Abroad

In The Near Abroad, Zbigniew Wojnowski traces how Soviet Ukrainian identities developed in dialogue and confrontation with the USSR's neighbours in Eastern Europe.

In Bombardier Abroad, Thomas examines several cases of the Canadian aerospace giant’s work in the high-speed rail sector in South Africa, China/Tibet, and Israel/Palestine and argues that these projects are deepening existing social and political tensions. By participating in these infrastructure projects, Thomas argues, Bombardier is both inserting itself into highly contested social and political climates and profiting from actions that further exacerbate existing conditions of dispossession and inequality. Thomas also examines the various ways in which the Canadian state supports the work of Bombardier in these countries. Centred around a theoretical framework that combines concepts of dispossession, political economy and important interventions from the field of settler colonial studies, Bombardier Abroad is a critical look at the problematic practices of a Canadian corporation and the ways in which the Canadian state is culpable.

Written for study abroad practitioners, this book introduces theoretical understandings of key study abroad terms including “the global/national,” “culture,” “native speaker,” “immersion,” and “host society.” Building theories on these notions with perspectives from cultural anthropology, political science, educational studies, linguistics, and narrative studies, it suggests ways to incorporate them in study abroad practices. Through attention to daily activities via the concept of immersion, it reframes study abroad not as an encounter with cultural others but as an occasion to analyze constructions of “differences” in daily life, backgrounded by structural arrangements.

Education abroad is an essential part of the university student experience. Initiatives such as IIE’s Generation Study Abroad encourage more U.S. undergraduate and graduate students to study abroad. According to the Open Doors 2019 Report by the Institute for International Education (IIE), 341,751 students participated in post-secondary education abroad programs during the 2017/2018 academic year. This figure represents an increase of 2.7% of U.S. students studying abroad from the previous year. Research shows that education abroad provides students with opportunities not only to see the world but also to develop intercultural competence, which is increasingly crucial in the 21st century workplace. There are also numerous studies that show gains in autonomy, confidence, and tolerance for ambiguity in students who complete some type of study abroad experience. In sum, the education abroad experience in itself represents a powerful learning environment that continues to support personal and professional development long after returning home. Nonetheless, these learning environments must be cultivated along with faculty who develop and lead programs, as well as university partners and providers. Furthermore, education abroad programming and assessment is complex and must take into consideration many factors including academic goals, purposeful curricular development, and a balance between academics and leisure activities on site. This book explores the many aspects of education abroad as a learning environment, such as student learning outcomes, faculty development, and program assessment and evaluation. In addition, several chapters present education abroad experiences as a model for community engagement and activism. The authors represent a diverse range of institutions and perspectives and discuss programs around the globe. The book represents the voices of faculty that lead education abroad programs, students who participate in them, and also those of international students on a U.S. campus reflecting on their personal experiences abroad. Furthermore, this book contributes to the discussion of best practices to assist faculty and program directors in creating robust education abroad programs that meet the needs of their students and institutions.

INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER A New York Times Notable Book * Named a Best Book of the Year by Vogue, TIME, and Marie Claire “A manifesto to happiness—the one found when you stop running from who you are.” –New York Times Book Review “An extraordinary book, acrobatic on the level of the sentence, symphonic across its many movements—and this is a book that moves…My Year Abroad is a wild ride—a caper, a romance, a bildungsroman, and something of a satire of how to get filthy rich in rising Asia.” – Vogue From the award-winning author of Native Speaker and On Such a Full Sea, an exuberant, provocative story about a young American life transformed by an unusual Asian adventure – and about the human capacities for pleasure, pain, and connection. Tiller is an average American college student with a good heart but minimal aspirations. Pong Lou is a larger-than-life, wildly creative Chinese American entrepreneur who sees something intriguing in Tiller beyond his bored exterior and takes him under his wing. When Pong brings him along on a boisterous trip across Asia, Tiller is catapulted from ordinary young man to talented protégé, and pulled into a series of ever more extreme and eye-opening experiences that transform his view of the world, of Pong, and of himself. In the breathtaking, “precise, elliptical prose” that Chang-rae Lee is known for (The New York Times), the narrative alternates between Tiller’s outlandish, mind-boggling year with Pong and the strange, riveting, emotionally complex domestic life that follows it, as Tiller processes what happened to him abroad and what it means for his future. Rich with commentary on Western attitudes, Eastern stereotypes, capitalism, global trade, mental health, parenthood, mentorship, and more, My Year Abroad is also an exploration of the surprising effects of cultural immersion—on a young American in Asia, on a Chinese man in America, and on an unlikely couple hiding out in the suburbs. Tinged at once with humor and darkness, electric with its accumulating surprises and suspense, My Year Abroad is a novel that only Chang-rae Lee could have written, and one that will be read and discussed for years to come.

This edited volume brings together the perspectives of a diverse group of international scholars to explore the intersections of study abroad and social mobility. In doing so, it challenges universalist assumptions and power imbalances implicit in study abroad across the Global North and South, and explores the implications of COVID-19 for equity within study abroad programs, policy, and practice going forward. Offering empirical, theoretical, and conceptual contributions, Critical Perspectives on Equity and Social Mobility in Study Abroad foregrounds critical reflection on the stratification of access to study abroad and examines the varied outcomes of international study in relation to graduates’ entry into domestic and international labor markets. Focusing on the experiences and outcomes of students from varied backgrounds, chapters identify a number of power imbalances relating to student race, ethnicity, religion, local and international policies and politics, and put forward valuable recommendations to ensure greater equity within the field. Against the backdrop of growing criticism over the power imbalances in international exchange, this text will benefit researchers, academics, and educators with an interest in higher education, international and comparative education, and multicultural education. Those interested in educational policy and the sociology of education more broadly will also benefit from this book.

From sending imams abroad to financing mosques and Islamic associations, home states play a key role in governing Islam in Western Europe. Drawing on over one hundred interviews and years of fieldwork, this book employs a comparative perspective that analyzes the foreign religious activities of the two home states with the largest diaspora populations in Europe: Turkey and Morocco. The research shows how these states use religion to promote ties with their citizens and their descendants abroad while also seeking to maintain control over the forms of Islam that develop within the diaspora. The author identifies and explains the internal and foreign political interests that have motivated state actors on both sides of the Mediterranean, ultimately arguing that interstate cooperation in religious affairs has and will continue to have a structural influence on the evolution of Islam in Western Europe.