Study Tours
DIS places a strong emphasis on combining classroom work with experiential learning so you’ll walk away with applicable, real life, cross-cultural skills for the global job market as well as a better understanding of how your academic interests can be applied to the real world. The study tours address issues of national and cultural identity, effects of emigration and immigration on nations, and the role of culture and history in national reconstruction, just to name a few. Study tours also include visits to historical sites and cultural activities associated with the overall topic.
Study Tours – each semester
- The Danish/German border region or Western Denmark (Short tour). The tour to the border region (fall) focuses on minority issues, visiting both the German minority in Denmark and the Danish minority in Germany. We explore what cultural idenity means in a border region. The tour to Western Denmark (spring) focuses on immigration and integration, and include explorations of some of the Danish "Ghettos" providing opportunities for challenging stereotype notions of immigrant communities in Denmark
- Lithuania (Long tour, fall). With Lithuania’s accession into the EU, the major transition from the past Soviet regime to present democracy and free market economy has been occurring. These changes have led to new challenges on different levels. During the study tour, students will explore the dynamics of minority/majority relations in a different setting and context (Polish/Lithuanian, etc) along with gaining an understanding of the difference between minorities and ethnicities in nationalized states. Students will also study the impact and consequences that immigration has on society and its culture while understanding the role of history and culture in Lithuania’s nation building projects
- Turkey (Long tour, spring). The program study tour will take us to Istanbul, Turkey. Istanbul has an intriguing history, being the center for both Christian and Muslim Empires for hundreds of years, to now where it is abuzzing metropolitan city literally on the border between the East and the West. The study tour will include lectures, cultural visits and gatherings with local students. Such topics to be explored on this study tour include, ‘Turkey and the EU’, The Armenian Genocide’, ‘ Immigrant and minority relations in Istanbul’ (vs. Copenhagen), ‘The relation between religion and politics in Turkey’ (vs. Denmark), and more generally topics pertaining to a discussion of the ‘Clash of Civilizations’ thesis.
Recommended Optional Study Tours: Russia Past & Present and Turkey at the Crossroads.
MI Field Studies and Other Activities
DIS also incorporates experiential learning into the classroom. Explore the Copenhagen region while enhancing your knowledge of a certain field of study by being introduced to a related company, organization or expert in your field. Often times, these excursions are accompanied with a tour of the organization and provide students with a sneak-peak into the inner workings of professional organizations. Typically field studies are a half-day or day excursion and are strongly related to the material studied in class.
Examples of field studies with in Migration and Identity program include:
Course |
Field Study |
| Holocaust and Genocide |
Trip to the Neuengamme Concentration Camp in Germany |
| Human Trafficking |
Red Light District of Copenhagen |
| Muslims in the West |
Dansk Islamisk Trossamfund (DIT) Mosque |
Cross Cultural Encounters |
Asylum Center |
The Migration and Identity Program also offers other activities throughout the semester such as:
- Program Socials
- Option to Participate in many of Copenhagen's International Festivals
- Panel Debates about hot topics (such as Integration, Secularism and the Role of the Media)
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