Conclusion
Emerging from the experience, one will have gained a breadth of knowledge about another nation, another world. One will also have gained a clearer perception about one's own nation, and a deeper understanding of one's self.
The latter insights are especially worthwhile for personal development, as one comes to recognize the extent to which one has been conditioned to respond to the world according the categories that are operative inside one's home nation. So, a deepening of an awareness of self, along with a widening of knowledge about the world, can be some of the results of this intensive process.
A service or a contribution to one's nation can also be an effect, as a nation gains an insightful member who knows another nation. The person knows the other nation beyond the positive and negative stereotypes that derive from the cursory experiences in phase 1 or that simply do derive from naïve fantasies. The person knows it furthermore beyond the self-defensive reactions that are typical in phase 2. A nation gains an individual who has had indepth experience and who has emerged with knowledge.
To emerge, one must learn to feel comfortable with difference: being different from others, and others being different from one's self. The process can be easier, I expect, if someone enjoys a healthy sense of humor, an ability to be amused at one's own differences and to laugh at one's own mistakes (I wish I had this ability!), for we must admit that much of our stumbling can be rather funny as we proceed along the way . . . to some extent. Isn't it rather troublesome, though, to see that many of the people who are making international decisions ~ politicians in particular, and their advisors ~ have never bothered to reach the depth of experience that has been described in phase 3?
Citation Guidelines for this Page
Mousalimas, S.A., "International Communication: a Process of Discovery", page 5, Cross-Cultural Communication: International Communication, Proceedings of the Mirny Regional Scientific-Practical Conference on Inter-Cultural Communication: Issues of Politics, History, Language and Literature (27-28 April 2002), Mirny Polytechnic Institute and Sakha (Yakutsk) State University, edited by S.A. Mousalimas, 2002, available at http://www.OxfordU.net/mirny/2002/mousalimas05.html.