Curriculum
The Bachelor of Arts in Language and Intercultural Relations shares a common one-year foundation with programs in Criminology, Environment and Urban Sustainability, English, Geographic Analysis, History, Philosophy, Politics and Governance, Psychology, and Sociology. In all programs, your first year offers basic knowledge of theories, methods, and practices of a broad range of social sciences and humanities, with specialized study in Language and Intercultural Relations in the final three years.
The first two years of the program offer basic knowledge of theories, methods, and practices of a broad range of social sciences, including sociology, psychology, politics and governance and more. This will broaden your perspective of the field and provide you with an ideal foundation for specialized study in Language and Intercultural Relations in the upper years.
Year 1
In the first year, you are introduced to Language and Intercultural Relations through the first language course in your stream of choice, and through LIR100 – Global Models in Intercultural Relations, which will expose you to the concepts of world-view as expressed via differences and similarities between systems of communication. You will also develop the necessary emotional competence and intercultural sensitivity to understand the complexities of intercultural communication. It is in February of your first year at Toronto Metropolitan University that you can apply for a transfer to another program on the common platform of the Faculty of Arts. During that first year, students are also exposed to other disciplines in the Social Sciences and Humanities, and they begin acquiring new skills in academic writing and critical thinking.
Year 2
The second year is when students begin to explore a concentration, in either Language and Cognition, Translation, or Organizational Behaviour. Students also take LIR200 – Critical Practices in Intercultural Relations, and LIR300 – Intercultural Negotiation, which are core courses of this program, in addition to three further language and culture courses.
Year 3
Typically, it is in Year 3 that students would choose to be away to do a year abroad, at one of our partner universities. Currently, we have agreements with France and Spain, and planned partnerships with Mexico. In Year 3, students take LIR400 – Ethnographic Practices, acquiring the necessary tools to analyze and understand how groups are defined by their cultural and social practices, including ways in which they communicate differently, based on these characteristics.
Year 4
It is in their fourth and last year that students take LIR800, a capstone course in which students interested in graduate studies can prepare a thesis, or an extensive intercultural relation project. During this fourth year, students also hone their skills in formal presentations. Students also have an opportunity to complete a Directed Reading directly related to their concentration.