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 BeyondLabels :: Multiculturalism, Education & Technology
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Weblog | 51 entries | 23-April-2007 | 2 authors |
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Advancing the Converstion...
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Blog Entry | 0 replies6.80 Kb | 01-August-2006 | Aishah Sabki |
Examining the connection between Identity Construction and the understanding of Multicultural Education----
Multicultural Perspectives, 3(2), 3-7
This article by Jana Noel (California State university, Sacramento) examines the idea that students construction of identity can be linked to their understandings of multicultural education. This article was written from the prespective of the teacher/educators in the sense that they need to have a good understanding of why our students have such a wide range of definitions of multicultural education. This article ties in really well with my PhD in the sense that, one of my dimension is looking at the identity implication form the learner perspective as well as teacher's perspective. There are not as many discussion around in terms of teacher's identity compared to learners's identity. Jana discussed how she found out for the first time from her 'student teacher' ......" I don't need to take Multicultural Education, because I'am in Agricultural and we feed the world". Such perception about multicultural eduation is and if it is part of the 'student teacher' thinking has made Jana more determined to gain a better understanding of why her students have such a different understanding of multicultural eduation. Extended text for this entry:To gain this understanding, identity construction plays an important part as how these student teachers perceive themselves and how they have made multicultural education concepts as part of their identities and whether they have include the importance of the field of multicultural education. One of the purposes of this article by Jana is to examine how the development of one's identity relates to one's beliefs about, understanding of, and practice of multicultural eduation. Hence this article is splited into two section, the research and literature on identity development and secondly how teachers perceive the field multicultural education. Sleeter (1992) discussed how some teachers ignore the importance of multicultural education or unable to see the relevance of it in from the perspective of teacher. These unexamined identity is usually when teacher try to ignore the races in the students in the classes and claimed that all the students are the same or colourblind. This behaviour of teacher was classified by D'Andreas and Daniels (1990) as falling into the "culturally entrenched stage". These type of teacher basically unaware of the culturally contrasting worldview point and are usually denying that race or ethinicity play any part int he development of the child. Table 2. How Identity Construction Affects the Understanding of Multicultural Education
In "search for Identity" (second column), many people at some point in their lives search to understand their cultural or ethinic identity and this is very true for myself. For some people this may be called an "encounter" which makes that person thinking about his/her ethinic identity for the "first time". For some people however this search for identity is part of their lives which sometimes can cause very much confusion. This identity constructionis "blaming the victim" or scapgoating other group which we can see a lot these days. If students posses such belief, teaches should help the students to see their own identity in a more realistic way. Sometimes a person will take part in identity construction but only in relation to his/her perception of the worth of other groups (Jana, 2001). This will fall under the category of "Construction of Identity Based on Devaluation of Others". This means that the person is totally immerse in his/her own culture and distancing him/her self for other cultures. This way is easier to devalue people from other culture from oneself. Banks(1994) called this stage "Ethinic Encapsulation" "Clarified identity" is when a person is able to explain and clarify his/her own identity and what makes up that identity. The person should be comforable with his/her own identity. The teachers who fall under this category will be able to include "human relation" in the classrooms and the teacher will have as part of their goals for their students the ability to respect, appreciate,and understand each other (Sleeter 1992). The teachers will feel very confident and comfortable dicsussing issues in terms of culture, race, colour and will project a positive feelings to the students. Once the person has a clarified identity, he/she will be more comfortable and wish to "expand sense of identity" by getting involve more deeper into one's culture and identity. The persons in this category will learn to look beyond what is close and seeing the bigger picture and hence help the understanding of the multicultural education on a different level. Lastly, following from Clarified Identity, one can then able to recognize or address "social change" whether in the community or group and the desire to change the world and make it a better palce for diversity and balance of ethinicity for all. The person usually try to liberate people that have been oppressed or marginilized and challenge and change the racist attitude around him/her. However apporach you have taken, the process of identity construction a complex issues and can involve many complex stages but one thing for sure is that we as educators should recognize and represent this understanding for our students at different levels in our teaching. |
