Editor’s Note: Mark Nehrenz is studying in South Africa.

It’s funny how being a world away can make local rivalries seem quite meaningless.

Coming to South Africa, the last thing I expected to do was meet Americans, so it is still sinking in that I just finished making a documentary with a student I met here from Oklahoma State.

Our meeting was quite random, and, to make a long story short: She needed someone to make a documentary, and I had video cameras and was looking for stories to tell.

Only one month elapsed between the day we actually met and the day I put the final touches on our 40-minute whirlwind of a movie about a rural after-school program.

This cooperation with a home-state rival is probably one of the coolest things I have ever done in my life, and it got me thinking about the power of collaboration.

There are so many barriers in our society that keep us from interacting with people we consider the “others.”

Think about it from a campus perspective.

How often do you see letters majors talking philosophy of wind with the meteorology crowd.

We all know that, ,in the greek world, there is often tension under the surface of U-Sing smiles.

I’m not pointing fingers because we all pre-judge people according to the groups they fall into, but what if we didn’t?

My roommate here, Hans, has a digital sticky note on his computer that says, “Strangers are just family you haven’t met yet.”

I know what you are thinking.

“Ahh, What a nice little quote,” followed by, “Wait, why would a German exchange student have an inspiring note on his computer in English?

Ha! Gotcha!

Hans is from Iowa, a fact he has to share with people often when they pre-judge him by his name and immediately assume he is German.

The concept of seeing someone as a rival or “other” is fairly lighthearted from the college point of view.

There are a few bar fights here and there, maybe jokes about a certain campus smelling like fresh fertilizer, but, in the end, the things we have in common vastly outweigh our little rivalries.

But looking beyond the “campus rivalry” lens, the implications of seeing someone as an outsider become a bit more intense

A few months before I came to South Africa, a wave of xenophobic attacks here made international headlines. Angry South Africans killed 65 African immigrants from a number of countries.

What followed was a massive immigrant refugee crisis and a national conversation about why there is so much anger vented on the immigrants.

I have been to two public forums on the attacks, in which people openly discuss and question the black-on-black violence.

What leads a group of African men to the point of burning a fellow African man alive? Not color.

The xenophobia conversations always fell to one theme: fear of the “other.”

It would be quite utopian to try to use this little article to propose a solution to a problem that has plagued mankind since creation, but, in my opinion, the solution starts with collaboration.

In the South African context, collaboration is described with one word: Ubuntu, or togetherness. Ubuntu acknowledes that we are all human and have vested interests in each other. We are strongest when we are together.

This concept of ubuntu, born of African culture, can apply to every level of human interaction, from the political to the personal.

When I think about what ubuntu would look like in American politics, I recall an OU round-table discussion with author Dorris Kearns Goodwin. Her book, “Team of Rivals,” focuses on Honest Abe Lincoln and his incrediblly collaborative acts wh ile president. He did something unheard of in today’s polarized Washington culture: He appointed to his cabinet the people who were running against him.

In an America currently divided as red states and blue states, we need a little Lincoln- style ubuntu.

With both Sen. John Obama, D-Ill., and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., emphasizing that they have worked with politicians on both sides of the aisle, it is apparent that cooperation is appealing. We can only hope that whoever wins will do it even more, out of a sincere desire to help people, not to win political points.

As an American abroad, I have learned that the concept of collaboration must go much further that just us trying to work together within our own borders.

Our generation needs to get out of the country for a while and realize that America is just a small part of the massive painting we call humanity.

The concept of global collaboration may seem quite lofty to an American student, but, in reality, it’s the future. And it must start at the individual level.

Try to relate and reach out to those you consider the “other.” Ignore the urge to classify someone by common stereotypes.

Meet an international student on campus.

If you need an excuse to hang out (shameless plug), there will be a screening of a previously mentioned OU-OSU collaborative documentary about South Africa in the Union next Friday evening.

Take a complete stranger. Ok, maybe that’s too creepy. Go with someone you know but often try to avoid. You might find that they are just like you.

Ubuntu has to start somewhere, and OU is a great place for it.

Mark Nehrenz is a journalism senior. His column appears every other Friday.