Intercultural Learning - Stereotypes & Perceptions of others

Selbstbild - self-perception - generally positive
Fremdbild - perception of others - less sophisticated

Stereotype:
- coined Lippmann (1922) - a picture in our heads
- we first make up our minds before we get the facts, while the ideal would be to gather and analyse the facts before reaching conclusions.
- we pick out what our culture has already defined for us, and we tend to perceive that which we have picked out in the form stereotyped for us by our culture because the attempt to see all things freshly and in detail, rather than as types and generalities, is exhausting and among busy affairs practically out of the question
- Linguistic definition: Ein Stereotyp ist der verbale Ausdruck einer auf soziale Gruppen oder einzelne Personen als deren Mitglieder gerichten Überzeugung. Es hat die logische Form eines Urteils, das in ungerechtfertigt vereinfachender und generalisierender Weise, mit emotionalwertender Tendenz, einer Klasse von Personen bestimmte Eigenschaften oder Verhaltensweisen zu- oder abspricht (Uta Quasthoff, 1973: 28)
(translation) A stereotype is the verbal expression of a conviction based on social groups or individual people as members of such groups. It has the logical form of a judgement, that, in an unjustifiably simplified and generalised way, with emotionally judgmental tendencies, assigns or denies particular characteristics or modes of behaviour to a class of person.