“While dancing, you cannot fight”, with this Sufi quotation Sr. Angela Rammé introduced a beautiful group dance which enabled the group to move into the theme of the day: cultural diversity and conflict management. With this topic Sisters Mariaelena Aceti and Anette Moltubakk continued to share what they had received by participating in the so called Hilton program. Already the first group exercise helped the group to realize the diversity of perceiving cultural reality. The task was to look at pictures under the perspective “What do you see” and share in groups.
We gained profound insights by Mariaelena`s extensive presentation on “The Cultural Dimensions” of different nationalities, on which the Dutch scientist Geert Hofstede has been doing research for many years. His statements have the purpose to understand cultures and the way they function. There are no good or bad cultures, they are just different. The differences are not meant to be value judgements. By the help of two short stories we could exemplify the theoretical knowledge to see the practical background on a cultural basis. Roleplays performed in groups had the purpose to express and relive a cultural situation individuals had experienced. Those small performances were both touching and moving and an eye opener to understand conflict situations better.
Sisters Jaya Mathew and Gisela Heitz (Czech Republic)
