Understanding Society, Marriage, and Family Around the World

How do different cultures express affection? How do marriage and family relations vary across the globe? How can a diverse student body help us appreciate these differences? Listen to this conversation with Dr. Georgia Bianchi, professor of sociology at Santa Fe College, to understand when and how she began observing social relations. Learn how she uses an internationalized curriculum and study abroad to help students understand our global interconnectedness. 

Transcript

Vilma:

Welcome to Santa Fe College. My name is Vilma Fuentes, and this is our podcast on developing global citizens. Today, we are joined by Dr. Georgia Bianchi, one of our long-standing sociology professors here at Santa Fe, and she's here to share with us a lot of what she's doing in her classroom to help bring the world to our students. So Georgia, thank you for joining.

Georgia:

Thank you. I'm happy to be here.

Vilma:

So, where did you grow up? Did you grow up traveling the world?

Georgia:

Yes. So this is always a fun story because I never know where to start in terms of details, but for you, I'll start at the very beginning. So, my parents are a binational family, so my mom is American, my dad's Italian. My mom basically sold all her worldly possessions and moved to Italy on love, at a whim, and that's where I was born and I grew up there.

Vilma:

They make movies out of that.

Georgia:

Yeah. It gets a little bit messy after, they divorce, but you know...

Vilma:

Okay.

Georgia:

That that's part of the story too. But yeah, eventually my mom and my sister and myself moved back to the states. So I had a childhood, really, between the US and Italy, maintaining really strong links to both. So spending a majority of my time in the US since the age of 10 and above, I guess, 10 and older, but going back to Italy as much as possible to see my dad and my dad's side of the family. And that continues even till today. And then...

Vilma:

Do you speak Italian?

Georgia:

I do. English is my second language.

Vilma:

Oh.

Georgia:

So, yeah.

Vilma:

Warms my heart.

Georgia:

Yeah.

Vilma:

Okay.

Georgia:

Yeah. No, my kids don't but that's another conversation. It's really hard to teach a language outside of the home language. But anyway. Yeah, so I grew up between the US and Italy, and that's always been something that I love to go from one place to the next. I feel like it was really great to have experience, deep experience, in both places because then you realize how much of everyday life is really relative to where you are and your horizons are a lot broader when you know that there's a lot more out there.

Vilma:

So fast forward, you started college.

Georgia:

Yep.

Vilma:

What did you study and why?

Georgia:

So I liked political science a lot, but I didn't want to be a political science major, so I actually became an international studies major, which was kind of a catchall. I got to take a lot of political science classes, but a lot of other languages. And I took a linguistics class that was fascinating and really just got to get the broad general education that a lot of four year colleges are known for, which I feel like gave me a really good base to then move on. I did end up going to grad school twice, actually. So I got a master's in political science from UNC Chapel Hill, and theirs was an international program. So it was a political science degree. It was called the Trans-Atlantic Masters. And it focused on spending six months in the US and then nine months abroad among a consortium of universities.

So there was Bath, there was Sciences Po in Paris, which is where I went. There were a couple other places, I want to say one in Italy and one in Spain, and I was able to work with scholars in these other places, which was great. I was able to take classes in other languages, which was great because I had been studying French for a long time so to be able to use it, actually, on a day-to-day basis was amazing.

Vilma:

So you're trilingual or you know more?

Georgia:

Well... I wouldn't say that I'm fluent in French, not anymore.

Vilma:

Okay.

Georgia:

I was pretty good at one point, but without practice... Yeah, it would take me a little bit to get back there.

Vilma:

Can you order food and ask for directions?

Georgia:

Yes, I can.

Vilma:

All right. You've passed a French two competency.

Georgia:

Yes. No, for sure. I can help my middle schooler with her French, so that helps.

Vilma:

That's wonderful.

Georgia:

Yeah.

Vilma:

But you ended up at UF?

Georgia:

I did. So I love school. I'm a big old nerd, and I just want to be in classes and learning all the time so I signed up for another degree, this time a PhD. I had decided that I had done what I wanted to do with political science, and I moved on to sociology.

Vilma:

Why?

Georgia:

That's a good question. Political science was really much more about institutions and policy, and I was really just interested in people and groups and culture and why we do what we do, and sociology offered me a lot of flexibility because we can still study politics, but just from a slightly different angle. So I really kind of found my home in sociology. And then while I was at the University of Florida, I ended up getting a fellowship with the Center for European Studies, which brought in a lot of the work that I had been doing in my master's in political science.

Vilma:

So the University of Florida's Center for European Studies is a Title Six center, which means they receive funding from the US Department of Education to help promote the study of less commonly taught languages and help expose people to different regions of the world. Did you pick up another language while you were there? Did you travel to a new part of Europe?

Georgia:

I did not. I kind of was stuck in my Western Europe. In fact, you're right. So the Center for European Studies, I believe, helped offer Czech and Polish, and I got to learn a lot about these places, but without necessarily going there. So we had a lot of movie nights, we had events, we had potlucks, we put out a cookbook, which was really fun, where we gathered recipes from all over the world, that our faculty was from. But I really got to work within the center and see what it looks like to promote globalization within curriculum, to promote events around campus, to just really focus on how can we incorporate a lot of these concepts into courses that already exist, or areas and events that we might want to put on around campus.

Vilma:

Well, this is really critically important because not everybody has the opportunity to travel abroad, but I think that...

Georgia:

That's right.

Vilma:

Right here in Gainesville. You can find that you can watch a Hungarian movie and you can eat food from a different culture and learn something new about the world through your classes. So how did you bring all this knowledge and experience to Santa Fe? What do you do here to help internationalize the curriculum?

Georgia:

So, I teach, primarily, intro to sociology and then marriage and the family, and I think both of those are just automatically great fits for including international content. For intro to sociology, we are really looking at what does deviance look like across the world? And you can look at it within the US, sure, but if you bring in an international example, it's going to become much more clear.

Vilma:

Give me an example.

Georgia:

So we can talk about... Let's see, we can talk handholding. In many places across the world, physical affection and physical space is a lot closer than it is in the US. We tend to have our personal space bubble that's a lot further apart. So what I would do is get some folks to come up to the front of the classroom and we would stand comfortably apart, and then I would move them closer to some of the other cultures' personal space bubbles and see how they feel. And they would usually start to feel a little uncomfortable, and you can see that in their demeanor. And then I ask them how they feel, and they would say, generally, it's a little too close. So we give examples and we do what is Italian space bubble look like, other places around the world, which is great. I use Italy a lot because that's the place I'm most familiar with in terms of customs. But we have a pretty good international student body as well. So it also gives people a chance to bring in their experiences if they've ever traveled abroad or if they're from another place.

We were recently just talking about current events, and I have a student from Iran in one of my classes, and he was able to give a really great explanation about why there's protests right now. So letting people both experience what it might be like or what some aspect of culture might be like in another place, but then also inviting their feedback, is a great way to just make these concrete connections.

Vilma:

I'm sitting here thinking to myself, "So I've never taken sociology, maybe I should." But being almost shocked walking around parts of Paris of like, "Oh my gosh, way too much public display of affection there, people. Keep it behind closed doors, please." And that was a very American perspective, and I say that as a Latina, Hispanics are more expressive, but France takes it to a whole other level, and as I presume, happens also in parts of Italy. But by contrast, I've seen people from say, I want to say Pakistan, maybe two men will be walking and they can hold hands.

Georgia:

Correct.

Vilma:

But they're not homosexuals. It's just, they're saying that they're friends, but in the US, there would be all sorts of different...

Georgia:

It wouldn't the same. Exactly. No...

Vilma:

Very different.

Georgia:

That's a great example. That's a great example. So these are the sorts of things that we would bring up in a sociology class, or even in marriage and families class when we're talking about gender. Physical affection between men in the US. You know, you can do the bro hug, but it's all very active and it's not long lasting, generally speaking, of course. But in other places, in Italy, you greet people by kissing on the cheek.

Vilma:

Right.

Georgia:

That wouldn't fly here. There would be a lot more going on if that's how you greet people. And again, a lot of people coming from other parts of the world are a little shocked that they don't get to do the air kisses.

Vilma:

So you had this personal experience in Europe, and then you followed that path and studied it even more through graduate school, but somehow ended up developing an incredible amount of knowledge about Jamaica and maybe the Caribbean at large. Help us understand that.

Georgia:

A little more specific about Jamaica. So just like my interest in Europe that stemmed from my personal experience, my interest in Jamaica also stems from a personal experience. So my husband is Jamaican and I've been fortunate and blessed, really, to spend a lot of time there visiting my in-laws and just on what a lot of folks would typically just think of as visits home. When it came time to develop a study abroad program, I felt like you could really have your pick. If you wanted to go to Western Europe, there's 30,000 programs available to you focusing on any subject that you might be interested in. A classic is art history, of course, or architecture but I mean, anything you want to take and go to Italy, you can go. Which is, I mean, I'm sure that if I developed a program, it would be great, but I feel like I would just be adding on top to a very well developed list.

Whereas, there really weren't any academic programs, study abroad programs, to Jamaica that I could find. And I did a pretty thorough Google search, I looked at all of the existing EF tours and all of the other tour companies, and, really, most of what I could find was maybe volunteer opportunities, and those aren't necessarily going to give you the same sort of value that a study abroad program would do. So I was a little intimidated in terms of developing something from scratch because at that point, I hadn't really led a study abroad program.

Doug Decal invited me to be the second faculty on a trip to Sweden, but it happened not to make enrollment that year, so we didn't go. But that kind of bug had gotten into my ear and I really wanted to look at, all right, well, what can we do? So I ended up trying to figure out which professors had any sort of program going on, which universities had a program, and I blasted email to every one of them. One of them replied from Temple University up in Pennsylvania and was like, "Yeah, we have a great program. Also, our faculty lead just quit, so do you want to join us this summer? We leave in three weeks." And I was like, "Yes, absolutely. I'm coming."

Vilma:

Wonderful.

Georgia:

Which was great.

Vilma:

But you were teaching at Santa Fe?

Georgia:

Yes. It was over the summer.

Vilma:

So you weren't teaching in the summer?

Georgia:

So I wasn't teaching in the summer, so I did have it free. My husband suddenly got settled with all household and childcare duties for a good five weeks. But yeah, so that was really my first foray into what a study abroad program can look like in Jamaica. And I found it to be amazing. So I wanted to bring that to Santa Fe. The program that I was involved with with Temple is a five week program. It was not super cost prohibitive for students, but it was because there was a lot of tuition money and academic support money that was going towards the program so it was really subsidizing the cost.

And we just don't have the same sort of resource because we're not a four year institution. We don't have a lot of the same, or comparable, really, budgets, I would say, to a much more established, well established... Not well established, what do I say?

Vilma:

A big four year university?

Georgia:

Yeah, big four university. Right. It's just a difference. And also, I don't think that our students would find it necessarily super easy to just take five weeks off. So I wanted something to be cost effective, short enough that working people, parents, et cetera, could take time off and go for a week and let's learn about Jamaica and let's learn about ourselves really, because that's really what study abroad programs, to me, do the best is open up your eyes, your mind, your outlook to the wider world, and it helps you kind of find your own place in where you are and where you want to be.

Vilma:

So the program that you now lead at Santa Fe, it's a one week program, and when does that normally take place?

Georgia:

Normally it takes over spring break. So we would leave the Saturday of spring break, come back the following Saturday. So, it's what? An eight day trip including travel. So by the time you get there, you're a little tired, but Jamaica's close by. We leave from Orlando, we're there in a couple hours. It's not a long or far trip.

Vilma:

So part of me is thinking, "Jamaica, is that really study abroad?" I mean, they speak English. They're not that different from us. Heck, there's parts of Florida where you could get little Jamaica.

Georgia:

That's true.

Vilma:

Let me not even leave Gainesville. In Gainesville, at the Blount Center, you could cross the street and go eat from the Jamaican Queen. I think that's like a...

Georgia:

Caribbean Queen.

Vilma:

Oh, sorry. The Caribbean Queen. Is she Jamaican? She's Jamaican.

Georgia:

Yes.

Vilma:

I'm not getting that wrong.

Georgia:

No, no.

Vilma:

And there's another restaurant in downtown that sells Jamaican food, the name just escapes me.

Georgia:

Reggae Shack, probably.

Vilma:

Reggae Shack, of course. Great onion rings, great ginger. So why do I need to go to Jamaica? What am I going to get in Jamaica that I can't get right here in Gainesville or in Florida?

Georgia:

That's a good question. I think that being there is completely different. I mean, you're in a majority black country. Yes, they speak English, but they also speak Patois, which is a little bit different. If you've ever listened to the music, then you'll know that it's a very, very cool language that adopts many West African grammar and words and some French words. And there's just a melange of culture. It has a sizable Chinese immigrant population. That's where [inaudible 00:17:25] come from. A sizable Indian population as well. The landscape is different, the cities look different, the goats and the dogs on the road are different.

Vilma:

Housing.

Georgia:

Housing, sure. A lot of students coming from Florida are going to look at these half-built houses and think poverty but really, these are folks who are in the US who send down a little bit of money at a time and build their retirement home piece by piece. So you can see, even something as simple as, what does a house look like and how does it get built? Even that process is different from what you might be used to. And having that moment of being like, "Oh, I assumed something, but it's actually not correct." What, to me, looks like poverty is actually wealth. I mean, that can be something that stays with you. That can be a moment where the next time you make an assumption, you're going to say, "Oh, well, the last time I did this, I wasn't quite right so maybe I should ask a question, or maybe I should see if I can look at this from a different perspective."

Vilma:

So, traveling abroad or even taking a course like Intro to Sociology that exposes you to the world can also help us understand diversity in America. So, again, using that example of the Caribbean Queen that's across the street from the Blunt Center, what is the connection between these international experiences and diversity in the US?

Georgia:

Well, it's interesting because for a long time, we've had this conversation about globalization, internationalization, are they the same thing? When we think about diversity, is it only within country? Is it between countries? And I think that for a sociology class, the concepts are so broad that you really can think about diversity even from the main campus to the Archer campus or the Starke campus. So if we talk about cultures and norms and values, there's going to be differences even within this, what? 50 mile radius, maybe? And so, having examples that span from the hyper-local to the international, I hope, can help our students see that there's a lot that ties us together, but there's all sorts of different experiences within that, all sorts of different points of view, places that we start from, and then we all come together and have a conversation.

So I hope that both within my class, but also within study abroad, we can make these connections between people, essentially, right? Because that's what we want to be. We are an interconnected people now, maybe more so than ever, and we should strive to try to make that communication clear and have everybody's minds open, I guess, ready to question a few things, question a few assumptions.

Vilma:

Well, I'm delighted that you're at Santa Fe, and that you're opening the minds of our students in all these ways.

Georgia:

We'll see. I hope so.

Vilma:

Yeah. And I really appreciate your being here today. Thank you.

Georgia:

Aw, thank you so much.