absolutely intercultural 29 +++ Adult Education +++ Lifelong Learning +++ International Emergency Calls +++

The culture of Adult Education – Lifelong Learning – International Emergency Calls

absolutely grown-up

Lifelong learning is often promoted by institutions of adult education, so for our first column we have interview Ulla and Beate, who both work for adult education institutions. Ulla works for the Folkuniversitetet in Sweden and Beate for Deutscher Volkshochschulverband in Germany. We tried to figure out whether there is a specific culture of adult education, and what makes people want to carry on learning throughout their lives.

absolutely personal
Laurent met his long-time friend and colleague in many European projects Pat Shrimpton, who went from England to Sweden 41 years ago with her husband Neville. She also started her career at the Folkuniversitetet but later on became a teacher at the University of Umea in the very north of Sweden. She talks about how the field of adult education has changed in all those years, and why she won’t move back to England after her retirement this summer.

absolutely on fire
Now, imagine you have just started a new job in a foreign country somewhere in Europe, let’s say Lithuania. At work you mainly speak English, and you haven’t really mastered the Lithuanian language yet. One night you wake up and discover that your house is on fire. You rush to the telephone, dial the emergency number 112 and suddenly realize that the operator at the other end might not understand you. This is where Dieter Nüssler and his wife Helga come in. They have won the European Language Label for the project Multicom112, which tackles exactly that problem.

absolutely lifelong
And last but not least we are proud to present a new column “absolutely lifelong” where we will share good ideas to organise your own life long learning. Today’s contribution has been produced by Anne Knopf and Gereon Reuter, two of our students at RheinAhrCampus. They will give you some good advice on how you can improve your English in a realistic way and have a lot of fun at the same time.

The next show will be coming to you on the 4th of May from Anne Fox in Denmark.

So long…stay tuned!

The host of this show is: Dr. Laurent Borgmann

Edited and co-hosted by: Karsten Kneese

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absolutely intercultural 28 +++ Does culture still matter? +++ Gypsy music in the Czech Republic+++

Just in time before the Easter holidays – Report from the conference “Does culture still matter” – Gypsy music in the Czech Republic

cimbalom

Absolutely yours: We get birthday congratulations and an idea for a new show.

Absolutely educational: Chris Saenger reports on some of sessions he attended at the ‘Does Culture Still Matter?’ conference hosted by the Intercultural Management Institute of Washington DC. First Chris recounts how an activity involving holding two water-filled cups of water can show you various aspects of how you react in an unknown situation. Later he tells us about how former US ambassador, Prudence Bushnell, adopted various strategies to enable a woman’s voice to be heard in patriarchal cultures.

Absolutely musical: On a recent trip to the east of the Czech Republic, the Rivus trio play traditional gypsy music in which the cimbalom or hammered dulcimer instrument (pictured) plays a leading role. This is not a music podcast but music can have an important role to play in culture.

The next show will be coming from Germany on April 20.

The Host of this show is: Anne Fox

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