. In the community diagnosis program, one group of students became
involved in a community altercation and a local community member aggressively questioned
why students were in the village year after year asking the same questions without any
progress. All students in the group became involved in processing this experience and a group
de-briefing session revealed that students became interested in larger questions of
development and giving back to the community as a result.
David’s experience reflecting on his newly formed friendships highlights the process he
went through in his own invention of culture in Ghana and culture in the U.S. when he
questioned what attributes constitute friendship to him. Many students wrote about
friendships and relationships in their journals. Some students questioned friendships within the
U.S. group while others reflected on gender roles and dating in Ghana.
When students witnessed the bonesetter, they had strong reactions to watching people
in pain. This experience forced many of the students to reflect on the ethics of certain practices
they witnessed in Ghana and how they would be understood in the U.S. context. Students also
felt torn between appreciating the learning aspect of the experience and experiencing the
traumatic way Ghanaians experienced pain, especially the children.
Finally, the failed service learning project illuminated many cultural practices, from the
involvement of the village chief to the student obsession with wanting to “help.” This vignette
highlights the reality that faculty leaders, too, experience disorienting dilemmas and have to

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process ambiguities alongside their students. More pressure might be placed on the faculty
member to solve a dilemma or steer the students toward the right path.
Through the vignettes, surveys, and document analysis, I argue that because students
engaged in a theory to practice exercise, reflectively journaled about it, and had strong faculty
intervention and guidance, students became culturally competent. Faculty engagement in this
step is essential to cultural competency. They must understand the cultural barriers and
benefits involved in conducting research or participating in a theory/practice exercise. The
praxis must be linked to concepts presented in the course. Students need to participate in and
engage in the process of doing/researching in order to achieve the linkage. If a student is
struggling, the faculty member should intervene and find out where the gaps are and how to
get them back on track.
Anthropology’s contributions to the field of study abroad are crucial in order to assess
how students learn cultural competency. Situating theories found in anthropology is the first
step to creating meaningful pedagogy on faculty-led programs. Faculty can define culture in
their own discipline and apply the concept to field-based learning. Whether the program
focuses on business, environment, or health care, it is valuable to understand the cultural
implications of the academic theme abroad. The purpose of taking a campus-based course
aboard is to engage in an exercise in understanding another cultural perspective. Study abroad
administrators are encouraged to work with faculty in pedagogical design to ensure that
attention is given to the cultural determinants found in the location of the program.
Anthropological methods are valuable to student learning as well as for assessing
outcomes. Students should be taught participant-observation skills so they can better navigate

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new cultural situations. Basic understandings of who sits where, who speaks first, what people
wear, etc. are key aspects of learning how to engage within the new cultural setting.
Furthermore, ethnographic writing can enhance student learning by teaching them how to
structure their field notes/journals in ways that help them process ambiguities or disorienting
dilemmas. As evidenced by the data in this dissertation, the structured journals and field notes
provide the most pertinent information regarding cultural competency. Faculty can use
ethnographic writing as a tool to learn how students are feeling about the class, about their
group, and about their host location. Issues that arise in the journals can be addressed by
faculty on short-term programs. I also argue that issues explored in the journals of students on
provider-organized programs or semester programs without faculty leaders can be evaluated
back on the home campus and study abroad staff and/or the student’s adviser can dive in to
assist and work with the student.
Regarding assessment tools for cultural competency, this dissertation demonstrates that
qualitative data reveals more a nuanced aspect of cultural competency than just quantitative
data. A triangulation approach to assessment might provide the best framework for
understanding the complex ways in which students understand and navigate cultural situations.
Administering a large, quantitative assessment tool is a valuable way to look at the larger
patterns relating to study abroad such as the demographics of students participating: majors,
background, identities, previous abroad experience, courses taken already, etc. These tools are
also helpful when looking at larger trends such as whether students who participate in study
abroad have more cultural competency than students who do not. Incorporating qualitative
tools can illuminate trends among the students who participate on faculty-led programs. These

102

tools can also be used when reviewing programs for accreditation if they can show the value of
the cultural competency outcomes.
Using this ethnographic account of cultural competency among a short-term, faculty-led
program to Ghana, I was able to create a rubric that study abroad administrators and educators
can use. This rubric is designed for large research universities that have access to faculty who
meet the criteria. The assumption is that many scholars might have in-depth cultural
knowledge of a study abroad location. Such a faculty member can create a new program in
their location of expertise.
Within the field of international education, study abroad is one of the most effective
ways to engage students culturally. As institutions internationalize their campuses and
continue to strengthen their internationalization efforts, study abroad will continue to be a key
strategy in the process. Student mobility is at the heart of comprehensive internationalization.
As administrators and campus stakeholder advocate for more resources, they will be asked to
demonstrate the value of study abroad. Incorporating qualitative data into existing quantitate
assessment tools allows for a more complete picture of how students are learning abroad, what
paths lead to transformational learning, and ultimately how many students can meet the
cultural competency standards set by each institution.
The rubric created in this dissertation is a great starting place for institutions who are
beginning to create short-term, faculty-led programs. It might also be used to enhance or
update older faculty-led programs as faculty retire or departments/institutions evaluate the
value of their portfolio offerings. This rubric is not an end result. More works needs to be done
on this rubric to fit within structures such as liberal arts colleges and community colleges,

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where there might not a large pool of faculty who have significant experience in a study abroad
location. For example, many faculty have the desire to start new programs on a topic they
teach on campus, but do not have experience in the proposed country. Faculty should be
encouraged to lead programs and branch out to new pedagogies. Campus administrators and
study abroad staff can help think strategically about ways to help faculty. A site visit to the field
location prior to submitting the program proposal is one way they can familiarize themselves
with the local community. Partnering with a faculty colleague in another department or
institution who has significant experience in the location is also a solution.

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APPENDICES

105

Appendix A: Pre-Dissertation Data of Study Abroad Students
Table 4: Pre-Dissertation Data of Study Abroad Students
Previous experience in
traveling abroad
Vacation to Aruba

Previous
study abroad

I have lived in Kenya and Senegal and
have visited many parts of the world,
excluding former USSR, China, and
Australia /New Zealand (generally, not
every country).

None

I enjoy getting to know people who are
different from me and learn a lot from
these experiences. Such experiences
and interactions have shaped my world
view.

I have travelled to Italy, Mexico,
Bonaire, Puerto Rico, Jamaica,
Bahamas, and Nicaragua.

None

Though I come from a very small town
of little to no diversity, my experiences
at X University have broadened my
horizons beyond imaginable. My school
is composed of a very diverse
population of students that come from
all over the world.

Costa Rica for 1 month doing service
projects, trips to Ireland, France, Italy,
and Spain.

London, for 1
month

The traveling that I’ve done in Europe
was all very similar even if it were for
tourism or a Study Abroad. Costa Rica
was a lot different than anything I
experienced in Europe. When I was in
Costa Rica I spent time working with
the locals of each town I was in. The
areas were in lower economic settings
and by integrating into society on a
different level than tourism I received a
very different perspective. The view I
get when I travel to France is also
unique. Because my dad lives there I
am a longer term tourist where I live at
his apartment and carry on more
everyday activities than I would if I
were just visiting on a tourist visit.

Galapagos
Islands study
abroad

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Experience with multicultural issues
and interactions
I would describe my experiences with
multicultural issues as positive,
educational and enlightening.

Table 4 (cont’d)

13

I have traveled to Canada several
times and Mexico three times but they
were all family vacations. My only
other experience abroad included a
mission trip to the Dominican Republic
my junior year in high school where I
helped build a school and installed
electricity.

None

Growing up in northern Michigan, I
wasn’t exposed to many different
cultures and it was predominantly
Caucasian. I would not say I was
completely ignorant of other cultures
though because I have traveled my
entire life to various cities across the
U.S. and Mexico; not to mention the
week I spent in the Dominican
Republic. Upon my arrival to X
University, I grew up on a very diverse
floor in my dorm and met my best
friend who is Vietnamese. I have
stayed with her family several times,
where they do not speak English and
cook only Vietnamese food.

I have been abroad many times
including Canada, Germany, Australia,
Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala.
Traveling to Central America was a
real eye-opener and an experience I
think will be similar to Ghana.

None

I grew up in a very multicultural town. I
was a minority being a white Christian
female. My schools were always filled
with Chaldeans, African Americans,
Asians, and Jewish students. From an
early age I was exposed to many
different beliefs and ways of life that
would sometimes clash at school.

Kenya and Sudan

None

I am from X 13 originally and I don’t
mind interacting with multicultural
issues. I have lived in Sudan, Ethiopia,
Kenya and U.S. so I am used to many
cultures around the world.

The only country that I have ever been
to outside of the United States is
Canada. I’ve been there many, many
times because I have family there and
I think it is a great place with great
people.

None

Being multicultural myself, I have had
some experiences with multicultural
issues. These included identity issues
and disproving stereotypes. I also
came from a very diverse high school,
and I saw quite a few issues there as
well.

Country of origin concealed for confidentiality

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Table 4 (cont’d)
I have traveled to Italy as well as
Mexico a couple of times

None

In Italy most of my interactions were
among family. Even though there was a
definite language barrier over time we
were able to communicate. You see I
was very young and play is a universal
language. In Mexico I did not really
interact with anyone other than
peddlers at the street market. I did
learn that they were very shrewd
business people.

My experience with travel abroad has
consisted of family vacations. I have
been to Mexico and the Caribbean on
cruise vacations. In 2003 we spent a
week in Ireland and in 2008 we spent
a week in Paris. Mostly tourist
locations on each trip.

None

I would describe my experiences and
interactions with multicultural issues as
limited. Besides learning about issues
from classrooms, textbooks, and news
media, my experience with different
cultures, outside of my own, has been
small.

I have been to Mexico for a senior
vacation which was not an educational
experience what so ever. I did not
invest myself in looking into their
cultural as I will in Ghana.

None

I have had many experiences with
African American people in Lansing and
elsewhere. I must say that these
experiences and encounter have
shaped the way I look at stereotypes
and must say that stereotypes can be
true however I am intelligent enough to
know that there are many social
determinants that give way to these
stereotypes. Education, lack of
transportation, parenting, government
funding, and other social and economic
factors that lead to a deprived
individual or family.

I went to Ireland, Cork and Galway.
My family also frequently travels to
the Caribbean, Mexico, Jamaica, etc.

Yes, two
weeks in
Ireland

I thoroughly enjoy stepping out of my
comfort zone and immersing myself
into others’ lifestyles. I have talked
with people everywhere I’ve traveled
and just listened to what they have to
say about themselves. Honestly, I have
never really come across a situation
where I felt there was an issue.

N/A
N/A

N/A
N/A

N/A
N/A
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Appendix B: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience
Pre-Departure Interview
The following questions will be asked. There may also be additional follow-up questions
generated during the open-ended interview itself which will be asked.
Part 1
1.

Name:

2.

Age:

3.

Racial/Ethnic Category (self-identified):

4.

Level of Education completed to date:

5.

Major:

6.

Current State Residency:

7.

Religion:

8.

Parent’s Occupation:

9.

Future Goals:

10.

What is your previous experience in traveling abroad?

11.

Have you participated on previous study abroad trips?

12.

How would you describe your experiences and interactions with multicultural issues?

______________________________________________________________________
Part 2
1. When did you develop an interest in going to Africa? Why?

2. Why Ghana?

3. What are some of your images of Ghana?

4. How would you characterize Ghanaian culture?

109

5. What attracted you to this study abroad program?

6. What do you hope to accomplish by participating in a study abroad program to Ghana?

7. What are some of your expectations of this program?

8. What part of the program most excites you, why?

9. What part of the program are you the most worried about, why?

10. How do you think you will be viewed by the people you meet and work with in Ghana?

11. Do you think your gender will affect how you’re viewed? If so, why?

12. Do you think your race/ethnicity will affect how you’re viewed? If so, why?

13. How do you think people live in Ghana? What are some of your expectations?

14. What do you hope to learn by participating on this program?

15. What word best describes what you expect to see in Ghana?
_______________________________________________________________________
Part 3
Please pick the answer that best aligns with your views:

Most people in Ghana live in poverty
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

110

Please explain:

Most people in Ghana have little access to education
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:

Women are more often oppressed than men in Ghana
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:

Ghana and neighboring countries are in need of development assistance
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:
________________________________________________________________________
Part 4
In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

Having culture means experiencing art, music, and dance

B.

Having culture means humans are connected to other humans

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?

111

A:

People in Ghana share many traits in common and taken together these constitute
Ghanaian culture

B:

The social diversity found in Ghana means that there is no agreed on common culture

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

There is only one culture in Ghana

B:

There are many cultures in Ghana

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

It is important to allow other countries a chance to help their own citizens

B:

It is important as Americans to help others in less developed countries

Why?

112

Appendix C: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience
Onsite Interview

The following questions will be asked. There may also be additional follow-up questions
generated during the open-ended interview itself which will be asked.
Questionnaire # ___________
Part 1
1. How have your images and perceptions of Ghana changed since this project began?

2. Have your preliminary expectations about the program been met? If so, how? If not, why?

3. What is the most rewarding part of the program so far?

4. What is the most frustrating aspect of the program so far?

5. Have the things you worried about before the program come true? If so, how?

6. How to you think you’re viewed by the people you’ve met so far in Ghana?

7. Has your gender affected how you’re viewed?

8. Has your race/ethnicity affected how you’re viewed?

9. What is the most surprising thing you’ve learned since you’ve been here?

10. What is the most disappointing thing you’ve experienced so far?

113

11. Have your ideas about Ghanaian culture changed since arriving in Ghana? If so how?

12. In a few short sentences, how would you explain your experiences so far to your friends
back home?

________________________________________________________________________
Part 2

Please pick the answer that best aligns with your views:

Most people in Ghana live in poverty
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:

Most people in Ghana have little access to education
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:

Women are more often oppressed than men in Ghana
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

Please explain:

Ghana and neighboring countries are in need of development assistance
Strongly Agree [ ] – Agree [ ] – Neither Agree/Disagree [ ] – Disagree [ ] – Strongly Disagree [ ]

114

Please explain:
________________________________________________________________________
Part 3

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

Having culture means experiencing art, music, and dance

B.

Having culture means humans are connected to other humans

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

People in Ghana share many traits in common and taken together these constitute
Ghanaian culture

B:

The social diversity found in Ghana means that there is no agreed on common culture

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

There is only one culture in Ghana

B:

There are many cultures in Ghana

Why?

In your opinion, which of the following statements is closest to your own viewpoint?
A:

It is important to allow other countries a chance to help their own citizens

B:

It is important as Americans to help others in less developed countries

Why?

115

Appendix D: Constructing Cultures in West Africa: The Study Abroad Experience
U.S. and/or Ghana Faculty/Program Organizers and University Personnel Survey

The following questions will be asked. There may also be additional follow-up questions
generated during the open-ended interview itself which will be asked.

Questionnaire # ___________

What is your role with this study abroad program?

How did you become involved in this particular program?

What is your past experience with study abroad?

What are the benefits to your university from having study abroad programs?

What are the benefits to the students from participating on study abroad programs?

In your opinion, why is it important for students to participate on study abroad?

Are these programs to lesser known countries – such as those in Africa – important? If so why?

Are programs to these lesser known areas beneficial to students? If so, why?

In what ways do you feel students learn by participating in study abroad programs?

How do you think your students are viewed by the local populations when studying abroad?

116

What aspects of the local Ghanaian culture do you think your students understand the most?

What aspects of the local Ghanaian culture do you think your students understand the least?

Where do you see the future of study abroad going this university? Nationally?

117

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118

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