« Does it have to be my decision? | Main | Can educational institutions be all things to all people? »

Tensions and Harmonies

Given the potential of experience to contribute to shaping a sense of ethnic
identity, school experiences that involve conflicting messages around the
value of curriculum events may further complicate the students’ developing
stories to live by. They may place them in a difficult position at the nexus of
differing and sometimes conflicting stories to live by, and contribute to shaping
their sense of ethnic identity. The curriculum may be perceived as the
intersection of school narratives and histories that differ significantly for
students, teachers, and parents. (pg 185)


My first teaching assignment was at Paschal High in Ft. Worth, Texas. It was a large 5A inner-city high school and at the eager-age of 22 I was the varsity girls soccer coach and one of several freshman honors English and 11th grade ESL English teachers. I was one of 115 faculty that year and, unlike the middle school in Chan's article, our curriculum and culture was far from celebratory of diversity. In many ways, we were a cross between crowd control and prison guards. My honors English class (and my soccer team) were largely white students and my ESL classes were multi-racial - to say the least! I had Cambodians, Bosnians, Croatians, Latinos, Vietnamese, Africans, and Chinese. The tension was so thick between many of the cultures represented that by fall break no student was allowed to wear shoe laces to school (I'm not kidding!) because of the gang activity and the various colors displayed. Looking back, I tried everything I knew to do to create an open and accepting environment. Yet, the tension still existed. Perhaps it was something deeper, like the poverty and disappointment in the American dream that perpetuated the tension rather then the school systems blundering, albeit kind-hearted, attempt to understand the significance of our students narratives.

While I agree that curriculum can worsen the immigrant struggle to assimilate while trying to remain faithful to their culture of origin, I’m not sure how curriculum can make the tension any more harmonious, especially between parents and their Americanized children. For my husband and his family (immigrants from Venezuela), the acknowledgment that the tension would always exist was part of the difficult decision to leave one culture and join another. In fact, for them, and many others like them, there was a genuine desire to embrace the idea of being an American.

Tension exists in the form of angst for all of us. We give it different names and different reasons. We color it or put a price tag on it or even say it is the wrong gender. Angst is human. Maybe a celebration of angst and awkwardness during middle school would be most fitting.

Danielle

TrackBack

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://blogs.rcoe.appstate.edu/admin/mt-tb.cgi/4786

Comments (2)

Alan:

Very good point about becoming "Americanized." I wonder if it is possible to be a part of two cultures (or more). My father was always taught to speak German in the home and English outside the home. I know that I'm part of many different cultures relating to my ethnic heritage, religious beliefs, gender, sexual orientation, career, education level etc. I guess the experiment that is the U.S. will either succeed or fail based on our ability to either choose between cultures or learn to integrate cultures.

marisa:

I love your perspective Danielle -- you can always cut through all the fluff and get to the bottom line, or in this case, common ground.

Alan, how did you develop an awareness of belonging in all your different cultures? Did any of them conflict or feel marginalized? I'm asking because I wonder how we might help students through this very same process -- towards being identity-comfortable.

Post a comment

About

This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on June 15, 2009 10:58 AM.

The previous post in this blog was Does it have to be my decision?.

The next post in this blog is Can educational institutions be all things to all people?.

Many more can be found on the main index page or by looking through the archives.

Powered by
Movable Type 3.35