Most Peace Corps Volunteers have the correct attitude for successful cross-cultural communication that allows changes to take place in them. However, there are always a few who do not possess the right attitude and who sometimes terminate even before the training is over. A few others may not make it through the first year and will also go home. And then there is sometimes even a few who must be “psycho-vacced” (psychological evacuation) because of acute culture shock.
The Peace Corps Approach To Cross-Cultural Training
A combination of intensive language training and cultural immersion living is the approach taken by the U.S. Peace Corps in its training programs for Peace Corps Volunteers throughout the world. In-country Peace Corps training programs typically last about 8 weeks and consist of intensive language and culture training as well as orientation and training in the field that the volunteer will be working in. The language and culture trainers are often well-educated locals, many times educators, who have a good understanding of American culture and its influence on the behavior of Americans. They also very often have an objective anthropological understanding of their own culture and its influence on themselves and their own people. Peace Corps training programs are intensive; there is normally about three hours of language training in the morning with cultural and job-related sessions in the afternoon. Peace Corps trainers use a lot of role-playing activities where volunteers must use both language and culturally-correct social interaction skills. In addition to this formal training, volunteer trainees also explore the local culture informally in their off-hours and on weekends and try out some of their language and social interaction skills. Some training programs also combine village and home-stays with locals as part of the training process. During my own Peace Corps training in Fiji we spent one week in a rural Fijian village, each volunteer staying with a separate family. The families were instructed not to speak any English to us and we were encouraged to try to speak as little English as possible to each other. This was immersion training at its best. At the end of a day we found ourselves starved to speak English, but forced to communicate in the local language. It was a very effective cross-cultural and linguistic training regime and everyone in my group went on to become successful volunteers, except for one.
Most Peace Corps Volunteers have the correct attitude for successful cross-cultural communication that allows changes to take place in them. However, there are always a few who do not possess the right attitude and who sometimes terminate even before the training is over. A few others may not make it through the first year and will also go home. And then there is sometimes even a few who must be “psycho-vacced” (psychological evacuation) because of acute culture shock. In my training group in Fiji there was only one volunteer that had to be psycho-vacced during the 8th month our two-year stay. She had classic culture-shock symptoms. While at work as a nurse in the hospital she was fine because she was always busy on the ward. But when off duty she spent an excessive amount of time alone at home reading novels and sleeping. And when she did socialize with fellow volunteers she would become overly happy and histrionic and end of laughing herself sometimes to the point of tears and sobbing. She was physically and psychologically assessed by a doctor and it was determined that it would be best for her to return home. She left Fiji in a good frame of mind. She had done a fine job while working as a nurse in the hospital, but she accepted the fact that she just wasn’t cut out for long-term overseas assignments.
However, the overwhelming majority of Peace Corps Volunteers are successful because it’s what they signed up for in the first place. There was one guy in our training group who wanted a very rigorous Peace Corps experience and felt that Fiji was too developed and comfortable for him. At the end of training he took an option of getting reassigned before the final swearing-in ceremony and ended up in Nepal. There is a lot of truth in the Peace Corps recruiting slogan that says “it’s the toughest job you’ll ever love.” It is psychologically demanding, even grueling sometimes with regard to cross-cultural adjustment requirements, but is also immensely challenging and rewarding with regard to the character building and personal enrichment and achievement aspects of it. Some volunteers even become significantly resocialized into the local culture and coupled with fluency in the language these are the volunteers who are said to have “gone local.” They are usually very successful volunteers and also the ones who are most remembered by the local people after they return home – if they ever return home. But “going local” is not a necessary requirement for a completely successful Peace Corps experience.
Not all expatriates take overseas jobs for enriching cross-cultural experience and hardships. Becoming bicultural or bilingual is not in everyone’s job description and neither is it always a prerequisite for being a success overseas, but it obviously helps. Today most multinational businesses provide cross-cultural and language training for employees who will be stationed overseas, and the U.S. Foreign Service, a pioneer in this field, has developed this type of training to a fine science.
