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America has long been called "The Melting Pot" due to the fact that it is made up of a varied mix of races, cultures, and ethnicities. As more and more immigrants come to America searching for a better life, the population naturally becomes more diverse. This has, in turn, spun a great debate over multiculturalism. Some of the issues under fire are who is benefiting from the education, and how to present the material in a way so as to offend the least amount of people. There are many variations on these themes as will be In the 1930's several educators called for programs of cultural diversity that encouraged ethnic and minority students to study their respective heritages. This is not a simple feat due to the fact that there is much diversity within individual cultures. A look at a 1990 census shows that the American population has changed more noticeably in the last ten years than in any other time in the twentieth century, with one out of every four Americans identifying themselves as black, Hispanic, Asian, Pacific Islander, or American Indian (Gould 198). The number of foreign born residents
In Paul Gannon's article Balancing Multicultural and Civic Education will Take More Than Social Stew, he brings up an interesting point that "Education in the origins, evolution, advances and defeats of democracy must, by its nature, be heavily Western and also demand great attention to political history (Gannon 8). With just a basic understanding of other cultures, and most importantly, the tools and background to think critically and make our own decisions not based on color, sex, religion, or national origin, but on information that we were able to accurately attain through the critical thinking skills we were taught in school, we would be better equipped to work at achieving harmony in a varied racial country. Another way to look at the issue is that most non-Western cultures have few achievements equal to Western culture either in the past or present (Duignan 492). In 1987, the faculty voted 39 to 4 to change the curriculum and do away with the fifteen book requirement and the term "Western" for the study of at least one non-European culture and proper attention to be given to the issues of race and gender (Gould 199). --- Works Cited Banks, James A. For instance, try to imagine a Turkish leader in Germany, or anyone but a Japanese in control of Japan (Cleveland 26). We are all equal owners of the earth, none of us are more entitled than others to share in its many wealths or misfortunes. By 1987, a group called the Rainbow Coalition argued the fact that the books were all written by DWEM's or Dead White European Males. Third, the curriculum must strive to be informed by the most up to date scholarship. This newly acquired vocabulary formed a common bond among the children in their early years, an appropriate time for learning respect and understanding (Pyszkowski 154). Another exciting idea is to put children in the setting of the culture they are learning about. Ask students how they feel about each other and why. While a teacher can be a great help in providing information about other cultures, by the same note, that information can be just as harmful if it is incomplete. Homosexuality is punished severely in other lands, while we have grown to realize that it is part of the genetic makeup of many people and they cannot control it.
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Acceptance Essays
