Marcela Gabioud
Writer, broadcaster, professor
RCCongress 2010 Panel Member:
Cultural Diversity and Communication
Marcela Gabioud is a freelance writer, radio broadcaster and professor in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Gabioud is of Methodist affiliation and is a WACC member. Her next career step is to help reform public policies on gender and communication.
Gabioud hopes to bring new ideas to RCCongress 2010.
Cultural Diversity and Communication
In all modern societies, one of the most difficult contemporary debates is about "social cohesion" and "cultural diversity," the integration of different cultural and religious groups into an increasingly pluralistic society in which it seems harder than ever to find common ground and values. This topic is especially important to religious communicators because religion plays such an important part in shaping the identities of individuals and groups.
These issues are played out day-by-day in the media which both reflects the unfolding situation and at the same time has an important role in framing the debate and shaping perceptions, especially of minorities and other groups deemed to be "outsiders."
What, then, are the responsibilities of religious communicators within this context? How can religious communicators influence the debates about cultural diversity? To what extent is religious communication itself a problem? How have different societies balanced the demands for diversity and for cohesion? What can religious communicators from different countries learn from each other?
This panel, made up of people from different cultures and countries, will seek to open up these questions and challenge religious communicators as how best they can respond.
I believe that the intersection between communication and religion must be given by the formation of specialized messages to different audiences, as not all think and have the same 