ABSTRACT
The notion of doxa is used in this chapter to describe some common knowledge and shared opinions that the author has identified in research and education. Doxa means ‘opinion’ and ‘praise’ in Greek and revolves around common beliefs around an object of knowledge. It is sometimes used as a synonym for common-sense knowledge, public opinion and even stereotype and myth. In his ideological criticism, Barthes (1972) describes the doxa as a representation confused with the real object. In this chapter, the collected fragments have to do with the ways interculturality is constructed as doxa. The author presents how the notion is worded stereotypically (e.g. the tautology of ‘complex interculturality’), how it revolves around binaries (e.g. essentialist/non-essentialist) and how it can be manipulated as an ideology to promote certain political agendas (e.g. the current use of the phrase ‘democratic culture’ as a synonym in the European context).
