Towards a Common Language in Intercultural Communication

Genesis 11:1: And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.

For over 5,000 years of recorded history, humanity has pursued unification and standardization in communication. Yet, despite proto-language concepts in both academic theories and spiritual texts, people still speak diverse languages, often taking years or decades to master them.

This drive for a shared communication framework has produced lingua franca that evolved across eras: Latin, French, then English. Each successive ‘international’ language builds on the ideological roots of its predecessor while adapting them. Artificial constructs like Esperanto have been tried, but they falter — rooted in Indo-European structures, they’re tough for Sino-Tibetan speakers and lack deep cultural resonance.

Thus, individuals persist in using their native tongues to learn, speak, write, listen, read, reflect, and form worldviews, as these languages mirror their social and informational worlds. Sapir and Whorf’s linguistic relativity hypothesis underscores this: while core ideas may be universal, a language’s structure molds their expression and shapes worldview perception.

This highlights the need for clear definitions of two core elements in intercultural communication: language and culture. Both are intricate systems, deeply intertwined and often inseparable. Numerous definitions exist for specific research or communication goals, but here we regard language as a sign system for storing and sharing information among people (serving as a key carrier of culture) and culture as a notion that encompasses all human creations (making language inherently cultural). For this discussion, we refine culture further to behavioural patterns and reactions that enable adaptation to particular natural and social environments.

Today’s world evolves rapidly, with accelerating information creation and exchange. The ‘global village’ is fully realized — physical distances erased, reduced to mere server response times in telecommunications. Communication has transformed too: once requiring foreign language mastery, it now flows seamlessly via automated, intelligent translation systems, minimizing the need for linguistic or cultural knowledge.

The UN emphasizes preserving linguistic and cultural diversity as essential for harmonious global development [1]. This poses a challenge: nations resist deculturalization, clinging to their linguistic and cultural identities as vital tools for survival and adaptation in unique environments. UNESCO’s Culture 21 Plus initiative, tied to sustainable development, champions multiculturalism as a core human achievement, backed by international consensus [2] and key to the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.

At the same time, cultural researchers note that despite robust activity in cultural studies, current models for analyzing and comparing cultures remain highly specialized — tailored to specific language-culture pairs and lacking scalability. Yet, applying the ‘cultural turn’ concept yields tangible gains: 25-40% improvements in language model accuracy, social integration success, and communication effectiveness, driven by enhanced intercultural awareness and cultural literacy [3].

This tension highlights the challenge of developing a common language for intercultural communication: it must preserve multiculturalism — and language as culture’s carrier — while reducing barriers from cultural differences to elevate dialogue quality, even at the cost of some cultural diversity.

To maintain multiculturalism while mastering a shared language, we turn to Leibniz’s intellectual legacy, particularly the Speciosa Generalis concept. Through it, culture — mediated by language — appears as a sign system, or better, a collection of cultural units open to various analyses, including mathematical ones. This approach lets us probe a complex system, uncovering its foundational structures. Today, cultural stereotypes reveal these elements clearly, but deeper cultural insight is key for people to truly speak a common ‘cultural’ language.
E. D. Hirsch, an American cultural scholar and educator, exemplifies in-depth research by identifying cultural units in his work that unifies the core cultural knowledge of the average American citizen, drawing from the content of mandatory secondary school curricula.
Thus, the solution lies in developing a unified body of cultural knowledge — derived from compulsory educational programs and structured as a system of cultural units.

This programme could be realized by establishing a unified centre for studying cultural units, adaptable to any region. Implementation would unfold in four stages:

1. Testing a methodology to identify cultural units from mandatory educational programmes.
2. Formulating region-specific systems of cultural units.
3. Performing comparative analysis across cultural units.
4. Building a global system of cultural units.
In summary, the global community acknowledges that a unified language system is unfeasible in the short or medium term due to socio-cultural and political-economic barriers. Today’s solution shifts from well-studied language to culture itself. A system of cultural units could parallel Mendeleev’s periodic table of elements, systematizing existing cultural knowledge while enabling new insights.
A system of cultural units would enhance intercultural communication and mutual understanding between different cultures, scientifically define national ‘cultural codes,’ improve language and culture learning by 20-25%, and bolster economic, political, and cultural ties.

References
1. https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/culture-2030-agenda
2. https://agenda21culture.net/documents/culture-21-plus-2025
3. Francis, N. Cross‑Cultural Language Awareness: Contrasting Scenarios of Literacy Learning / N. Francis, S.‑M. Chireac, J. McClure // Journal of Cognition and Culture. — 2023. — Vol. 23. — P. 357–377. — DOI: 10.1163/15685373‑12340167