MEGATRENDS AND MEDIA

TRANSCULTURAL COMMUNICATION AND MEDIA ART
REFLECTION OF THE MEDIA IMAGE
OF INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION
IN THE EDUCATIONAL PROCESS
IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC
Andrea Preissová Krejčí
ABSTRACT:
Globalization brings new opportunities but also dificulties in understanding
intercultural communication. This study is based on a comparison of research
studies concerning the media images of people who are viewed as “different”
by means of a quantitative content analysis of the Czech media together with an
examination of values and attitudes towards those viewed as “different” among
high school students. The aim is to show the vicious circle of reproduction of
stereotypical thinking without critical relection in school and in the media,
which conirms our subjective, stereotyped reality. In today’s globalized world
this is perceived as a problem that multicultural education could deal with.
However, in the Czech Republic, the multicultural approach in the educational
process, due to its reduction to “Roma problem”, does not meet our expectations
or is in fact failing, since to date this approach leads to a supericial acceptance of
postmodern values, which includes for example toleration of differences among
pupils (and often also among teachers).
KEY WORDS:
educational process, media image, multicultural education, social constructivism,
transcultural communication
1 Introduction
Globalization brings new opportunities but also dificulties
in understanding intercultural communication. The theory of
multiculturalism is naturally linked to the cultural and political
discourse of postmodernism. Contemporary society is living in an age of
globalization, and with it also an age of plurality of ethical and political
values. We must accept the reality of a world inhabited by people with
different experience, creating various stories about the world, living their
lives in different ways and holding different political views and religious
beliefs. This said, from the position of postmodernism, means that we do
not live in a single world, but we de facto inhibit a number of different
worlds and we use varied, personal dictionaries to describe them.
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