Dissertation Proposal Questions Flashcards
Summarize your Dissertation Proposal in under 10 minutes. Your purpose, research questions, and method. The logic of purpose and structure should be crystal clear.
RESEARCH CONCERN: Many authorities on preaching believe that pastors should preach sermons that are both faithful to the text of the Bible and fitting to the contexts of their audiences. But in order to do that effectively, many authorities on preaching (Tisdale 1997, Allen 1998, Neiman and Rogers 2001, Jeter and Allen 2002, Eswine 2008, Tisdale and Troeger 2013, Lamb 2014, Alcantara 2015, and Bartholomew 2016) argue that pastors should immerse themselves in the daily lives of their listeners to develop cultural self-awareness- the “conscious ability to critically view and understand the objective and subjective cultures to which the individual belongs” (Bennett 2015, 177). Such an awareness of the self, scholars argue, is necessary to be an effective preacher of God’s word. There is a paucity of resources and qualitative research on whether pastors are actually immersing themselves in the day-to-day lives of the members of congregations and people of their cities; and, if they are, the extent to which their intercultural interactions have helped them develop cultural self-awareness. RESEARCH OBJECTIVES: To help remedy this paucity of resources, I propose this dissertation to achieve 5 objectives: (1) to find out if pastors are spending time with people who attend their congregations or who live in their cities, outside of worship services, bible studies, worship service planning meetings, or other explicitly church-related gatherings; (2) to search for specific ways pastors interact with people who attend their congregations or who live in cities (apart from worship services, bible studies, worship-planning meetings, or hospital visitations); (3) to examine whether their intercultural interactions have led to cultural self-awareness; (4) to determine how, specifically, if at all, the pastors’ cultural self-awareness have affected how they (prepare to) preach and/or teach the Bible; (5) and, based on these findings, this study will aim to develop a grounded theory of how preaching pastors in the United States develop cultural self-awareness. RESEARCH QUESTIONS RQ 1: What intercultural interactions have preaching pastors gone through to help them become aware of their own cultural backgrounds, and, what, specifically, have pastors become aware of with regard to their own cultures or the cultures of others? RQ 2: If preaching pastors spend their time with congregants outside of the church building and church-related meetings, how do they spend that time? RQ 3: To what extent do preaching pastors interact with people who are culturally different from themselves, and what are the typical contexts of those interactions? RQ 4: What difference, if any, has this awareness about their own cultural backgrounds made in their approach to preaching? What strategies emerged from this awareness? RQ 5: If the preaching pastors have employed preaching strategies as a result of their awareness about their own cultural backgrounds, what, if any, were their perceived consequences of those strategies? RESEARCH METHOD I selected a grounded theory approach (Strauss & Corbin, 1998) because so so little is known about the specific factors and factor relationships that make up the process of developing cultural self-awareness among preaching pastors. The grounded theory approach developed by Corbin & Strauss (2007, 2015) seeks to “inductively generate a theory of a process, an action, or an interaction that is grounded in, or emerges from, the data (in this case, the views of the research participants)” (Bloomberg 2016, 49). Sampling I will conduct face-to-face, in-depth interviews of 30 pastors in the United States for 45-60 minutes. When face-to-face interviews are not possible, I will interview them online via zoom or skype or whatever technology that is most convenient for them, and which will still give me access to the data I need for this research project. In grounded theory, the ultimate criterion for the final sample size is theoretical saturation (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Theoretical saturation uses the general rule that when building a theory, data should be gathered until each category (or theme) is saturated. A sample size of 30 pastors will be used as a baseline and theoretical saturation will be employed to determine the final sample size. Criteria for Participant Selection I will seek to interview a diversity of male and female preaching pastors between age 25 and 65 who preach in urban, suburban, and/or rural contexts. I will seek recommendations from pastors and seminary professors for preaching pastors whom they consider effective cross-cultural Christian communicators. Gaining Access and Developing Rapport I will seek to gain permission to interview pastors by requesting a mutual pastoral or academic acquaintance to introduce me to their colleagues. In the absence of a mutual acquaintance, I will contact churches via phone, email, and mail correspondence to request interviews with pastors of those churches. Data Collection I will collect data from multiple sources, but the primary source will be face-to-face (in person or online), one-on-one, in-depth interviews with pastors. According to Brinkmann and Kvale (2015, 4), an interview is “where knowledge is constructed in the interaction between the interviewer and the interviewee.” Practically, I will rely as much as possible on the participants’ views of their situations. Often, the meanings pastors have not been imprinted on them as individuals, but have been formed through interactions with others, and through historical and cultural norms that operate in their individual lives. So rather than starting with a theory, I hope to inductively develop a theory or pattern of meaning about cultural self-awareness that is based on their multiple perspectives. In addition to interviews, I will attend, when possible, some of the live worship services of pastors in order to observe (i.e., get a fully sense of) how they actually communicate to their congregations in person, paying special attention to any implicit or explicit references to culture. To supplement interviews and in-person observations, I will also review some audiovisual materials of each preaching pastor. By watching or listening to worship services and sermons of each preaching pastor via DVDs, cassette tapes, their websites, Youtube, Vimeo, Livestream, or some other online platforms. When possible, I will look at the ethnic, age, and educational diversity of the churches, and see if I might make a connection between the preaching pastor’s cultural self-awareness and the diversity of the congregation. Such data can give me insight about how the pastors’ culture reveals itself through the sermon or worship service; and, to see if I can identify any moments where the preaching pastor acknowledges his or her awareness about his or her own cultural background as it relates to the people in the audience. If more information is needed after the interview is over, I will also submit follow-up questions to pastors via email to see if he or she can fill in some information gaps that might be revealed during my analysis of the data. Recording Information I will record data following my interview protocol, taking field notes, and reflective memoing or journaling. The interviews will be conducted in English and will be recorded with a Zoom H2N portable audio recorder. They will be transferred to Lacie 10TB external hard drives and backed up by other hard drives. The interviews will be transcribed by someone I hire, and will be loaded into Nvivo and coded according to themes. Using factor analysis, the topics will be reduced in order to identify common threads. Minimizing Field Issues In order to protect the anonymity of participants, I will make their names aliases in the data, and if a master list is needed, I will be sure to store it separately. In order to make each preaching pastor feel comfortable, my questions will be broad and general so that the participants can construct the meanings of a situation, a meaning typically forged in discussion and interactions with other persons. I will listen carefully to what participants say or do, paying particular attention to how they describe the processes of interaction they have had people who do not share their cultures. I will use a script to help guide the interview, but will allow the direction of the conversation to be open-ended so that each of the interviewees will feel comfortable enough to share everything they want to share on this topic without feeling constrained. I believe 60-minutes will give interviewees to have enough time to reflect and respond to questions and follow-up questions. Because some of the questions will require careful consideration, I believe a qualitative approach best suits the purposes of this study. Because I want the interviewees to feel as comfortable as possible to talk freely, I will hold interviews in locations that are appropriate for the respondents, and which do not create any anxiety or discomfort. As such, I will probably conduct the interviews in the pastor’s office, at their homes, or, if they prefer, a location away from their homes or offices. I will also conduct some interviews online via zoom or some other media platform. Storing Data Securely I will record each interview with a Zoom H2N portable audio recorder. For interviews that will conducted online, I will prefer to use Zoom’s online platform because it gives me the option to record, save, and download each interview. Once downloaded, I will transfer all the data from the above technologies to a 10TB Lacie external hard drives, and back up the data by copying it to other Lacie 10TB hard drives. As a third measure to preserve and protect the data, I will store it online in Dropbox, an online data storage service. As a fourth measure, I will also upload all files into NVivo where I can analyze it in one convenient place. Data Analysis First, the interviews will be transcribed by someone I hire, and will be loaded into Nvivo. Then, using the basic principles of grounded theory data analysis (Strauss & Corbin, 1998), I will analyze the data. Specifically, I will use Microanalysis for all interviews to ensure that no important ideas or constructs are overlooked. I will create codes for each new idea and theme that will be found to be conceptually similar in nature or related in meaning will be grouped together as concepts. Those concepts will then be developed through constant comparison, with the most relevant concepts being integrated to forma theoretical framework for cultural self-awareness among pastors. This framework, which will be the final product of the study, will explain the central theme of the data as well as account for variation. Validity and Possible Biases I am aware that I am not completely objective, value-neutral, that I bring certain convictions, philosophical assumptions, values, biases, and influences to this study. Ontologically, I assume that there is one ultimate reality that people perceive in multiple ways. In that sense, there are multiple “realities” based on the perceptions of people. I believe that the best way to study those perceptions is by getting as close to those realities as possible and recording those interviews and other collected data, and only reporting what the informants actually communicate. Epistemologically, I embrace the idea that knowledge of those realities/perceptions can be discovered through the subjective experiences of people. As such, I think the best way to examine that knowledge is to reduce the distance between me as a researcher and the people who are the subjects of my study, namely, pastors. Axiologically, I am aware that all my findings are interpretations of interpretations. With that in mind, I think it is important to share some of the values that I am aware I am bringing to this study: I am forty-two years old, which might influence that fact that my interest and awareness of this topic might not be as important to an older preaching pastor who has not had to interact across cultures. To address this, I am not going to do my best to not allow my own evaluations of their responses to influence how I report their responses. Also, I spent the first 16 years of my life as a non-Christian whose family did not attend church or believe in God; and, despite having been a Christian involved in churches for almost thirty years, I still feel like an outsider in many churches. Some of this is due to the fact that many churches and sermons create distance with me because they do not address the particularities of my own personal experiences or cultural background. This feeling of being an outsider has undoubtedly influenced my evaluations of how pastors preach and teach, especially with regard to how that preaching might make one feel included or excluded culturally. Again, to correct this bias, I will give every preaching pastor the benefit of the doubt during their interviews and report exactly what pastors have to say about this topic by recording and transcribing our interviews. I am ethnically mixed with African-American, Chicano-American, and Irish, and have been primarily socialized in both African-American and Chicano-American contexts. This is important because if interviewing a preaching pastor who does not have an ethnically diverse church, my physical appearance may influence his/her answers in the interviews. I am aware that those ethnic lenses could bias me against any preaching that fails to take into consideration the cultures of African-American and Chicano-American, and other marginalized cultures in the United States. To make sure that I am fair and unbiased, I will report only what pastors share during my interviews with them and will postpone my analysis, evaluations, and interpretations of their responses until after I have completed my interviews with them. In terms of denominational influences, I have been a member of, and served as a minister, at black, white, and ethnically mixed churches that were pentecostal, non-denominational, charismatic, Baptist, United Methodist, and Progressive Baptist. I also suspect that there is a correlation between intercultural communication competence and church attendance/size. My hypothesis is that the more a preaching pastor interacts with people outside of Sunday, the more culturally self-aware that preaching pastor will become, and the more inter-culturally competent that preaching pastor can be. Put another way, I hypothesize that the more inter-culturally competent a preaching pastor is, the larger that church’s average attendance. To increase validity and reduce bias, I will use a software program, NVivo, to analyze the data. Also, I will subject my research to expert review in my dissertation committee. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RESEARCH In this rapidly changing, globalized, multicultural world, I believe pastors must begin functioning more like missionary preachers who must communicate the gospel to people whose idioms, values, and worldview are significantly different from their own. However, most preachers do not receive the training that cross-cultural missionaries receive, which can cause them to be caught unaware and unprepared to preach to culturally diverse people. This lack of cultural self-awareness can cause preachers to preach something that is, to them, deeply meaningful, but that fails to feed the hearts and spirits of their hearers. The lack of cultural self-awareness can create distance with an audience rather than alignment. Therefore, this study is based on the belief that if we study how preachers are processing their inter-cultural interactions, we might discover some insights regarding cultural self-awareness that could help preaching pastors become more effective at communicating the Word of God across cultures for the Kingdom of God. ANTICIPATED NEW CONTRIBUTION First, this research will provide new insights about whether pastors are interacting with people inter-culturally outside of their usual church-related gatherings such as worship services, bible studies, hospital visitations, ministry-planning meetings, etc. Second, it will provide new insights about how pastors have actually processed intercultural interactions and whether those interactions have led to their development of cultural self-awareness. Third, this study will reveal how, if at all, cultural self-awareness has specifically affected how pastors (prepare to) preach and teach the Bible. Fourth, this dissertation will reveal the outcomes of strategies pastors have used after developing cultural self-awareness. Finally, this dissertation will generate a unified, grounded theoretical explanation for how preaching pastors develop cultural self-awareness. That theory, I hope, will make a significant contribution in terms of knowledge building and potential practical application for preaching pastors in the United States.
What is your research concern?
Many authorities on preaching believe that pastors should preach sermons that are both faithful to the text of the Bible and fitting to the contexts of their audiences. But in order to do that effectively, many authorities on preaching (Tisdale 1997, Allen 1998, Neiman and Rogers 2001, Jeter and Allen 2002, Eswine 2008, Tisdale and Troeger 2013, Lamb 2014, Alcantara 2015, and Bartholomew 2016) argue that pastors should immerse themselves in the daily lives of their listeners to develop cultural self-awareness- the “conscious ability to critically view and understand the objective and subjective cultures to which the individual belongs” (Bennett 2015, 177). Such an awareness of the self, scholars argue, is necessary to be an effective preacher of God’s word. There is a paucity of resources and qualitative research on whether pastors are actually immersing themselves in the day-to-day lives of their congregations and people of their cities; and, if they are, how those interactions with people who are culturally different from them have affected them and their preaching. To help remedy this, I propose this dissertation to explore if, or to what extent, pastors are immersing themselves in the day-to-day lives of the members of their congregations and the people of their cities; and, if those interactions are helping pastors develop cultural self-awareness.
What are your research objectives?
The purpose of this grounded theory study will be to explore the processes preaching pastors go through to develop cultural self-awareness. Specifically, this research project (1) will find out if pastors are spending time with people who attend their congregations or who live in their cities, outside of worship services, bible studies, worship service planning meetings, or other explicitly church-related gatherings; (2) it will search for specific ways pastors interact with people who attend their congregations or who live in cities (apart from worship services, bible studies, worship-planning meetings, or hospital visitations); (3) it will examine whether those interactions have led to cultural self-awareness among pastors; (4) it will seek to determine how, specifically, if at all, the pastors’ cultural self-awareness have affected how they (prepare to) preach and/or teach the Bible; (5) and, based on these findings, this study will aim to develop a theory of how to develop cultural self-awareness for pastors in the United States.
What are your research questions?
RQ 1: What intercultural interactions have preaching pastors gone through to help them become aware of their own cultural backgrounds, and, what, specifically, have pastors become aware of with regard to their own cultures or the cultures of others? RQ 2: If preaching pastors spend their time with congregants outside of the church building and church-related meetings, how do they spend that time? RQ 3: To what extent do preaching pastors interact with people who are culturally different from themselves, and what are the typical contexts of those interactions? RQ 4: What difference, if any, has this awareness about their own cultural backgrounds made in their approach to preaching? What strategies emerged from this awareness? RQ 5: If the preaching pastor has employed preaching strategies as a result of their awareness about their own cultural backgrounds, what, if any, were their perceived consequences of those strategies?
What theoretical constructs will you use to frame your study?
This study will use Darla Deardorff’s (2006, 2015) Pyramid Model of Intercultural Communication Competence to place this entire discussion in a broader context; it will use Jared Alcantara’s (2015) theory of Reflective Immersion; Corbin and Strauss’s (2007, 2015) grounded theory approach and Denzin & Lincoln’s (2011) social constructivist/interpretivist framework. Darla Deardorff (2006, 2015) conducted an empirical study to determine what intercultural competence is, what components are included in intercultural competence, and how it can be assessed; and argues that “Cultural self-awareness” is an important component of intercultural communication competence. I will use Deardorff’s model to place this study in the wider context of intercultural communication competence, a skill that all communicators, including pastors, need to be effective and appropriate communicators of biblical truth. I also plan to use Jared Alcantara (2015, 292) calls for preachers to engage in “reflective immersion,” a process in which students immerse themselves in the culture of others and critically reflect on their experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or group reflection. Based on that Alcantara’s theory, this study will determine, first, if pastors are immersing themselves in the culture of others, and, if they are, I would like to determine if they are they also critically reflecting on those experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or other strategies. Furthermore, I would like to examine what types of discoveries those pastors made about themselves and others through their immersion experiences and explore how, if at all, those new discoveries have affected how they (prepare to) preach and teach. Grounded Theory Then, building upon findings regarding whether pastors are actually immersing themselves in the cultures of others, and whether those interactions lead to cultural self-awareness, I would like to find out the specific factors and factor relationships that comprise the process and outcomes of developing cultural self-awareness among pastors. A grounded theory approach developed by Corbin & Strauss (2007, 2015) will help me discover a unified theoretical explanation for that process. Social Constructivism Finally, I plan to base this study on a social constructivist framework propagated by Denzin & Lincoln (2011). Social constructivism focuses on seeking to understand the world of people as they see it, and they develop subjective meanings of their experiences. Those meanings are varied and multiple, and, using this framework, I will look for the complexity of views from the multiple perspectives of pastors I will interview regarding cultural self-awareness.
Who is Darla Deardorff, what is her Pyramid Model of ICC, and why is it important for your study?
Dr. Darla K. Deardorff is Executive Director of the Association of International Education Administrators, a leadership organization. She is also a research fellow at Duke University. Recent projects include advising the OECD’s PISA Global Competence Project & a UNESCO Intercultural Competence Project. She has published widely, including editor of The SAGE Handbook of Intercultural Competence (Sage, 2009). Other recent books include lead editor of The Sage Handbook of International Higher Education (Sage, 2012), co-author of Building Cultural Competence Specialties: Intercultural Competence, Assessment and Evaluation, Global Leadership, Cross-Cultural Training, Intercultural Research, Internationalization, International Higher Education Deardorff (2006), seeing all the different conceptualizations and definitions of ICC among scholars, conducted an empirical study to determine what intercultural competence is, what components are included in intercultural competence, and how it can be assessed. She surveyed twenty-three of the most cross-referenced, influential scholars in the field of Intercultural Studies about how they define intercultural competence, what is included in it, and how they assess it. She found that scholars predominantly defined intercultural communication competence as “the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes” (Deardorff 2006, 194). Deardorff presents a pyramid model to illustrate her findings. Her pyramid model has attitude at the foundation of it. According to Deardorff, “Attitudes” is the foundation upon which all intercultural communication competence is built because, without it, knowledge and skill will not be adequately learned. The attitude that will be the most helpful to a person consists of: 1. Respect (value other cultures) 2. Openness (open to learning about other cultures; suspension of judgment), 3. Curiosity and discovery (tolerating ambiguity and uncertainty). One level above Attitudes are two adjacent boxes. The first box, Knowledge and Comprehension, includes: 1. Cultural self-awareness 2. Understanding of culture of others, 3. Socio-linguistic awareness. The second box, adjacent to Knowledge is Skills. They consist of: 1. Listening 2. Observing 3. Interpreting 4. Analyzing 5. Evaluating 6. Relating Deardorff says that knowledge and skills are interrelated, but does not explain their relationship. The next level up on Deardorff’s (2006) Pyramid model is the “Desired Internal Outcomes” of having knowledge and skills. They are: 1. Adaptability 2. Flexibility 3. Ethnorelative View 4. Empathy The top level of Deardorff’s pyramid model is “Desired External Outcomes,” which involves: 1. Communicating and behaving effectively. 2. Communicating and behaving appropriately The main point I would like to make is that Deardorff, based on the findings of her empirical study, establishes that cultural self-awareness is a necessary component of intercultural communication competence.
Who is Jared Alcantara, what is his theory of Reflective Immersion, and why did you choose it for this study?
Jared E. Alcántara is Associate Professor of Preaching and holder of the Paul W. Powell Endowed Chair in Preaching. He was born and raised in New Jersey and came to faith in Christ at the age of fourteen. He is half-Latino (Honduran) and half-White. An ordained Baptist minister, he has served as a youth pastor, associate pastor, and teaching pastor in Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon, and New Jersey. Before coming to Truett, from 2014-2018, he served as an associate professor of homiletics at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. Dr. Alcántara is passionate about equipping students to preach God’s Word in ways that are faithful, effective, clear, creative, and inspiring. He also plays piano, enjoys disc golf, and is a rabid Philadelphia Eagles fan. He lives in the Waco area with his wife, Jennifer, and their three daughters. Jared Alcántara (2015) is the only scholar who pays specific attention to helping preachers developing cultural self-awareness. He offers a definition of, and recommends a process for, immersion. Alcántara (2015, 288), critically examining the sermons of Gardner C. Taylor, and citing research of other social scientists, describes the interaction between preachers and others who are culturally different from them as “two icebergs colliding.” Citing the research of Gary Weaver (2000), Alcántara explains that a person’s internal culture, a term coined by Edward T. Hall (1976), can be compared to an iceberg that is only 10 percent above the surface (conscious) and 90 percent below (unconscious). Thus, when preachers enter another culture, the real clash occurs beneath the surface. Through these interactions, the preacher begins to become aware of one’s own culture. In that way, intercultural proficiency comes not only from learning about others, but also from learning about oneself. To reduce the kinds of problems that could result from cultural collisions in preaching, Alcántara (2015, 292) calls for preachers to engage in “reflective immersion,” a process in which students immerse themselves in the culture of others and critically reflect on their experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or group reflection. He believes professors of preaching can also help their students reflect on how their own cultural and denominational backgrounds have shaped them and their expectations of preaching. Based on that Alcantara’s theory, this study will determine, first, if pastors are immersing themselves in the culture of others, and, if they are, I would like to determine if they are they also critically reflecting on those experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or other strategies. Furthermore, I would like to examine what types of discoveries those pastors made about themselves and others through their immersion experiences, and explore how, if at all, those new discoveries have affected how they (prepare to) preach and teach. Furthermore, Alcántara (2015, 281) recommends that for preachers to develop intercultural competence — which includes cultural self-awareness — they should go through LEAD (Listen, Engage, Assess and Decenter), a process he created. It means listen to others, engage in activities and cultural experiences of people who do not share their culture, assess one’s own progress through interviews or written assignments, and decenter oneself ethnocentrically. Alcántara also recommends that preachers and professors of preaching, take tests that can help them develop cultural self-awareness. While the tests he mentions (Brislin and Yoshida 1999; Gudykunst 1998; Early, Ang, and Tan 2006; Livermore 2011; and Bennett 2013) could help preachers increase their intercultural competence, I am not sure which test or tests Alcántara believes would best help preachers develop cultural self-awareness. I am not sure why he selected these tests and he does not say. Which categories should be included? Because Alcántara recommends so many different tests, I am not sure which categories he believes preachers should consider when examining the objective and subjective cultures to which they belong. Nonetheless, he has remarkably advanced the conversation about cultural self-awareness. He has laid the foundation for more qualitative work to be done.
What is grounded theory, who created it, and why did you choose it as opposed to the other (4) approaches?
The grounded theory approach developed by Corbin & Strauss (2007, 2015) seeks to develop a theory grounded in data from the field. That is, “to inductively generate theory that is grounded in, or emerges from, the data…The goal is to move beyond description (of a phenomenon) and have the researcher generate or discover a theory of a process, an action, or an interaction grounded in the view of the research participants” (Bloomberg 2016, 49). Because so so little is known about how pastors develop cultural self-awareness, I would like to find out the specific factors and factor relationships that comprise the process of developing cultural self-awareness among preaching pastors; and, a grounded theory approach- which studies processes- can help me discover a unified theoretical explanation for that process that I hope will have explanatory power to make a significant contribution in terms of knowledge building and potential practical application for preaching pastors.
What are the other approaches you could have used to design this study, and why did you choose the grounded study approach?
The Narrative approach usually explores the life of one or more individuals and it is best suited for telling stories of individual experiences. I didn’t choose that approach because I think the answers I need to find require me to interview 30 or more individuals about the intercultural experiences. While knowing the life stories of individuals is relevant to understanding their cultural backgrounds, I am more interested in the extent to which their intercultural interactions have affected them. The Ethnographic research seeks to describe and interpret a culture-sharing group. That is, it focuses on studying a group that shares the same culture. That approach is best for describing and interpreting the shared patterns of a group of people. I am interested in the process several individuals go through in their intercultural interactions, not in a single group’s culture. The Phenomenological approach seeks to understand the essence of an experience or a phenomenon. It’s unit of analysis usually involves studying several individuals who have shared the experience with a phenomenon. It is best suited for describing the essence of a lived phenomenon. I didn’t choose that approach because I think there is a consensus among scholars about what cultural self-awareness is. I am interested in the processes preaching pastors go through whenever they experience that phenomenon. That’s what grounded theory research does- it focuses on processes. The Case Study approach seeks to develop an in-depth description and analysis of a case or multiple cases, and focusing on studying an event, a program, an activity, or more than one individual. It is best for providing an in-depth understanding of a case or cases. I didn’t choose that approach because I am not interested in studying a business, a program, or a particular case but I am interested in studying the process that several individuals go through to develop cultural self-awareness, or, at the very least, understanding the processes preaching pastors go through when they interact with people who do not share their own cultures. The Grounded Theory approach seeks to develop a theory grounded in data from the field. It is less interested in studying individual stories (as in Narrative research), individual cases (as in Case Study research), bounded groups (Ethnographic research), or in describing the essence of a phenomenon (as in Phenomenological research), but, instead, is interested in studying a process, an action, or an interaction of several individuals. As such, it is the most appropriate method to help me look closely at the processes preaching pastors go through when they interact with people in intercultural contexts. Then, based on the data, I will be able to ground a theory about how preaching pastors can develop cultural self-awareness.
What is social constructivism, who created it, and why did you choose this framework over other options?
Finally, I plan to base this study on a social constructivist framework propagated by Denzin & Lincoln (2011). Social constructivism focuses on seeking to understand the world of people as they see it, and they develop subjective meanings of their experiences. Those meanings are varied and multiple, and, using this framework, I will look for the complexity of views from the multiple perspectives of pastors I will interview regarding cultural self-awareness.
What other frameworks could you have chosen, and why did you choose social constructivism?
I could have used a postpositivist framework, which takes a more scientific approach to research. It does not believe in strict cause and effect but rather recognizes that all cause and effect is a probability that may or may not occur. It has elements of being reductionistic, logical, empirical, and cause-and-effect oriented. A transformation framework is based on the belief that postpositivists impose laws and theories that do not fit marginalized individuals or groups and constructivists don’t go far enough in advocating action to help individuals. As such, they believe that knowledge is not neutral and it reflects the power and social relationships within society. Thus, the purpose of knowledge construction is to aid people to improve society, especially for marginalized groups. A postmodern framework that believes that knowledge claims must be set within the conditions of the world today and in the multiple perspectives of class, race, gender, and other group affiliations. Deconstructs texts and rejects metanarratives. A Pragmatic framework focuses on the outcomes of hte research- the actions, situations, and consequences of inquiry- rather than antecedent conditions (as in postpositivism). There is a concern with application- with “what works”- and solutions to problems. But I chose a social constructivist framework because..
Why is this research significant? Who cares?
Not all scholars believe that preachers need to attend to culture, whether it is the culture of the congregation, the broader world outside the congregation, or the culture of the preacher. Resner (2008, 350) asserts that “[o]nly God can make efficacious the Word,” and the preacher, therefore “is of no consequence.” To support this claim, he makes a distinction between persuasion and proclamation. He asserts that persuasion is adjusting to the audience to close the deal, and proclamation “trusts in the divine efficacy of the logos of the cross.” He infers that those who try to persuade rather than proclaim are “peddlers of God’s logos” who do not trust in the efficacy of the Word of God. Resner’s distinction between persuasion and proclamation incorrectly presupposes that any preacher who uses persuasion lacks confidence in the efficacy of God’s Word. However, even the Apostle Paul, who is the apotheosis of fervent faith in the efficacy of God’s Word, proclaimed God’s Word by using persuasion, reasoning, and debate (Acts 17:16ff; 18:4; 19:8; 28:23; 1 Cor. 5:11). For him, persuasion was an acceptable means with which he proclaimed the gospel, not somehow compensate for it. Paul’s use of persuasion in no way reveals his lack of faith in the efficacy of God’s Word. Rather, his use of persuasion undergirded his faith in the efficacy of God’s Word. By using persuasion as a tool for proclamation, God used the Apostle Paul to lead many people to faith in Christ (Acts 17:4; 19:26; 28:24). Furthermore, the assertion that proclamation should not take into account an audience’s context contradicts the very nature of Scripture, for even the authors of the Bible take into consideration their respective audiences, not to “close the deal,” but rather, to communicate God’s Word to them. Gonzalez (2005, 21) confirms this, arguing, “The very fact that our New Testament includes four different Gospels, yet all attesting to the same truth, shows that the need to take into account the perspective of the observer- and even a variety of perspectives- is central to the very manner in which the Bible understands and presents truth. Just as there is a Gospel ‘according to Matthew’ and another ‘according to Luke,’ and yet they all witness to the same gospel, so today each of us must preach the gospel from our own perspective, and incarnate it in our own situation.” Gonzales argues that because each author of the gospels takes into account the local situations of their audiences, preachers should do the same thing. All this is to say that any claims that the preacher is of “no consequence” are just not true. It is undeniable that preachers come from particular cultural contexts. It has also been established that cultural context strongly influences how one interprets a text. Furthermore, how one interprets a text determines what and how one preaches that text. Because of that, there is no interpretation or expression, that is free from the influence of culture. Therefore, when it comes to preaching, even though the Word of God is undeniably efficacious in the work of salvation, the preacher is of significant consequence in the preaching event. Given the inescapable influence of culture on a person communicating biblical truths, pastors need to engage in an exegesis of the self in order to develop cultural self-awareness. Only by doing so can one be sure that the preacher’s culture is not an “intrusion” to the preaching of God’s Word. In short, the culture of the preaching pastor must be examined. This research is significant for the field of Missiology and Homiletics because if Christian communicators lack awareness about how they have been shaped culturally and how they are culturally different from the people in the Bible and their present-day audiences, their effectiveness at preaching the Word of God to people whom do not share their cultures will be limited, at best. That lack of cultural self-awareness could be a barrier that prevents the gospel from being preached in ways that are meaningful for their audiences today. Therefore, this study is based on the belief that if we study how preachers are processing their inter-cultural interactions, we might discover some insights regarding cultural self-awareness that could help preachers and pastors everywhere become more effective at communicating the Word of God across cultures for the Kingdom of God. Studying cultural self-awareness among pastors is also important to me personally because I have spoken to over two-thousand culturally-diverse groups since 1999 and I have faced many challenges when trying to communicate to people who do not share my social or cultural background. Those challenges have prompted me to search for ways to be more effective at communicating across cultures. Furthermore, because our world is rapidly changing in terms of globalization, politics, immigration patterns, religion, and technology, among other areas, there is a need to equip other Christian communicators with the cultural self-awareness, and, ultimately, with the intercultural communication competence needed to preach and teach God’s Word to people in this rapidly changing world more effectively.
What does the precedent literature about Intercultural Communication Competence say about Cultural Self-Awareness?
Intercultural Communication Competence For more than fifty years, scholars from a variety of fields have studied intercultural communication competence (ICC) to help people understand and navigate a rapidly changing world. Some scholars refer to the concept of ICC as cross-cultural competence, communication competence, global competence, cultural intelligence, global citizenship, multiculturalism, and intercultural sensitivity, among other things. Summary and Comparison of the Various ICC Models Early scholars such as Hammar, Wiseman, and Gudykunst (1978) sought to identify skills within individuals but Bennett (1986), who thought that skills without a sequence or structure were unhelpful, introduced a developmental model of ICC that involves sequences. The height of his model involves “constructive marginality” in which a person loses any absolute sense of identity. Collier and Thomas (1988), Imahori and Cupach (1993), and Ting-Toomey (1993) argue that one’s cultural identity plays such a central role in intercultural interactions that it is impossible to marginalize them. Gudykunst (1993) takes identity more seriously, and includes it as a subcategory of his conceptualization of ICC, but adds “mindfulness” to the discussion. Byram (1997) argues that Gudykunst (1993) and others fail to take seriously linguistic competence, and, thus, adds it to his conceptualization as well as another domain called “critical cultural awareness.” Spitzberg (2000) argues that ICC is not just about what an individual does but about what an individual is perceived to be by others. Deardorff (2006), seeing all the different conceptualizations and definitions of ICC among scholars, conducted an empirical study to determine what intercultural competence is, what components are included in intercultural competence, and how it can be assessed. She surveyed twenty-three of the most cross-referenced, influential scholars in the field of Intercultural Studies about how they define intercultural competence, what is included in it, and how they assess it. She found that scholars predominantly defined intercultural communication competence as “the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately in intercultural situations based on one’s intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes” (Deardorff 2006, 194). Deardorff presents a pyramid model to illustrate her findings. Her pyramid model has attitude at the foundation of it. According to Deardorff, “Attitudes” is the foundation upon which all intercultural communication competence is built because, without it, knowledge and skill will not be adequately learned. The attitude that will be the most helpful to a person consists of: 1. Respect (value other cultures) 2. Openness (open to learning about other cultures; suspension of judgment), 3. Curiosity and discovery (tolerating ambiguity and uncertainty). One level above Attitudes are two adjacent boxes. The first box, Knowledge and Comprehension, includes: 1. Cultural self-awareness 2. Understanding of culture of others, 3. Socio-linguistic awareness. The second box, adjacent to Knowledge is Skills. They consist of: 1. Listening 2. Observing 3. Interpreting 4. Analyzing 5. Evaluating 6. Relating Deardorff says that knowledge and skills are interrelated, but does not explain their relationship. The next level up on Deardorff’s (2006) Pyramid model is the “Desired Internal Outcomes” of having knowledge and skills. They are: 1. Adaptability 2. Flexibility 3. Ethnorelative View 4. Empathy The top level of Deardorff’s pyramid model is “Desired External Outcomes,” which involves: 1. Communicating and behaving effectively. 2. Communicating and behaving appropriately The main point I would like to make is that Deardorff, based on the findings of her empirical study, establishes that cultural self-awareness is a necessary component of intercultural communication competence.
What are some open questions regarding cultural self-awareness?
The literature on intercultural communication competence makes it clear that more empirical research needs to be done to test current theories, including Deardorff’s Pyramid Model. If cultural self-awareness is a fundamental aspect of ICC, how does a person develop it? There is no consensus in the literature. Also, since communication happens within inter-cultural contexts, what should people consider when they are examining another person’s context or culture? There is still no consensus among scholars. Many of them point people to studying a culture’s “context” or “conventions,” but do not get specific about what those terms mean. Of all the things one could know about the culture, conventions, and contexts of others, what would be the most helpful knowledge for positioning a person to speak in ways that are effective and appropriate? Finally, what does the development of social media mean for the development of ICC, and, specifically, cultural self-awareness? With the world becoming increasingly filled with social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Snapchat, among other media platforms), can inter-cultural interactions over social media help a preaching pastor develop cultural self-awareness?
What does precedent literature on preaching say about cultural self-awareness?
Many authorities on preaching (Tisdale 1997, Allen 1998, Neiman and Rogers 2001, Jeter and Allen 2002, Eswine 2008, Tisdale and Troeger 2013, Lamb 2014, Alcantara 2015, and Bartholomew 2016) argue that pastors should immerse themselves in the daily lives of their listeners to develop cultural self-awareness- the “conscious ability to critically view and understand the objective and subjective cultures to which the individual belongs” (Bennett 2015, 177). That is, pastors should spend time the people of their congregations outside of their regular church-related activities such as Sunday morning worship services, bible studies, and other explicitly church-related gatherings, in order to not only understand the members of their congregations better, but also to help them develop an awareness of their own cultural backgrounds. Jared Alcántara (2015) is the only scholar who pays specific attention to helping preachers developing cultural self-awareness. He offers a definition of, and recommends a process for, immersion. Alcántara (2015, 288), critically examining the sermons of Gardner C. Taylor, and citing research of other social scientists, describes the interaction between preachers and others who are culturally different from them as “two icebergs colliding.” Citing the research of Gary Weaver (2000), Alcántara explains that a person’s internal culture, a term coined by Edward T. Hall (1976), can be compared to an iceberg that is only 10 percent above the surface (conscious) and 90 percent below (unconscious). Thus, when preachers enter another culture, the real clash occurs beneath the surface. Through these interactions, the preacher begins to become aware of one’s own culture. In that way, intercultural proficiency comes not only from learning about others, but also from learning about oneself. To reduce the kinds of problems that could result from cultural collisions in preaching, Alcántara (2015, 292) calls for preachers to engage in “reflective immersion,” a process in which students immerse themselves in the culture of others and critically reflect on their experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or group reflection. He believes professors of preaching can also help their students reflect on how their own cultural and denominational backgrounds have shaped them and their expectations of preaching. Based on that Alcantara’s theory, this study will determine, first, if pastors are immersing themselves in the culture of others, and, if they are, I would like to determine if they are they also critically reflecting on those experiences through journaling, reflective paper assignments, or other strategies. Furthermore, I would like to examine what types of discoveries those pastors made about themselves and others through their immersion experiences, and explore how, if at all, those new discoveries have affected how they (prepare to) preach and teach. Furthermore, Alcántara (2015, 281) recommends that for preachers to develop intercultural competence — which includes cultural self-awareness — they should go through LEAD (Listen, Engage, Assess and Decenter), a process he created. It means listen to others, engage in activities and cultural experiences of people who do not share their culture, assess one’s own progress through interviews or written assignments, and decenter oneself ethnocentrically. Alcántara also recommends that preachers and professors of preaching, take tests that can help them develop cultural self-awareness. While the tests he mentions (Brislin and Yoshida 1999; Gudykunst 1998; Early, Ang, and Tan 2006; Livermore 2011; and Bennett 2013) could help preachers increase their intercultural competence, I am not sure which test or tests Alcántara believes would best help preachers develop cultural self-awareness. I am not sure why he selected these tests and he does not say. Which categories should be included? Because Alcántara recommends so many different tests, I am not sure which categories he believes preachers should consider when examining the objective and subjective cultures to which they belong. Nonetheless, he has remarkably advanced the conversation about cultural self-awareness. He has laid the foundation for more qualitative work to be done.
