Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World by David Livermore

Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World Reviews

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  Hannah Blankenship

  Incredible. Perceptive. Showed me ingrained ways of thinking due to my culture I didn’t even know I had. Balances the value of self with the gospel call to bridge the chasm to the “other” so well. Highly, highly recommend.
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  kailey saunders

  i had to read this for my first year seminar class!
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  James Nahrgang

  Good book for someone to break their teeth on for an introduction to missiology. Its very easy to read. However, if the reader has already read a book or two on missiology, then this book will likely repeat much of what they have already read in other places.
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  Andrew K

  like most books of this genre, it could be about 100 pages shorter. that being said, Livermore's discussion of bounded and centered sets succinctly verbalized content in a way that I had been struggling to verbalize for quite a long time now.
  
  Livermore also challenges American readers to analyze their cultural context for what it is, a culture. This is a much-needed challenge that tends to be lacking from most books of this nature.
  
  
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  Joanna Martin

  Fairly thorough overview of the process of developing cultural intelligence across global cultures, age cultures and sub-cultures. A strong focus on love for the ‘other’ as a motivation. One of the better books of its genre. The emphasis on understanding and valuing one’s own cultural background is often missing from the discussion on cultural intelligence, and this book handles it well. Chapter 10 on Herbert’s bounded and centered sets was extremely helpful to my thinking. Recommend.
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  Luke Schmeltzer

  I read this book for a Cross Cultural Ministry class and benefitted from it. It has been interesting to be challenged to think more meaningfully about my own culture and the cultures of others. However, I think some of the theological underpinnings of the book were a bit weak at times, and he recommends writers like Richard Rohr. No thank you haha
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  Robert Murphy

  This is a book on being "culturally intelligent" -- i.e. globally/culturally savvy -- which happens to be written by a Christian. A non-Christian could read this book and understand 99% of.
  It's a fine book, but the author ends up coming across as rather judgmental of those without cultural intelligence. It's full of good examples, and yet I never really connected with the author. I think most people would learn a lot from this book, without loving it.
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  Dave Courtney

  What do you do when you encounter someone who isn’t like you? This is the question that opens his book on cultural intelligence (CQ) by David A. Livermore. CQ is a multi disciplinary approach to contextualization that measures cultural awareness in the same way IQ measures the level of intelligence. CQ is necessary because there is a cultural divide that exists in all areas of our life in some fashion within an increasing global village. The book speaks formally to western culture, although it can apply to a broad audience. The essential motivation of CQ is to look inward towards authentic transformation, of which love plays a central role, in order to achieve the outward behavioral change necessary to reach across cultural divides. This process is theoretical and practical as it looks to develop us personally and relationally within a proper understanding of the core of the Gospel.
  
  Livermore suggests that if we begin with the Gospel, what we discover is the process of God contextualizing in to our worldview, taking His language and expressing it within our own. He writes, “Christianity is the most multicultural faith in the world. It has its roots in Hebrew and Greek, and yet has managed to speak to our world” (p33). One of the clear challenges in approaching a discussion of CQ is that in Western culture we tend to be leery of culture for fear of cheapening this Gospel. At the same time, because of the seemingly relative and inclusive nature of contextualizing, we fail to see our own penchant for stripping culture from our own understanding of the Gospel, thus thinking that our ideas should apply in the same way to everyone everywhere. Livermore writes, “Some of the most volatile debates among Christians center around which aspects of Christianity are up for grabs and which are not” (p43). But unless we first discover a desire to grow in our CQ and challenge our own perceptions, we will remain severely limited not only in our understanding of how the Gospel and love works in our own lives, but also in being a faithful witness to the culture around us.
  
  Livermore emphasizes our ability to ‘understand’ as an important indicator of CQ. “We have a universal tendency to think that other people do things for the same reasons we do them (p61).” Western Christianity however carries a different worldview than the majority of the world. It is set within a highly individualistic perspective that remains centered on freedom, equality and personal happiness through the pursuit of knowledge. Having broken from the old world monarchy, this culture mindset tends to function on the belief that every problem can be fixed, and that fairness is the highest virtue. These sets of values express themselves most readily through direct language and relationships that exist for the enjoyment of the individual and to increase self worth. This stands opposed to the sense of commitment and obligation within relationship and the communal perspective that guides the majority of cultures around us.
  Livermore presents CQ as further defined as “a pattern of thinking, feeling, and reacting to various situations and actions” P80. He goes on to describe it is the shared understandings which people use within a society to organize their actions, these understandings and actions being divided in to surface/conscious and below the surface/subconscious categories. This plays in to the question of how much of our individual personality is truly shaped individually, a question that can challenge the western notion of freedom and individualism. The truth is that all beliefs and actions are affected to a great degree by culture. Livermore helps navigate this by exploring how human nature, that which is universal to being human across cultures, becomes differentiated and expressed within the cultural boundaries that distinguish groups of people within these universals. Our personalities then distinguish the individual within culture. We therefore can only truly come to know the individual within relationship by increasing our awareness of the culture the forms them, and we should do so primarily motivated by that which unifies us as being human.
  
  Whether we are looking at perceptions of time, means of communication, or levels of power and risk inherent in a given culture, the degree to which our worldview governs how we organize the things around us is massive. For as much as we might think we are free of this influence, a part of learning how to move towards an increased CQ is to recognize our own worldview in relation to that which daily shapes it beneath the surface. We must accept the degree to which we inherit ways of thinking and assumptions. As Livermore writes, he emphasizes the importance of spending time thinking and observing those components of our worldview. Here he writes, “In understanding these values we gain the ability to think and listen first and speak second” P140. The is a challenging notion for the best of us. It is clear though that observing and understanding are two distinct parts of this journey. CQ is measured more so by our level of true understanding, which brings us back to a necessary inward transformation within the idea of empathy as what we observe genuinely changes us and humbles us. Livermore writes, “Empathy is the ability to imagine ourselves in someone else’s position and to intuit what that person is feeling” p159. By employing empathy we gain a sense of praxis, defined as the process in which we move from simple observation to a critical and expressive understanding within active experience. If we are able to move effectively from empathy and empathic response as we face obstacles such as fear and self-efficacy, we can then gain a clearer sense of our capacity to truly love from within a developed CQ. True empathy both embraces and expects the components of culture shock as that which can help us grow in our understanding of ourselves purely for the sake of being able to love others more effectively. A powerful notion indeed.
  
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  Tre Brickley

  This book provided so much to think about in terms to relating properly to other people. I would highly recommend it for any Christian who wants to learn how to relate better to people from different cultures. I appreciated the refreshing challenges provided to more fundamentalist forms of Christianity. However, I would have preferred a work without a decidedly Christian message. Also, I thought the work could have been better without as many stories about the author's personal experiences.
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  Nicholas Varady-szabo

  In this book Livermore comprehensively explores the concept of CQ (Cultural intelligence) which he interprets as the ability to be sensitive to and interpret cultural differences. Though coming from a christian worldview, Livermore uses a socialogical model and draws from his extensive experience travelling and teaching on this topic. 
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  Amy Greenwood

  Interesting concepts, but not very Biblical.
  
  There is value to learning how to navigate culture in order to demonstrate the love of Christ to others. But many of the concepts here equate to psycho-babel and the author makes only feeble attempts to associate his teaching to Scripture.
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  Brittany

  Read this for a class. Livermore often comes across as hypocritical - he is very judgmental of the people who don't have a cultural intelligence like him, which is exactly what he's trying to caution against.
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  Curtis Reid

  Honestly I think anyone thinking critically about ministry should read this book and be able to identify certain aspects of this in their real life. Very helpful, but it needs to be read in concordance with a teacher of some sort.
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  Sara Best

  Cultural Intelligence by David Livermore is one of the most excellent books I have read on the topic of crossing cultures. It is well researched, yet very readable. It is practical and widely applicable to any cross-cultural context whether at home or overseas, short-term or long-term.
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  Amy Redelsperger

  Overall it was well written and thoughtful. It really helped me learn to be more culturally aware. This translates into many different areas of my life. We live in such a multi-cultural world, it would be a shame to miss the beauty of it because we don't see others ethnicity as valuable.
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  Kenneth Malott

  Helpful self-evaluation in how we relate to the world and communities around us.
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  Carol Ip

  This is the require book for the first year of my seminary course, Missions in Global Perspectives
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  Jacquie

  Lots of good info about cultural intelligence but wrapped in religion which is not my thing.
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  Sean Post

  The author argues that CQ builds upon EQ (emotional intelligence). Another set of skills are called for when we're in a cross-cultural situation. And such situations now take place every day - not just when we travel. In fact, as I was reading the last chapter of the book at the doctor's office today each of the patient's in the waiting room was speaking a different language! We need to navigate generational differences, ethno-social differences, and organizational differences.
  
  The other key concept Livermore emphasizes is moving beyond an idea of CQ that only involves more training and education. That is a superficial intelligence rooted in behavior modification. The essence of real CQ is love learning to express itself via self-awareness, understanding, and action.
  
  In terms of IQ, Livermore clearly has a high one. Yet he writes in a very accessible style. He explains several high-level and academic models in a simple manner. A definite plus in this book.
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  Chuck

  By the time I was done I had decided I knew little about how to interact with people from other cultures. Though I think that's not entirely true, I was certainly helped to see new ways to evaluate. Livermore's term is "go deep." I'm anxious to spend time with some folks in Kenya this week and see if I can develop more Cultural Intelligence.
  
  A bit on the academic side with lots of theory, this has plenty of real life examples to make it very readable and understandable. No one should shy away from this book. In fact, because we all cross cultures of one kind or another (generational, organizational, ethnic, etc), we can all use the information and challenges in the book.
  
  The final list of suggestions for developing Cultural Intelligence is worthy of note in itself.
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  Dallas Vaughn

  This book was paradigm-shaping for me. Livermore helped me think through how to better love people from other cultures, helped me gain a deeper understanding of what culture is, and helped me to see how much bitterness and self-righteousness I had towards people of my own culture who are less "cultured" than I am. I recommend this for anyone, but this is a MUST for people who work with people, from a customer service clerk to a professional counselor.
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  Sara

  I will read this again and again. Amazing ideas and implications of what it means to interact intelligently in our highly multicultural world - whether it's while traveling or just around town. I bought this at a conference where Livermore was one of the main speakers. He knows what he's talking about and lives it out daily. I would recommend anything by him.
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  Karl Mueller

  A good book on working cross-culturally. It is a bit academic for the "average" reader, but it is a good addition to a reference library on cross-cultural ministry. I found the expanded discussion on bounded-set/centered-set theory quite helpful. I can think of several people with an academic bent, who are considering cross-cultural ministry, who should read this book.
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  Ben

  Thought provoking and challenging - I frequently travel internationally for my job and found this book to challenge me in a good way and revealed areas for me to improve my cultural intelligence (an area in which I tend to have high level of confidence). Also expanded how I view cultural intelligence and how I relate and interact with various cultures here at home.
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  Robbyn Abedi

  A very detailed and articulate book for cultural intelligence in today's world. Not the best writing but very practical and helpful in living as savvy and aware in our culture(s). Would give it 3.5 if possible.
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  Reno J.

  A must to read as a theoretical partner to the book Serving with Eyes Wide Open.
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  Tim

  Pretty good, but something I feel I'm a child of anyway because of my age so a lot of the stuff Livermore writes I meshed with because it seemed to already have made sense to me.
  
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  Sarah

  a lot of good information - a bit long, though, for the information given...
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  Brian

  An interesting read about crossing cultures. David argues that we need to learn to cross cultures no matter where we minister. True. There are some helpful ideas on how to do that.