Multiculturalism

The schools I attended from primary through to secondary education comprised of many diverse students from a wide range of cultural backgrounds. I was exposed to cultural diversity in my early childhood years and as a result of this I never viewed those of another cultural background or view other than myself as someone different. As mentioned by Dutton, Singer and Devlin (2001) they quote that “children in the integrated schools are more accepting of other races” in comparison to those in the non-integrated schools.  Different geographical areas have different diversities of cultures. Cultural acceptance can be dependent upon the area in which you grew up in and this allows you to mix amongst the community and form tolerable and accepting attitudes.

Exposure to culture at an early age can be imperative, as at this time in a child’s life it is here where opinions and views are shaped and formed. Schooling is a vital stepping-stone along the way to creating one’s identity through knowledge and interaction with other students with different cultures and backgrounds.

I am a white anglo saxon student, which in society was stereotypically viewed as being the privileged majority. When I first started school, my school was somewhat multicultural. I did not see myself as being different or any better than anyone else. This never affected the way in which I viewed or saw other people. My first and best friend at school was darked skinned, had curly dark hair and spoke with an accent.   When I started school I thought that everyone was the same and I viewed everyone at school as normal, the same as me.  Discrimination was not present at my school, or I was not aware or subjected to any type of discrimination.  I think my early interaction with multiculturalism and positive role models attributed to my growing up experiences without multicultural discrimination.  I cannot recall any discrimination amongst any of my friends or peers.

When I was in first year, the school had a compulsory activity; Multicultural Week.  All students were to bring in foods from their traditional backgrounds and students in each class would taste and experience these different cuisines from their friend’s cultural background.  It was an exciting week, as everyone had the experience to taste all different types of foods some that had never been seen or tasted before.  Another experience with this activity was that you could also dress up in outfits or costumes that were traditional of your background. According to Okoye-Johnson (2011) multiculturalism should be incorporated into the school curriculum, where learning of cultural diversity will captivate and pride those of there own identity, meeting all cultural backgrounds. I can remember all this focus on this one week of multiculturalism, which was a great idea to open student’s views and opinions of diversity amongst the school. However this should have carried on and further been incorporated into the overall curriculum rather than being highlighted all in one week. It would have been a more effective approach to have this cultural learning throughout the overall curriculum during the course of the year.

During this week, it was also compulsory for every student in the school to write a speech about ‘What is Multiculturalism?’  I can remember bringing home this assignment and questioning my Mother as to what does Multiculturalism mean? I can also remember there being a meeting at the school with all the parents about this subject.  The majority of the parents were not in favour of this task as they felt that because the school was multicultural in itself and that their children did not see the school’s diversity of different backgrounds as anything but normal, that it was not necessary to have the children write a speech about multiculturalism as this would only draw attention to multicultural backgrounds and other’s differences.  The children at the school had integrated with no problems and this was only going to question and raise the differences between each other. 

In regards to multiculturalism, I viewed this as the norm and it was part of my life.  Growing up as an anglo saxon student did not expose me to any direct concerns with multiculturalism.  Exposure to multiculturalism at an early age forms opinions and identities and evidently everyone is equal.

 

References

Dutton, S., Singer, J., & Devlin., A. (2001). Racial Identity of Children in Integrated, Predominately White, and Black Schools, The Journal of Social Psychology, 138 (1), p. 50.

Okoye-Johnson, O. (2011). Does Multicultural Education Improve Students’ Racial Attitudes? Implications for Closing the Achievement Gap, Journal of Black Studies, 42 (8), p. 1259.