MULTICULTURALISM IN THE ARMY. REFLECTIONS
Rafael Sanchez-Barriga Marin
This paper was completed and submitted in partial fulfillment of the Master Teacher Program, a 2-year faculty professional development program conducted by the Center for Faculty Excellence,
United States Military Academy, West Point, NY, 2014.
1. CULTURE AND SELF IN MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION: REFLECTIONS ON DISCOURSE, TEXT, AND PRACTICE, Diane M. Hoffman
Even though there is actually a debate concerning the nature and goals of multicultural
education, multiculturally teaching practices, and curricula, are in fact rapidly becoming
a part of the school experience for many American children. At the same time, critics
rise up regarding the delivery and implementation of multicultural education broadly
defines, as well as the texts and discourses to teach multicultural perspectives.
While accepting that some forms of multicultural education can contribute to larger
goals of educational and societal justice, to the author is arguable that current concepts
with regards to multiculturalism lack a critical self-awareness about basic culture, self
identity, and difference.
It goes without saying that there are diverse perspectives on multiculturalism in the
States, and the difference of perception upon the topic all over the world, many certain
stances seem to have fundamental assumptions about the nature of the self, culture,
and identity. On the other hand multicultural education per se as a solution to face with
problems with regards to pluralism appears most developed in the US and other nations
within the Western cultural sphere of influence.
It seems to the author of the essence to become more aware of how the elements of
that symbolic order are constituted in order to move toward a more self-awareness
multiculturalism with greater potential.
Hallways in schools have been promoting multiculturalism for many years. This proofs
the American effort to face a reality. They were clearly aimed at promoting an
awareness and understanding of multiculturalism. The question posed by the author is
whether it the posters hung on the walls are either promoting an ideological conformity,
we must think in the same way, or an inherent openness and flexibility.
Background: Problematizing Multiculturalism. As a first step it would be necessary to
consider the four trends in the criticism of multiculturalism.
A conservative stance when political and philosophical issue arises due to the tension
which exit between an emphasis on pluralism: diversity and the need for defining a
common society.
A second opinion, with regards to multiculturalism, sees as a comprehensive program
which doesn’t meet stated goals or expectations. As expressed in concerns about
efforts to multiculturalize curricula buy adding ethnic content, this critique focuses on
how valuable goals are defeated or undermined in practice.
The third approach is one that takes issue with the increased normalization of
multicultural discourse and its resultant failure to establish categories of knowledge or
relations of power.
The last one deals with the need to identify the underlying assumptions, meanings, and
orientations of multiculturalists discourse and practice.
Culture as recipe. Anthropologists have criticized the way the concept of culture has
been simplified and reified to fit multiculturalist’s discourses that support visions of
personal, ethnic, or national cultural identity that are fixed, essentialized, stereotyped,
and normalized.
The normative acceptance leads to views of culture that ignore the realities of fuzzy
borders and mutual interface and interdependency.
Culture as Essentialized Difference. Many faces juxtaposed against a larger unifying
background image such as the globe stressed out the concept of diversity and its flip
side: unity.
Difference is thereby diluted or made to support overarching frameworks of shared
values or world view firmly enshrined in that existential space called culture.
Culture as category. The most important characteristic of culture as it is presented in
multicultural discourse is its categoricalness.
The learning process encourages teacher and students alike to think of culture in terms
of categories of food, behavior, language, government, and so forth. This emphasis on
culture as category is far from unique in multicultural education. The culture as category
approach is reinforced throughout by lists of disparate practices identified by various
cultural labels.
Problems of Practice. Although is preferable to have entrenched positive views o f those
one does not understand to having prejudiced or negative views, simple, reified, and
categorical approaches to culture undermine the importance of more accurate and
complete knowledge about different cultural ways of life.
Valuing diversity also poses another practical problem: who or what qualifies for
inclusion in diversity? How can we really celebrate diversity without drawing artificial
boundaries or engaging in cultural simplification? Reification?
Culture and identity. Some givens in multicultural education reveal a troubling
universalism and Western-centrism. In that notion of identity, including the ways person
and self are conceptualized and attendant notions such as self-esteem, are simply not
the same in all cultures or ethnic groups, and differences in concepts of self are among
the most profound influences on cultural and social phenomena.
Identity as Property and Choice. The relationship between person and culture is one of
possession: no one owes identity as if it were a house, car or some tangible asset.
Despite the assumed political usefulness of his notion from the point of view of at least
some minority group members, the ownership formulation can also been seen as a
reflection of the mainstream American materialism and the property rights that make
ethnicity compatible with the dominant economic structure of American society.
Toward Reformulating Multicultural Discourse. From a more practical perspective,
reforms in multicultural teacher education might address the following key issues:
teaching and learning about culture, pedagogy, and critical perspectives.
Teacher preparation must move beyond that individualism of stage models, it also
eschew the over-emphasis on self-esteem building as well as that genre of multicultural
teaching the primary aim of which is to inculcate proper attitudes through various self-
celebratory, self assertive, explore-your-heritage sorts of exercise that often relies on
reified and categorical approaches to culture.
Teacher must be given exposure to the various existing critiques of multicultural
education and be encouraged to develop new one.
2. MULTICULTURALISM: THE RANGE OF TEACHER APPROACHES. John A.Zahorik and Raymond Novak
The authors of this article focus on an important reflection: the extent of multiculturalism
implementation.
Models of Multicultural Teaching .First of all they account for the different approaches
which exist in the educational wise. They distinguished various types of methods
according to the use of education. From the use of a education of the culturally
difference, education about cultural pluralism to promote cross-cultural understanding,
education for cultural pluralism to preserve cultures, bicultural education to help
multicultural students acquire language skills , through the use of multiculturalism as the
normal human experience in which students are taught how to function in many cultural
contexts in our multicultural society.
Teachers ‘reports of multicultural teaching. The goal of cultural adjustment is to have
students learn the established curriculum. The teacher presents the regular content and
skills identified for the particular grade level and subject are without additions related to
multiculturalism. The techniques or methods the teacher use to present curriculum are
altered because of the multicultural composition of the class.
In cultural embellishment teaching, the teacher also seeks to have students learn the
established curriculum but in addition he or she has a secondary goal of having
students come to understand various aspects of different cultures for either assimilation
or pluralism purposes.
Regarding cultural integration, the teachers, according to the authors, tend to have
traditional goals, but also multicultural goals, usually stressing pluralism. Teachers who
support this type of teaching seek to infuse multicultural topics into the regular
curriculum whenever possible. The multicultural topics are integral aspects of the
lesson. The instructional approach can vary but often involves group projects, problem-
solving tasks, and personal responses.
The last type of teaching, cultural analysis integrates the regular curriculum and
multiculturalism. Its help, somehow, students gain a deeper understanding of
multicultural topics and acquire skills and attitudes necessary for creating a just society.
Present State and Future Needs. Teaching is being influenced by the multicultural
nature of the students, but the influence is far from uniform. Some of the teachers have
made only instructional changes while others have changed both their instruction and
their curriculum. The cultural adjustment teachers are teachers whose changes are
almost instructional. Some of these changes may be counterproductive.
Implicit in the behavior of cultural adjustments teachers is the belief that the most
important service they can provide for multicultural students is to help them acquire
basic knowledge and skills
3. TEACHING “MULTICULTURAL” PERSPECTIVES: ALL NOT PRESENT AND ACCOUNT FOR. Bruce McKenna
Teaching effectiveness hinges on many factors. One of them, and is that the author is
focused on, is the relative inability of a class to affect its students. Many students have
learned how they might successfully resist, either actively or passively, the best efforts
of any teacher. Best teachers are no less likely to be accomplished at this than ‘worst”
students, those who get lower grades. A good grade point average can be achieved by
disassociating the process from knowledge as much as possible.
Teaching course that students see as fulfilling requirements but otherwise not
necessarily beneficial to their education is always difficult and almost always results in a
class room experience quite different from those courses with which students are
engaged more fully.
The great distance between even the most carefully syllabus and the actual experience
of being a student or teacher in class is often attributed to the competence of the
students.
What the author suggest us to focus on is the difference generated by the presence of
the speaker and listener. The interaction between the two is a different experience than
the solitary activity of reading. Whether I wish to applaud or condemn what I experience,
my response is stronger and more immediate. The classroom experience is so
dramatically different from reading and writing because of the experience of human
beings, because we come together.
Teachers can communicate so much more information more effectively with their mere
presence. It is this difference that makes teaching courses with many perspectives more
of an explosive situation. The best and the worst moments can be generated by the
actual presence of the teacher and student together.
This is a matter which has particular significance when teaching courses which touch
upon matters of race and ethnicity, gender and class, and such courses have grown
greatly in numbers the last few decades. Topic which are close to concepts as
multiculturalism etc.
Avoidance and confrontations are too often part and parcel of many cultural courses. As
per the author more and more courses in many fields of study are deliberately trying to
present not just an alternative, not just ideas from one resisting group versus ideas from
the dominating one, but ideas from a whole range of peoples.
The growth in multicultural courses is seen by some as an effort to disable the efforts of
successful programs focusing on single culture, and some do have just such an
intention. Remaining apart in an effort to resist dominating forces is not sound strategy.
We must better find common strategies in our efforts to resist the dominating culture.
4. WINNING HEARTS AS WELL AS MINDS? TEACHING MULTICULTURAL HISTORY IN THE 21ST CENTURY. Jama Lazerow
This article accounts for the pressing issues in multicultural education at an institution
that prides itself on preparing students to work with all of the nation’s children and
families. Many teachers bring up the frustration and successes in confronting and
overcoming the racist attitudes of some of their students. One question then come
forcefully to mind: are we ready to open minds or to change them?
According to the author American education has never been value free. The creation of
the public school system in the pre-civil war period was in great measure the product of
an explicit attempt by certain groups to inculcate. Protestant, republican, and capitalist
values in a rapidly expanding and increasingly diverse population. Early colleges and
universities were hardly immune to such political pressures. Today, it is the fashion to
blame the Left (the so-called politically correct”) for the politicization of education, for
seeking converts to a particular belief system rather than teaching “the basics”.
The author show clearly his stance against the idea of proselytizing for a certain point of
view or set of values even though, it might be suggested, student who will one day work
with diverse populations of children and families need certain values to do their jobs.
The author is for promoting the method of inquiry usually denominated “critical thinking”.
Effective teaching must engage the effective as well as the cognitive processes of the
learner: it must speak to the heart as well as the head. There is a difference between
teaching to the heart and trying to change. We ought to be encouraging independent
though rather than any particular brand of thought, even if the issue in question is
something as popularly valued as opposition to racism. Though difficult, we ought to be
teaching students to think, not what to believe.
Promoting thought rather than belief in the classroom is especially problematical today
because of the current flap over “political correctness”.
While fear expressed in some teachers that in some of its forms multiculturalism
endangers the republic itself may seem exaggerated, such sentiments reflect a very real
struggle for the hearts as well as the minds of Americans.
In author’s opinion the main that conservative stance has with regards to the demand
for a multicultural curriculum is that those demands are explicitly critical, in both form
and content.
While the author is not sympathetic to the conservative critique, he does think that in the
field of history multiculturalism presents certain potential dangers to the educational
process. Among those dangers are the following uses of history that are sometimes
advanced under the multicultural label: the inculcation of self-esteem, the derivation of
lessons from the past, the creation of myth, the invention of heroes and villains, the
promulgation of something called Historical Truth that can be apprehend and,
presumably, maintained for all time.
Regarding the college level, the author clarifies what is in his opinion the worst aspect of
the current trends in multiculturalism. That is, the notion held by some that it is valuable
as an approach to knowledge because it endangers belief in certain beneficial social
values. We ought not to evaluate our students based on how well the assimilate
teacher’s values. In his opinion what is really valuable in multicultural history is the
critical method itself, out of which it emerged: that method has the singular virtue of
being fiercely skeptical, allowing for the questioning of all orthodoxy, in whatever form.
For the teacher, objectivity is an ultimately elusive goal and neutrality an undesirable
one.
5. IDENTITY AND CITIZENSHIP: SOME CONTRADICTIONS IN PRACTICE. Heather Piper and dean Garrat.
Many currents forms of anti-racist and multicultural teaching, whilst well-intentioned,
nevertheless serve to fix identities of children in ways which inhibit their agency and
reinforce stereotypes. They are therefore counterproductive.
The author explores some of the tensions that exit, but are seldom articulated, between
understandings and expressions of identity and citizenship. The author accepts that
tensions and contradictions are not necessarily bad, but by making them explicit we are
better able to consider their consequences. There is a suggestion regarding a
consideration of such tensions and how they may enhance rather than impair the
learning experiences of young people, since this can lead to a deeper understanding of
issues through processes that are both challenging and critical. Teaching of citizenship
has a direct impact on the identities of many students, and this impact is top down, and
rarely benign.
While multicultural and anti-racist teaching has in recent times received considerable
attention, some aspects arguably tend to take for granted values and assumptions of
the enlightment tradition, with its western principles.
Some teachers claim that “multicultural/equal opportunities approaches have tended to
focus upon the negative effects that education has had upon the educational
performance. Anti-racist/social justice approaches have more often emphasized the role
that education has had in reproducing structural inequality through its preferential
treatment of white and ethnic majority pupils.
Such teaching overlooks the importance of the international and interlingual character of
a global citizen, which occurs in spite of increasing globalization, where international
mobility has facilitated the “cross-culturalization” of citizens and a strengthening of
ethnic communities.
The author argues that current discourses, which inevitably lead to the celebration of
difference in classrooms situations, can have significant and sometimes unintended
negative consequences.
It is apparent that the author’s preference is to allow space for leaky and fluid identities
that change over time and place to be a privilege for all children and young people, and
this should be allowed for and not inhibited in classroom practice. Human condition of
prejudice results, at least partly, from the tendency for individuals to collect and put up
markers of identity to distinguish their collective self from that of others. It is necessary
though to alert teachers and others to the idea that the location and promotion of
standpoints on behalf of others, which appears to be an intended by-product of
multicultural teaching, is not appropriate.
With regards to identity and culture, the author argues that the relationship between
people and society is interminably reflexive, and identity inevitably includes both being
and becoming, position and positioning, and past and present. The notion of being and
becoming is at the nexus of a relationship between epistemological and ontological
issues that we consider next.
As conclusion what is really argued here is that the teaching of citizenship context
needs a more careful and critical assessment of the ways that culture and ethnicity are
re-created in the classroom situation.
6. THE NATURE OF MULTICULTURAL TEACHING AND LEARNING IN AMERICAN SOCIETY. Martin Haberman The purpose of multicultural teaching is to prepare Americans for functioning on three
levels: as individuals, as members of some subgroup or subculture, and as effective
participants in the general American society. In this first introduction to the theme the
author provides an obvious description of the intent of multiculturalism. In that regard
actually the article is not contributing. However in author’s opinion this model rejects the
notion that sub-cultural differences must be melted away and if this is not possible, such
diversity should merely be tolerated.
Conflicts and tensions among the three realms of required learning should be regarded
as natural consequences.
An educationally healthy society is one which provides the social groups residing within
that general culture with learnings that support a balance between group and individual
needs. Individual learning refers to the enhancement of personal differences. Group
learnings refer to the development of commonalities which support the larger society.
Individual learning is necessary for personal survival and growth. Group learnings are
required for successful functioning in the larger society.
Another way, in author’s opinion, to view this balance is to consider the need of
individuals to perform specialized and differentiated roles in all successful educational
systems. As these different functions contribute to the group survival it becomes
obvious that some degree of individual difference in capacity and performance is a
group asset.
In relation to this group-individual balance, American society can be characterized as a
general setting with shifting and consistent social characterized as a general, with
shifting and inconsistent social boundaries. American society is the general
environmental and social setting within which all subgroups must effectively interact.
From an educational health point of view, there are three levels of learning required-
whether the unit of analysis is the individual, the subgroup or the larger society. These
three levels are:
Level I: Individual enhancement which reflects the range of human potentialities.
Level II: Knowledge, skills, behaviors, and values for participation in some
subgroup B.
Level III: Knowledge, skills, behaviors, and values for participation in the larger
society.
There are no educationally healthy individuals conceived in isolation from their
subgroup and from the larger American society. Similarly, there is no healthy larger
society, without different subgroups agreeing with some of the society’s basic value
orientations and challenging others.
Those who define education too narrowly make the term synonymous with schooling. In
addition, they engage in two other kinds of over-specification which are even more
limiting. First, they rank order the stated objectives of public schools so that basic skills
become either the paramount goals, or the pre-requisites for achieving all other goals.
Second they trend to delegate some responsibilities.
The model stated by the author outlines three levels of learning as necessary for fully
functioning in American society. As a result, the number of constituencies that this
model defines as educationally disadvantaged is increased. Individuals who do not fully
develop their distinctive talents (Level I learnings) are not only underdeveloped as
people but unable to contribute all that they might to the general society. Those who do
not learn to fully participate in their own subgroup are similarly underdeveloped and
educationally disadvantaged. Finally those who might appear to be doing well in level III
learning may actually be unprepared to function in American society. Effectiveness in
society depends on much more than having attained minimal skills levels in a few
basics.
7. A DEVELOPING MODEL OF TEACHERS EDUCATING THEMSELVES FOR MULTICULTURAL PEDAGOGY. Dorothy Heard
The experience of working with teachers toward their own personal multi-cultural
education and toward democratic multicultural arts pedagogical practices lead the
author to several conclusions, most of which were new.
It is generally assumed that teachers, like all human beings are motivated to learn grow
and change. And that multicultural environment educator is proactive for good arts
teaching and learning for a democratic society. For some of them this took the form of
preference, advocacy, development, adoption and practice of a multicultural education
that was limited to sound facts about ethnic arts and histories.
Indeed, it is generally agreed that introducing students to cultural art forms unfamiliar to
them is not only valuable and important, but very necessary.
Some teachers admired and fully adopted the aesthetic and social democratic deals of
multicultural education. These were teachers who not only wanted to introduce their
students to new and different art forms, but teachers who were also very concerned
about the real day-to-day practice of critically challenging their own and their students'
understandings about teaching and learning the arts for a multicultural democracy.
Good teaching involves pedagogical inquiry, interpretation and the creating of
understanding and knowledge without unjust sacrifices from either individuals or
cultures. Good multicultural teaching must combine a high level of self-expression with
total self-commitment to moral democratic actions toward students' creation of arts
knowledge and their questioning of existing arts knowledge. Some teachers who had
personally witnessed or known inequity and its effects found themselves in conflicted
states about democratic multicultural education and art. Some of those teachers found it
convenient to agree with those who assumed positions of power and who said that
there were no inequities in education or society. These teachers denied their own first-
hand knowledge and experience of real inequities and thus lowered their feelings of
discomfort at being in disagreement with those who claimed positions of power. There
were also teachers who knew that inequities existed but choose to risk, accept, and
more importantly, to embrace discomfort in order to morally, freely and effectively live,
teach and create within such a dilemma. These teachers confronted the real
possibilities of what it means to disagree and potentially expose themselves to reprisals
and uncertainty in order to educate themselves and arrive at an enlightened position
about teaching arts for a democracy. Such teachers showed responsibility to and for
their students and society through responsibility to themselves.
The strategies of multicultural teachers must be sharply focused on creating democratic
atmosphere within which all students, including students of European descent, minority
ethnic students of color, female students and students from different economic
circumstances can learn that they have rights and responsibilities and can be taught
how to claim their rights and take charge of their responsibilities. Widespread
misconceptions about race, class and gender, and actions based upon such
misconceptions, make democratic multicultural education a necessary part of the
schooling of all students. Multicultural teachers must help students learn that there is no
white race, no black race, no yellow race, no red race, no brown race.
Teachers' adopted “democratic” multi-cultural positions involved: taking and making
opportunities to develop, expand and create a coherent critical approach to art
knowledge, schooling, race, class and gender; modifying beliefs about the purposes of
teaching in order to effect democratic student learning and social outcomes; and
visualizing an equal society through education institutional change. When teachers took
a "democratic" opportunities perspective to teaching and learning at their schools they
began to expand their teaching behaviors to not only include, but to functionally treat
differences as a positive quality that exists among students, faculty, administrators and
parents in their schools and communities. When they focused on outcomes for a
democratic multicultural arts education, some teachers recognized past and present
inequities in all aspects of the arts and in education, and began to think about and plan
for ways to make the future aesthetically diverse and equitable. As part of their change
process some teachers also engaged in visualizing an ideal democratic multicultural
arts education by querying those who share their educational contexts and discussing
how to bring such a vision into reality.
8. A RESEARCH INFORMED VISION OF GOOD PRACTICEIN MULTICULTURAL TEACHER EDUCATION: DESIGN PRINCIPLE. Kenneth M.Zeichner, Carl Grant, Geneva Gay, Maureen Gillette, Linda Valli, Ana Maria Villegas.
The design principles described in this article represent one view of good practice in
multi-cultural preservice teacher education. The principles are organized into three main
categories: (a) those emphasizing issues of institutional and programmatic reform, (b)
those addressing issues related to personnel (staff and students), and (c) those
focusing on issues of curriculum and instruction in teacher education programs.
The institutional context shapes both students experience and program possibilities,
diversity and multicultural education will not be valued without the strongest
commitment at the institutional level. This commitment should be explicitly spelled out in
the institution's mission statement, formal policies, and daily procedures.
1.The mission, policies, and procedures of the institution reflect the values of diversity
and multicultural education.
These policies and procedures include recruitment, support, and retention of faculty,
staff, and students of color, a multicultural core curriculum, service to a diverse
community, and numerous multicultural experiences for students and their teacher
educators. Evidence of institutional commitment to diversity would be found in concrete
plans with adequate resources for affirmative action, student recruitment, and faculty
mentoring and development. Technological and other innovative ways of recruiting and
diversifying the campus would be in place. Faculty and staff would be adequately
rewarded and funded for engaging in multicultural activities.
2. The institution is committed to multicultural teacher education. This principle
highlights the importance of a dual and simultaneous commitment: to teacher education
on the one hand and to multicultural education on the other. Teacher education is held
in low regard at many institutions of higher education. Curriculum fragmentation,
inadequate faculty reward structures, excessive faculty workloads, and inequitable
funding formulas jeopardize the operation of quality teacher education programs
3. The teacher education program is a living example of multicultural education. The
power of informal teaching, or the "hid-den curriculum," is a recurrent theme in teacher
education. Both research and conventional wisdom validate the assertion that teachers
teach as they were taught. Frequently, graduates of teacher education programs mimic
or imitate the instructional and interactional styles of their teacher educators. If teacher
education students are to be taught with the conviction that multiculturalism is valuable
and necessary, diversity should be visibly evident in everything that symbolizes the
value orientations of the students' schools, colleges, and departments of education.
4. Admissions requirements to teacher education programs include multicultural as well
as academic criteria. Currently, students are admitted to teacher education programs
largely on the basis of grade point average and scores on tests of academic skills.
Because of the limited impact that formal teacher education programs can have on
attitudes, beliefs, and values developed over a lifetime, it is necessary to broaden and
enhance admissions criteria to also consider personal characteristics of candidates that
are related to their potential success in working with culturally diverse learners.
Examples of a faculty commitment to developing greater competence in multicultural
teacher education include regular participation in professional development
opportunities related to multicultural education, research and writing that addresses
and/or includes multicultural education, faculty involvement in the larger community in
multicultural contexts, and support for the recruitment of diverse faculty and students.
6. Multicultural perspectives permeate the entire teacher education curriculum, including
general education courses and those in academic subject matter areas. Evidence from
research and wisdom from best practice points out that in order for teacher education
students to both understand and implement a multicultural perspective in their classes
and during their field experiences, such a perspective should permeate the entire
curriculum of their teacher education programs including courses taken outside of their
schools, departments, and colleges of education.
7. The program fosters the understanding that teaching and learning occur in socio-
political contexts that are not neutral but are based on relations of power and privilege.
Educational policies are often based on the belief that the classroom and school
contexts pro-vide equal opportunities for all children. These policies imply those children
and their families simply take unequal advantage of the opportunities afforded them.
This belief is misguided and dangerous. It denies the reality that schools and class-
rooms themselves have cultures that can be more hospitable to some groups and
individuals than others. This principle contends that no social context is neutral. The
contexts of classroom, school, local community, and society are constantly negotiated
within preexisting and unequal relations of power and privilege. Race, ethnicity, gender,
and social class are closely related to the distribution of power and privilege in these
various contexts. In schools, these unequal power relations are manifested in some
groups and students being favored more than some others-often in subtle and
unintentional ways. An understanding of these unequal power relations can help
teachers overcome a "blame the victim" and a "cultural deficit" orientation toward
students and their families so that they can restructure schooling and classroom
processes to be more responsive to a culturally diverse student population.
8. The program is based on the assumption that all students in elementary and
secondary schools bring knowledge, skills, and experiences that should be used as
resources in teaching and learning, and that high expectations for learning are held for
all students. Research in cognitive science shows that learning is not the simple act of
accumulating new facts and skills, as is popularly believed. In order to move beyond
rote memorization to achieve understanding, students need to reorganize and re-
configure what they already know about a topic or concept. Students' prior knowledge
and experience, both personal and cultural, are critical resources for learning. Schools
and classrooms, however, generally are not organized to accommodate diversity in
students' background knowledge and experiences.
9. The program teaches prospective teachers how to learn about students, families, and
communities, and how to use knowledge of culturally diverse students' backgrounds in
planning, delivering, and evaluating instruction. Because teaching entails helping
students build bridges between what they already know and the new knowledge and
skills to be learned, it is essential that teachers be familiar with their students'
background knowledge and experiences, including their beliefs about topics relevant to
the curriculum. This familiarity with the students should not to be limited to their school
knowledge, however. To make the culture of the class-room inclusive of all students,
teachers must understand the way life is organized in the com-munities where the
children live.
10. The program helps prospective teachers reexamine their own and others' multiple
and inter-related identities. Every person has multiple identities that are formed through
a unique and complex intersection of race, ethnicity, social class, gender, language,
religion, sexual orientation, and ability. In order for prospective teachers to become
effective teachers in our multicultural society, they must first understand their own
identities as complex multidimensional people in a multicultural society
11. The program provides carefully planned and varied field experiences that explore
sociocultural diversity in schools and communities. School and community field
experiences in a variety of cultural settings that can provide all prospective teachers
with opportunities to develop greater intercultural teaching competence are important
components of multicultural teacher education. Under some conditions, however, these
experiences can serve to strengthen and reinforce the stereotypes and prejudices about
"others" that prospective teachers often bring to them.
12. The program helps prospective teachers develop the commitment to be change
agents who work to promote greater equity and social justice in schooling and society.
The goal of a multicultural teacher education program is to help prospective teachers
become change agents who can impact power relationships through curriculum,
instructional practices, and individual and collective action toward more just personal
and structural relationships in schools, districts, and communities.
13. The program teaches prospective teachers how to change power and privilege in
multicultural classrooms. "Example" is the most powerful conduit of meaning in
teaching. Therefore, the best way to teach how to redistribute power and privilege in
culturally pluralistic classrooms is for it to be demonstrated in teacher education
classrooms. Teacher educators should use their own classrooms as "laboratories" in
which they share the power and privilege of their position with their students. These are
symbolized by their claims to scholarly expertise, authority to make unilateral decisions
about what and how students will learn, opportunities provided for student participation
in classroom activities, and the right to evaluate students' performance. Each of these
can become a test case for the redistribution of power in the teacher education
classroom. The issue of exclusive expertise can be reconstructed by students and
instructors engaging in collaborative, cooperative, and partnership teaching and
learning.
14. The program draws upon and validates multiple types and sources of knowledge. A
broad approach to the utilization of the knowledge and expertise about schools and
communities that is held by many different stakeholders is employed in the program.
The knowledge of expert teachers, other school staff members, and members of the
local community and business sector is integrated into the teacher education program
along with the academic knowledge that is typically included in the teacher education
curriculum. Hiring community members and/or school staff as adjunct teacher education
program faculty is one example of how teacher education programs have accessed
practitioner knowledge.
9. MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION:BEYOND THE RETHORIC. Diane E.Newby, Karen L.Swift, Robert G.Newby.
Among the important issues now facing education is that of preparing all students to live
and work in a society that is changing dramatically - that is rapidly becoming more
diverse in its populations and more global in its scope. Critical thinkers, flexible
leadership, many concepts arise as a result of these new challenges. Demographers
predict that persons of color and women will comprise 80 percent of new entrants to the
labor force by the year 2020.
In author’s opinion it is becoming increasingly urgent that we help those populations to
acquire needed skills. At the same time, it is imperative a transformation of the total
curriculum in order to help all students acquire the knowledge, attitudes, and skills that
will improve the quality of life and social conditions for future generations. So it is
necessary to implement curricula that reduce prejudices, improve intergroup interaction,
and develop programs of an intercultural nature with a global perspective. In that our
students are members of an expanding pluralistic global society and that the fabric of
our society will become even more diverse in the future, we can no longer afford to be
provincial in our perspectives and approaches.
This approach involves organizing the school staff into small groups to promote collegial
interchange and action. Study groups provide a collaborative environment for teachers
possessing varying knowledge and skills. Self-regulating working teams is another
viable approach. It is grounded in a framework which emphasizes the leadership theory
that those closest to the point of implementation become involved in designing plans
and strategies that will move the organization closer to its vision and goals. The benefits
of self-regulating work teams are many. They involve educators at all levels of the
school organization. In addition, they emphasize outcomes while team members create
their own processes. Moreover, educators share numerous skills and have relative
autonomy along with adequate information to make decisions. These are just a few
approaches for designing and implementing a curriculum that is multicultural.
10. CONSTRUCTING THE MARGINS: OF MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION AND CURRICULUM SETTLEMENTS. Dennis L. Carlson
The author argued that multicultural education may be understood as emerging from,
and related to, broad-based settlements between dominant and oppositional power
blocs and social movements. As such it provides one of the primary terrains of struggle
over the cultural construction of identity and community. Particularly during the past two
decades of growing neoconservatism in U.S. politics and culture, the progressive and
democratic potential of multicultural education has been circumscribed or blocked. Even
in conservative times, however, multicultural education has provided an important space
for progressive work in schools, and its contradictions provide an important basis for
critiquing what is and visioning what could be. What directions is multicultural education
likely to take in the nineties? That, of course, depends on which social movements are
able to organize a power bloc and discourse on school reform that constructs a new
hegemonic "common sense." At this point, neoliberalism (constructed primarily around
elements of the business community, organized labor, the women's movement, the civil
rights movement, the gay and lesbian rights movement) does not appear to imply a
fundamental break with neoconservative educational policy, although it does provide
more room for maneuvering. Neoliberals also appear to be more receptive to extending
multicultural education in public schools to include some discussion of gay and lesbian
identity and rights. At the same time, the neoliberal power bloc is a very fragile one and
its discourse deeply contradictory. It is heavily driven by economic rationales and
agendas that privilege the interests and perspectives of multinational capitalism, yet it
does not wish to further alienate labor leadership and rank-and-file workers and it is
committed to extending the agendas of the new identity politics movements of gender,
race, and sexuality while at the same time not encouraging more backlash that plays
into the interests of New Right groups. As African Americans, Hispanics, and other
minorities have become more discontented with the lack of substantive progress made
in overcoming inequities and discriminatory practices over the past few decades, an era
of relative quiescence and political stability is giving way to an age of not only "talking
back" but "acting up. Within this volatile cultural and political context, democratic and
progressive forces will need to articulate a persuasive new commonsense discourse
that is consistent with the changing times in which we live. In conclusion it is of the
essence, for the author, a commitment to multicultural education as central to the
mission of public education and as integrated throughout the "core" curriculum. The
implication is that we view clashes of interests, beliefs, and values among students and
school staff as positive, in that they provide a mechanism for hearing all voices,
negotiating across difference, and staying responsive to the unique interests and
perspectives of all involved parties. A politics of difference also implies offering students
and parents more choice among schools, curriculum programs, and approaches to
instruction.
11. CONCLUSIONS. REFLECTIONS The American society is experimenting deep major changes in its culture. From its birth,
the nation sought a governmental system which was able to unite 13 colonies with
different interests and aspirations but, in essence, colonies that saw the union as the
only possible way to defeat the British power and survive afterwards.
The new American government inherited Anglo-Saxon tenets that, without a doubt,
were present in the redaction of the American Constitution: the organization in states,
counties, and towns, freedom, the three levels of power, and so forth.
The American Republic showed up as the haven for those ones who fought for
democracy and liberty. A new nation claiming for freedom in which the only merit was
the talent. The “American dream” was born.
The immigration was rampant during the first decades after its birth. As the number of
emigrants rose radically their adaptation was distressing and painful.
Initially the American society reacted to this phenomenon melting the different cultures,
customs, and even ethics in the so-called “American Pot”.
This attitude made a significant difference with Europe since the old continent was still
reluctant to house different cultures and traditions whereas the new American continent
commenced to favor the spirit of expansion.
During the last decades of the 20th century new waves of emigrants arrived in the
American shores from Latin America, the Caribbean area, Africa and Asia.
The 20th century was the era of telecommunications and eased the adjustment of these
emigrant generations to the society. The transformation of the world into a global
community was driving many people to the idea that merging cultures might not be the
final solution.
This new situation, with an ever-changing society dictating new rules to cohabit, has
provoked confusion. The American society has been boomed with many different
concepts such as multiculturalism, racism, and diversity in a little while. Time is required
to assimilate all these new tendencies.
The United States of America is an unique position to become the actual battlefield at
which a solution to this problem is found: how to unite a nation through its diversity?.
If we look up the concept multiculturalism into a dictionary we may conclude that
multiculturalism has more to do with “preservation of identities and cultures” than with
“melting”. Yet I do not think that the solution lies on the mere description of concepts but
further agreements.
First of all the solution of the dilemma requires to abandon extremes stances.
Second of all people need to know the history of the nation and spot and place the most
important historic events in a proper manner.
Some followers of the “melting pot” concept agree that “multiculturalism” poses a threat
to the stability of the American society. Other than refusing upon the pros of
multiculturalism, the supporters of such a stance deny that multiculturalism is attainable
from a modern society. It is simple a cause of unsteadiness and the effect for the
society would be to collapse after many years of stability.
On the other hand followers of multiculturalism consider that “melting pot” is a racist –
selfish concept.
The American nation, and this is unarguable, was founded by a white community with
European heritage. Tradition, culture and language, all them were mere consequences
of a fact: America was a European colony. Yet the necessity of manpower to shape the
American aspirations and the principle of freedom, bedrock of the American
Constitution, was going to shake the foundations of the nation.
The first problem was the African-American culture. Slaves were incorporated to the
American society without their consent. Once the American society decided to abolish
slavery, Afro-Americans called for a place in the society. Their role was obviously going
to change and they seek to have the same civil rights as the rest, their own
opportunities. A new age kicks off and not only recuperating their culture was
demanded but the study of others.
Whilst complaints were rampant, the economical development of the States attracted
other minorities whereas the boom of the industry and the GDP demanded more
manpower with low salaries.
Multiculturalism was trendy topic and not because American people wanted a debate. It
was a consequence of the desire of Americans to place their nation at the top of the
worldwide ranking.
America had the “pot”, that’s to say, the frame at which different incoming cultures could
merge away. The American Constitution, the American democracy provides the “pot”
whereas the respect to the law is the only requirement for new generations.
The fact that the States keeps the same political organization, language, constitution
and that individuals belonging to minorities have taking on important responsibilities in
the structure of the Nation, proves that the “pot” is not cracked.
Yet this is not the aim of the debate.
The debate is upon whether America is facing properly the emigration phenomenon or
is turning a blind eye.
Incomers represent an important source of manpower for those non-qualified jobs at low
cost. This situation results in different lobbies defending extreme positions. Out of their
demands education is the most important. If we think carefully it makes sense. They
want for their kids what they couldn’t get.
Aside from the language, which is the basic element of the “pot”, both positions had had
trouble understanding each other.
Conservative stance envisions the multiculturalism as a strike against the American
values, its foundations. A more liberal position defends the right of anyone else to
preserve the culture and identity, even above the unity.
The American educational system has been the spearhead of multiculturalism.
Supportive positions saw the necessity to change a society starting by the roots and
realized that if education was the bedrock of a modern society it would be the first battle
to fight.
Either curriculums or new staff became a proof of the American commitment to make a
solid and truly change in the mentality of the citizens.
The US Army, especially West Point, have experimented this change. Either this
change is a mere pipe dream or a reality in the American educational system, the Army
tried to anticipate any problem which may disturb the coexistence of different cultures
and identities.
The fact that the Army is supposed to set an example as an organization before the
citizens played a factor, as well, pushed the Army further. The goal was for the Army not
to let down those who put their trust upon its. Sexual harassment, drug or alcohol
abuse, or racial discrimination began to obsess the military brass, sometimes with a
lack of guidelines or intent.
West Point has implemented many changes in the curricula during these last decades
in order to be part of this collective effort.
The learning of foreign languages, numerous activities abroad, increasing number of
foreign teachers either civilians or militaries, and the increase in the total number of
cadets from minorities are examples of this change of mentality.
In my opinion, however, we cannot expect that the Army is a valid example of “melting
pot”. The Army is out of the debate.
Traditionally the Army has rallied people with different heritage, culture and even
language. From mercenaries through aristocrats the Army has been able to unite
soldiers and officers under a unique law. Within the Army, the “pot” now is not actually
the language but the creed, a moral code. Values as pride, honor, loyalty, discipline and
so forth are internationally recognized and applicable in any circumstance.
Can we expect the Army to allow external cultural signs in its soldiers? Do the Army
have to fuel the “melting-away “cultural process?
The learning of a language per se doesn’t guarantee the cultural understanding.
Culture is a broader concept which encompasses the language, not the other way
around. Without a doubt, the language is the first visible barrier to get over with. Yet the
history, religion and traditions usually provide more keys to really understand the
mentality of a nation.
The activities abroad are useful tools. They let students without any previous
experience to break the ice. The immediate consequence is for them to gain insight into
the worldwide reality and acknowledge the importance of interacting with different
cultures. Their age, skills and background eases this process of adaptation to
international exposure.
The participation of foreign personnel in the Academy staff is, for certain, quite positive.
Foreign teachers, fully aware of the current status of the multiculturalism in the States,
can carry out an essential task. Not everybody is ready to fully understand the
weaknesses and strengths of this society and, similarly, those ones existing in their
Nation.
The mere comparison between both is a useful tool to be used when applying any
teaching method. The exposure to these teachers will help our cadets to understand the
reality of the world they live in and their limitations.
The increase in the number of cadets belonging to minorities is the consequence of the
guidelines coming from the higher. Obviously the Army cannot deny this evidence and
must come along hand in hand with the society it must protect to with some limits.
The American society is a reference but only provides a frame. Its courses of action with
regards to multicultural approaches are valid insofar as they provide references. Yet the
Army might take different directions.
Diversity is going to enrich an Army whilst this diversity widely accepts common rules
under the same law. Taking for granted the equality of opportunities, minorities are
included in a pre-arrange organization whose foundation and tradition can be modified
to a certain extent.
Minorities cannot expect the Army to respect their cultures above its regulations and
operational requirements.
Denying the influence of the phenomenon of multiculturalism would be a terrible mistake
though.
It is a fact that we need to “control” the changes in the organization to “host” these new
groups of our society reducing collateral damages on our operability. Nevertheless to
refuse to modify our model of leadership would be catastrophic.
Leaders, critical thinkers, must face realities when those ones are unavoidable.
Coalition forces in order to gain legitimacy and minorities co-existing in the American
Army are pure realities, plain and simple.
In conclusion I would say hence that the multiculturalism model in the Army has to be by
definition “Melting Pot”.
If we go through the Army values we will conclude that this is evident:
• Loyalty. Bear true faith and allegiance to the U.S. Constitution, the Army,
your unit and other Soldiers. Bearing true faith and allegiance is a matter of
believing in and devoting yourself to something or someone.
• Duty. Fulfill your obligations. Doing your duty means more than carrying
out your assigned tasks. Duty means being able to accomplish tasks as part of a
team.
• Respect. Treat people as they should be treated. In the Soldier’s Code,
we pledge to “treat others with dignity and respect while expecting others to do
the same.”
• Selfless Service. Put the welfare of the Nation, the Army and your
subordinates before your own. Selfless service is larger than just one person. In
serving your country, you are doing your duty loyally without thought of
recognition or gain.
• Honor. Live up to Army values. Honor is a matter of carrying out, acting,
and living the values of respect, duty, loyalty, selfless service, integrity and
personal courage in everything you do.
• Integrity. Do what’s right, legally and morally. Integrity is a quality you
develop by adhering to moral principles. It requires that you do and say nothing
that deceives others.
• Personal Courage. Face fear, danger or adversity (physical or moral).
Personal courage has long been associated with our Army. With physical
courage, it is a matter of enduring physical duress and at times risking personal
safety.
The respect, integration and even integrity of new cultures are implicit in these values.
Nevertheless going further, trying to modify our standards, when these standards were
set up according to operational requirements, might be a non-return mistake.
The excuse that these requirements are coming from the society is not always an
excuse.
The Army makes a place for itself between the radical multiculturalism and the “melting
pot”. The necessity to change mentalities is widely accepted among their members.
Either dealing with civil rights or multiculturalism Army members are in good disposition
to be educated and keep the educating process going.
The Army effort whether it is effective or not is provoking a positive predisposition. This
predisposition, sooner or later, is going to be decisive in the quest of a multicultural
Army which is cohesive and efficient.
Is the Army going to keep a model of integration different from that of the society?
This is actually the dilemma.
Politicians and many lobbies may push the Army to make decisions in a different
direction because traditionally the politic level finds easier to push the subordinated
military brass than other sectors of the society.
I don’t envision not only this Army but any Army else getting off scot-free.
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