Queens Professor Introduces Students to her Country and Culture through Study Abroad

For Varvara Pasiali, Ph.D., MT-BC, leading a group abroad to the country where she was born and raised was the fulfillment of a long-held dream. In June, Pasiali and Jeffrey Thomas, Ph.D., led a group of students to Cyprus as an extension of the semester-long course they taught on campus. Short-term, faculty-led programs are the most popular type of study abroad program at Queens. For about two weeks, students have the opportunity to diversify their classroom education with international exploration all while building meaningful connections with their peers and professors.

“Cyprus has a rich historical tradition and is an island that has been conquered multiple times throughout history given its geopolitical location,” Pasiali explained. “The topic of the course and trip centered around the juxtaposition of cultural pulls and threads that shaped the island’s history with sociohistorical elements of power, oppression, identity, gender, class, and cultural change.”

Through their studies, the group engaged in discussions about issues of race, cultural identity, oppression, and colonialism in a global context. During the 12-day trip, students had the opportunity to visit the mountains and many cities. They also explored United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) heritage sites and participated in a three-day intercultural communication training. Though these faculty-led study abroad programs focus on providing immersive educational experiences for students, the students are not the only ones who benefit from the travel.

“I always learn things when I think about how students experience a new country,” Thomas said. “In addition to learning from student experiences, one part of our trip included listening to historian and archaeologist Anna Marangou speak to the historical and more recent political issues in Cyprus – and her dedication to pushing for more respectful policies was very poignant – especially in the context of what’s been happening here in the United States.”

With countless memories made throughout the trip, Pasiali’s favorite educational excursion was the intercultural communication training.

“We worked with a trainer named Constantinos Papageorgiou who is a poet and systemic-family psychotherapist at the Ministry of Education focusing on prevention training addressing violence, anti-bullying and diversity in public schools,” said Pasiali. “Students engaged in a role-playing game where they had to interact with people from another ‘planet’ and the extraterrestrials had a different set of cultural norms,” Thomas added. “While the game was fun to watch, the most interesting things to see were the conclusions and insights students gained afterward about cultural differences.”

Pasiali walks away from this summer with a deeper understanding of Cyprus, its people and how the history of a nation changes over time. As one of the leaders of the trip, she was able to enjoy seeing familiar places with a newer lens and introducing her students to the place she calls home.