Virtually intercultural: higher education in Bolivia

Abstract

Bolivia is a multicultural and multilingual society. This diversity has built up the exclusion of the indigenous majorities and the predominance of multiple values that coexist in an apparent form of interculturality. Three experiences in Bolivian higher education are described in this context, each from a different but supplementary angle. On the one hand, the paper describes the Intercultural Bilingual Education Program, based on the recognition of native languages as a method to convey knowledge. On the other hand, it examines peasant academic units, an initiative implemented by the Bolivian Catholic University based on its singular understanding of interculturality. And third, the paper analyzes a recent research study on "interculturality" as the construction of the identity of indigenous university students. Lastly, the paper attempts to draw a conclusion which brings to a close the persistent challenge to which the concept of interculturality is subject.