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Television in the late 1980s has offered even the occasional viewer an almost dizzying picture of other peoples and other cultures, thanks in part to the rapid technological advancement of satellite communication systems. At the same time, a just-reported survey of the most widely assigned literary works in high schools, conducted by the Center for the Learning and Teaching of Literature at the State University of New York at Albany, found that the high school canon changed very little between 1963 (the year of the last similar survey) and 1989. High school students still read the same classic novels and plays that were read 25 years ago, even in schools with large minority populations. (USA Today)
Without arguing the relative merits of classic versus popular or traditional versus ethnic literature--points of disagreement even among educators and literary specialists--this digest will review the resources available in the ERIC database for teachers and administrators who wish to offer their students varied literary and cultural experiences.
One teacher has expressed her rationale in the following manner: "If teachers are to help children become more humane, they need to help boys and girls appreciate the dignity and beauty of other ethnic groups who are different than they." (Carlson, 1971) She continues in the same vein: "A child who is one of a minority group suffers from some form of 'triple loneliness'--a feeling that his or her cultural heritage is being trampled upon, that this heritage is being denied, and that a particular language dialect is being frowned upon by teachers who lack an understanding of his or her ethnic identity."
Ranta (1978) has developed material for a comprehensive course on American literature for boys and girls in grades K-8 that is based on the concept of the United States as a pluralistic society. It can be easily adapted for use as a unit within the typical established course on literature for children required of preservice teachers in many institutions teaching elementary education. An extensive booklist forms the basis of the course, with sections on the American Black, the American Indian, the Puerto Ricans on the mainland, the Chicanos, the Jewish-Americans, and the Oriental-Americans. Sample assignments are also included.
Sims (1982) focuses on literature about American Blacks. In her monograph, Shadow and Substance: Afro-American Experience in Contemporary Children's Fiction, she provides teachers, librarians, and teacher-educators in the field of children's literature with information that will enable them to make informed selections of books for and about American Blacks. She includes books for young people from preschool through eighth grade, and she bases her selections on a survey and analysis of 150 books of contemporary realistic fiction about Blacks published between 1965 and 1979.
Appropriate for use with both high school and college students, a special issue of the Illinois English Bulletin (Matthews, 1982) offers suggestions for teaching multiethnic literature. Black, Jewish-American, Chinese-American, and Native-American literature are some of the topics discussed. The article on Native-American literature outlines steps for the study of poetry by a class group (four students): 1) review principles of poetry: Method (arrangement, shape, and order), Matter (what the poem says), and Manner (mood and idea); 2) locate several collections of contemporary Native-American poetry to review; 3) draw up a list of questions to ask particular poets if one could be chosen for a personal interview; 4) select one poet to investigate in depth; 5) select several traditional Native-American poems for review, and share the findings with the rest of the class in oral interpretations of the poems; and 6) write a short paper analyzing the use of nature as a theme in contemporary Native-American poetry. Post-reading activities include panel discussions and an evaluation of the image versus the reality of the Native American (Sasse, 1982).
Bunker and Kalivoda (1975) believe that studying the culture embedded within a literary work can serve to bring into better focus the aesthetic qualities of the work by providing a fuller appreciation of the author's artistry and skill in portraying people, things, and events within the framework of any number of cultural themes.
The concept of culture can also be broken down into smaller components if a teacher feels that studying the entire culture of America or even of an individual ethnic group is too daunting a prospect. Erisman (1979) has developed a unit on western regionalism and awareness of place, while Brennan (1981) has developed a similar unit on Appalachian literature and culture for use with high school students.
Brennan's unit on Harriet Arnow's novel The Dollmaker takes 10 weeks to complete. The first week the teacher presents background on the geography, flora, fauna, history, and language of the region. After that comes the study of the novel, a film on strip mining, daily class discussion and occasional quizzes. During the final three weeks, students prepare and present demonstrations on one of the arts and crafts indigenous to the Appalachian region. Lesson plans are provided with the unit, as are selected bibliographies of resources, films, poetry, prose, folklore, drama, music and dance, arts and crafts, and regional background materials.
To appeal to a student body that contained individuals mostly following business and technical courses, one community college restructured its sophomore American literature program to focus on concepts and themes rather than on chronology or on literary movements (Dziech, 1979). This change placed a much greater emphasis on the cultural aspects of the material and was easier for non-literature majors to follow.
For example, American Lit I--a study of the principal authors of early American literature, and American Lit II--a study of the principal authors of later American literature, were revised into 1) Strangers in a Strange Land: The American Ethnic Experience--literary approaches to the experiences of selected ethnic groups; 2) Culture and Counter-Culture: American Lifestyles--literary approaches to various American environments (e.g., frontier, rural, urban, communal); 3) Divinity: Affirmation and Denial--selected readings reflecting American authors' views of the existence and nature of God; 4) Utopia: The American Dream of Perfectibility--selected readings illustrating the hope for a perfect society; 5) Conformity/Non-Conformity: The Individual versus Society--an examination of the American struggle to define freedom and responsibility; and 6) The Paradox of Material Success: The Luxury of Integrity--literary approaches to the issues of wealth and poverty in America.
The general theme of multi-ethnic literature can be simple: diversity. The study of diversity of cultures offers schools a richer potential than does uniformity or monoculture. As Patterson (1982) explains, the role of the teacher in multi-ethnic literature is not to praise one culture over another, but to accept and develop each child as a unique individual, because of and apart from his or her culture.
REFERENCES
Brennan, Joan H. "Appalachian literature and culture: A
teaching unit for high school students," 1981. 43pp. [ED 209 048] Brooks, Charlotte K., et al. (Eds.) Tapping Potential:
English and Language Arts for the Black Learner. Urbana, Illinois:
National Council of Teachers of English, 1985. 334 pp. [ED 252 886] Bunker, Duane F., and Kolivoda, Theodore B. "Analyzing
culture in Spanish literature." Studies in Language Education, No.
19, Georgia University Department of Language Education, 1975. 22
pp. [ED 122 627] Carlson, Ruth Kearney. "To humanize people or to make the
hearts strong." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the
International Reading Association, 1971. 23 pp. [ED 053 874] Dziech, Billie. "The role of the humanities in vocational
and technological programs." Paper presented at the 59th Annual
Convention of the American Association of Community and Junior
Colleges, 1979. 11 pp. [ED 175 506] Erisman, Fred. "Western regionalism and awareness of
place." Paper presented at the 69th Annual Meeting of the National
Council of Teachers of English, 1979. 14 pp. [ED 178 921] Matthews, Dorothy (Ed.) "Multi-ethnic literature: Help
for the English teacher. Tips on selecting and teaching works by:
Jewish Americans, Chinese Americans, Native Americans, and Black
Americans," Illinois English Bulletin, 69 (3) 1982, 58 pp. [ED 213
043] Patterson, Lucille J. "The role of the teacher in
multi-ethnic literature." In Dorothy Matthews (Ed.) Multi-Ethnic
Literature: Help for the English Teacher. Tips on Selecting and
Teaching Works by: Jewish Americans, Chinese Americans, Native
Americans, and Black Americans, pp. 46-54. Illinois English
Bulletin, 69 (3), 1982. 58 pp. [ED 213 043] Ranta, Taimi M. "Literature for children and young people
in a pluralistic, multicultural society." Illinois State
University, 1978. 57 pp. [ED 163 473] Sasse, Mary. "Teaching Native American literature: Some
problems and some solutions." In Dorothy Matthews (Ed.)
Multi-Ethnic Literature: Help for the English Teacher. Tips on
Selecting and Teaching Works by: Jewish Americans, Chinese
Americans, Native Americans, and Black Americans, pp. 15-36.
Illinois English Bulletin, 69 (3), 1982. 58 pp. [ED 213 043] Sims, Rudine. Shadow and Substance: Afro-American
Experience in Contemporary Children's Fiction. Urbana, Illinois:
National Council of Teachers of English, 1982. 116 pp. [ED 215 369] Stoddard, Ann H. "Teaching worldmindedness through
children's literature." Paper presented at the 21st Annual Meeting
of the Florida Reading Association, 1983. 11 pp. [ED 243 152] USA Today, May 31, 1989. ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading and Communication Skills Indiana University 2805 East Tenth Street, Suite 150 Bloomington, IN 47408
This publication was prepared with funding from the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education, under contract no. RI88062001. Contractors undertaking such projects under government sponsorship are encouraged to express freely their judgment in professional and technical matters. Points of view or opinions, however, do not necessarily represent the official view or opinions of the Office of Educational Research and Improvement.
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