Authors

Carme Vega Monteagudo, Núria Roca i Caparà

Position

Profesoras de la Escola Universitària Infermeria Sant Joan de Déu. Universitat de Barcelona.

Contact address

C/ Santa Rosa, 39-57. 08950 Esplugues, Barcelona.

Contact email: cvega@santjoandedeu.edu.es

Abstract

International migrations from the last decades have generated a great social transformation, both  globally and locally. Societies of the XXI century are multicultural, cosmopolitan and very diverse, but also unequal and because of that they generate segregation, social exclusion and deny any alterity and recognition of the “otherness”. Multicultural society is a reality that we must define in all scopes, principally in the political scope, and also how it is specifically defined in daily life.
One of the fundamental issues of the University is how it involves and articulates the studies it offers in society. The University, a vital centre for the production of knowledge and skills must advance hand in hand with society, but it must also be able to prepare students so that these same students are able to transform it. All institutions must become involved and, in this sense, the University plays a preponderant role in the training of our citizens.
Nursing practice is based on the exercise of caring. The action of caring is a universal constant with currently interacting particular models or patterns. In the practice of the nursing profession which integrates interaction with people from different cultural origins, the starting point is usually a distant one with differentiation between “us” and the “others”.  Communication is established based on our cultural codes and pre-constructed images we have from the “other”, acting with distrust and making, on many occasions, an erroneous interpretation. University nursing studies are aimed at training professionals capable of providing holistic care to people and to the community. Nursing schools, among other competencies, must train their students to enable them to be aware of the diversity of our social setting, analysing the main socio-cultural problems that appear in such diverse setting, integrating values and positive attitudes towards individual differences and adopting the plurality as a means of cohabitation and personal enrichment.

Keywords:

nursing; multicultural; intercultural; reflexive learning; sant joan de déu nursing schooldiversity

Versión en Español

Título:

La formación de los estudiantes de enfermería para la sociedad intercultural