Student profile: Lara Neumann, 25 years old, General Linguistics student
Thu: How do you define cultural diversity?
Lara: Cultural diversity to me means different cultures engage with each other in one society.
Thu: Do you think cultural diversity and globalisation are the same?
Lara: Not really, but globalisation creates cultural diversity, globalisation is the cause, and cultural diversity is the effect.
Thu: Which benefits does cultural diversity bring you?
Lara: I always like to stay in an international environment. Diversity brings me many benefits, such as learning a new perspective, new cuisine, new language and finally, cultural diversity makes me more empathetic and understanding when I meet new people.
Thu: How is your student life connected with diversity?
Lara: During my student life, I got to know many international students because I’m studying linguistics, maybe. People are very open-minded, and whenever we work in a group with people from different backgrounds, we always come up with new and interesting ideas. I also did one internship in Brazil, and I loved it there. I grew up after that.
Thu: Do you think COVID-19 has affected cultural diversity since it restricts social contacts and creates more inequality?
Lara: Certainly. It is harder to meet up in big groups and therefore no opportunity to meet new cultures, which is a shame.
Thu: Do you think digitalisation and technologies help us to bring more cultural diversity?
Lara: I like that I can use social media to contact my friends in Brazil, but it still doesn’t feel real to me. I would prefer having contacts in person, rather than sitting in front of the desk and looking at the laptop. However, during the pandemic, that’s the best thing we can do to maintain connections.
Thu: Thank you so much for your time and effort!
*Note: This interview was done in the form of audio.