The Department of Modern Languages, Linguistics and Intercultural Communication (MLLI) offers a program leading to a M.A. in Intercultural Communication. Students focusing on French and Francophone, Hispanic, and Russian studies participate in the program in the LANGUAGES AND CULTURES concentration. Heritage speakers and students with an extensive background in a different culture participate in the program in the CULTURES AND DIVERSITY concentration (Fall 2021). Undergraduate students can enroll in an ACCELERATED BA/MA PROGRAM and take three courses at a graduate level and count them both towards the BA and the MA Degree.
Students and faculty come from various parts of the world, and participation in the program is itself a significant intercultural experience. Our graduate students include returning Peace Corps volunteers, (THE SHRIVER PEACEWORKER PROGRAM at UMBC), teachers, foreign language students, heritage students, international educators, university and non-profit employees, and BA/MA students.
The INCC program aims:
(1) to develop advanced language and intercultural proficiency through advanced topic courses.
(2) to function effectively in intercultural situations and acquire intercultural skills in areas such as education, digital media, policy, and training.
(3) to train for specific career goals through individual courses of study and internships.
(4) to gain an understanding of the social, political, cultural, and linguistic factors of interculturality to function as fully proficient global citizens.
There are three areas of skills acquisition emphasized:
- intercultural training and conflict resolution management
- intercultural filmmaking and media
- intercultural policy (immigration and language policy).
The program provides students with intercultural skills and language and cultural proficiency to fill positions in:
- foreign-language education and training programs
- international education and advisement, human resources, university administration
- government, NGOs, human rights organizations
- travel and tourism, industry, medicine, and law
- social service and community organizations
The Department of Modern Languages, Linguistics, and Intercultural Communication at UMBC has had an interdisciplinary focus since the mid-1970s and the department is currently composed of specialists in linguistics, the social sciences, second language pedagogy, bilingual education, literary analysis, cultural studies, and intercultural communication. Initiated in 1985, this MA program has been a response to the economic, political, social, and cultural complexities of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.