Introduction

Whereas the readings discussed in Chapters 3–6 focus on countries and their interrelationships (comparisons, mutual perceptions and stereotypes, historical relations), this is not possible in the transnational studies reading, which focuses on non-state actors and all those processes and practices that transcend national borders – without disregarding that there are, of course, states and state territories. Non-state actors may be, for example, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as human rights organisations (e.g. Amnesty International), environmental organisations (e.g. Greenpeace), development organisations (e.g. Oxfam), religious organisations (e.g. the Roman Catholic Church), multinational corporations (e.g. Coca-Cola) or they may be transnational diaspora communities, transnational networks of cities, transnational terrorist networks, etc. The UN and its various sub-organisations might be included here, although they are international (collaboration between separate nations) rather than transnational. The same may be said of, for example, the World Esperanto Association (UEA). The EU is an example of a political entity that has international as well as transnational traits.

All levels of social life are concerned in transnational studies, from the micro-level of individual people to macro-levels of economic globalisation and worldwide climate issues. Transnational studies is a particularly challenging perspective for language and culture pedagogy because of the strong tradition of the national paradigm in this field.

Transnational Studies

In their introduction to a reader on transnational studies (Khagram & Levitt, 2008a), Sanjeev Khagram and Peggy Levitt start with the following illustration of the transnational nature of the world: