Cultural contact and intercultural communication involve the sharing of knowledge between individuals and groups. This knowledge is partly explicit and can be communicated in the form of contents and information. Part of this knowledge is tacit and cannot be explicitly formulated. However, it influences and constrains the interaction in fundamental ways, as it is manifested in skills, understanding and beliefs acquired individually in the framework of a specific culture. Tacit knowledge is constrained and enabled by cognitive processes, such as attention, memory and intersubjectivity, and it is manifested both in individual action and in social interaction. Though tacit knowledge cannot be verbalized, it can be shared, it is imparted through education and modulated by culture.
For the study of cultural contacts, it is thus important to understand tacit knowledge and to capture its nature and its consequences: here, tacit knowledge is manifested in cultural representations – both of the own culture and of others – which inform (inter)action. Understanding tacit knowledge, what constrains and shapes it, can reveal how it influences the process of cultural understanding and misunderstanding.
This CRP aims at studying tacit knowledge in the intersection of cognitive science and culture studies: on the one hand, it aims at describing the cognitive conditions – both individual and social – that enable the acquisition and sharing of tacit knowledge. On the other hand, the project aims at studying how tacit knowledge shapes intercultural exchange. These two generic objectives are further specified in particular goals, covered by the related individual projects proposed.
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